What does "draw a line" mean?

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Context

BEIJING—Xi Jinping, the man expected to take over China's top post in the fall, made a public appeal for "purity" among Communist Party leaders as the country's leadership sought to draw a line under a scandal that felled one of its senior members this week.

In an essay published Friday, Vice President Xi didn't refer directly to Bo Xilai, who was dismissed as party chief of the mega-city of Chongqing on Thursday over a political scandal that erupted when his former police chief spent a night in a U.S. consulate in China last month.

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Type: Question • Score: 6 • Views: 3,610 • Replies: 28

View best answer, chosen by oristarA

@oristarA,

It means to move on, it's an attempt at closure, although this is not always successful. Basically Xi is talking about something else, and looking to the future.

1 Reply

@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

It means to move on, it's an attempt at closure, although this is not always successful. Basically Xi is talking about something else, and looking to the future.

Thank you.
Does "one of its senior members" refer to Bo Xilai?

2 Replies

@oristarA,

yes. Bo Xilai.
~~

I'd like to know what the people on the street are saying about this.

Joe(maybe I'll start a thread to discuss it elsewhere on A2K)Nation

0 Replies

Ori - is this a translation?.

It is such odd wording.

"leadership sought to draw a line under a scandal that felled one of its senior members this week"

Perhaps the meaning is to underscore = emphasise
or undermine = weaken

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@oristarA,

Yes.

0 Replies

@PUNKEY,

It doesn't seem strange to me, maybe the phrase 'draw a line under,' isn't used in American English, but it's fairly common parlance over here.

Quote:

draw a line under something
if you draw a line under something, it is finished and you do not think about it again Let's draw a line under the whole episode and try to continue our work in a more positive frame of mind.

http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/draw+a+line+under

1 Reply

@izzythepush,

I bet the item comes from a British source so Izzy's got it right.

We are separated by our common language.
Joe(pip, pip, ta ta, cheerio)Nation

0 Replies

@PUNKEY,

PUNKEY wrote:

Ori - is this a translation?.

It is such odd wording.

"leadership sought to draw a line under a scandal that felled one of its senior members this week"

Perhaps the meaning is to underscore = emphasise
or undermine = weaken

It is from today's headline of WallStreetJournal:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304459804577284674241443342.html?mod=WSJAsia_hpp_LEFTTopStories

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@oristarA,

Still it's a British usage of the phrase meaning to 'try to put a stop' to the scandal.
Think of the line drawn under an arithmetic problem, "nothing to be added on here."

267
456
145
_______

Joe(we don't use it in the USA, despite its appearance in the WSG.)Nation

PS: Maybe an refugee writer/editor from The (dead) News of the World.

Another instance:
It comes after a Feb. 2 ruling by India's Supreme Court annulling 122 licences obtained by nine companies in the controversial 2008 awards.

The court ruling and new policy in the world's fastest growing telecoms market is an attempt to draw a line under a scandal with its themes of government corruption, lack of transparency and opaque regulations that in the view of many analysts has tainted India's entire standing as an investment destination.

Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/India+attempts+clean+long+running+telecoms+scandal/6179406/story.html#ixzz1pIKEEfOA<br />

2 Replies

@Joe Nation,

We don't use pip pip, ta ta or cheerio over here, honest.

1 Reply

@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

We don't use pip pip, ta ta or cheerio over here, honest.

I've failed to get "pip pip, ta ta". Embarrassed

1 Reply

@oristarA,

They're 19th Century terms for Goodbye.

0 Replies

I'm sorry about the 'pip, pip, cheerio'.
I can be confusing at times.

I'll try to keep to the current jargon.

Joe( Cool

)Nation

1 Reply

@Joe Nation,

That's ok mate, I can get a mite sensitive when your countrymen try to be British, but end up sounding Dickensian. Governor is another word that nobody, (with the possible exception of police officers talking about their superiors,) ever uses.

0 Replies

@oristarA,

oristarA wrote:

Context

BEIJING—Xi Jinping, the man expected to take over China's top post in the fall, made a public appeal for "purity" among Communist Party leaders as the country's leadership sought to draw a line under a scandal that felled one of its senior members this week.

Just a minor addition, but if they had said "underline" instead of "draw a line under", it would have sounded much more natural to an American.

2 Replies

@roger,

And it would have sounded unnatural over here.

0 Replies

@roger,

Isn't underlining usually used to draw attention to something?

Drawing a line under something (here in central Canada) means that you're marking the end of something. The example of coming to the end of a set of numbers to be added up putting a line under the last number is how I've heard it explained.

1 Reply

@oristarA,

sooooooo, in the original example

oristarA wrote:

the country's leadership sought to draw a line under a scandal that felled one of its senior members this week.

to draw a line under the scandal would mean that the government is trying to end discussion of the matter. It's over. It's done.

~~~

Underlining (to me) would mean that the government is attempting to draw attention to the scandal.

Unlikely, eh.

1 Reply

@ehBeth,

Underlining something, and drawing a line under something have the same meaning, so far as I know. My point was that 'draw a line' by itself is usually used in the sense of drawing a line in the sand, or maybe establishing a deadline. In otherwords, establishing a line that can't be crossed. When I first saw the words draw a line (under) something, I was momentarily diverted from the actual meaning. My mind sometimes goes in odd directions. I should really save it for something important.

We also use the underline to mark the end of a column of numbers, as you know. Put all the revenues in a column and underline the last number. Do the same with expenses. When you find the difference, double underline the net income or loss. All done. Finished.

2 Replies

What does "draw a line" mean?

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