subterfuge

subterfuge
    n 1: something intended to misrepresent the true nature of an
         activity; "he wasn't sick--it was just a subterfuge"; "the
         holding company was just a blind" [syn: {subterfuge},
         {blind}]
    

Subterfuge \Sub"ter*fuge\, n. [F., from LL. subterfugium, fr. L.
   subterfugere to flee secretly, to escape; subter under +
   fugere to flee. See {Fugitive}.]
   That to which one resorts for escape or concealment; an
   artifice employed to escape censure or the force of an
   argument, or to justify opinions or conduct; a shift; an
   evasion.
   [1913 Webster]

         Affect not little shifts and subterfuges, to avoid the
         force of an argument.                    --I. Watts.
   [1913 Webster]

         By a miserable subterfuge, they hope to render this
         position safe by rendering it nugatory.  --Burke.
   [1913 Webster]
    

203 Moby Thesaurus words for "subterfuge":
      airtight secrecy, alibi, apology, art, artful dodge, artifice,
      bag of tricks, bamboozlement, befooling, bickering, blind, bluff,
      bluffing, boggling, bosey, burial, burying, calculated deception,
      captiousness, catch, caviling, cheat, chicane, chicanery, chouse,
      circumvention, cloak, close secrecy, closeness, clouding, color,
      concealedness, concealment, conning, conspiracy, contrivance, coup,
      cover, cover story, cover-up, covering, covering up, covertness,
      craft, crypticness, curve, curve-ball, cute trick, darkening,
      deceit, deceiving, deception, deceptiveness, defrauding, delusion,
      delusiveness, design, device, dirty deal, dirty trick,
      discreetness, discretion, dishonesty, dodge, dodging,
      double-dealing, dupery, enmeshment, ensnarement, entanglement,
      entrapment, equivocation, evasion, evasiveness, excuse, expedient,
      facade, fakement, fallaciousness, fallacy, falseness, fast deal,
      feint, fencing, fetch, ficelle, flimflam, flimflammery,
      fond illusion, fooling, fraud, front, gambit, game, gimmick, gloss,
      googly, grift, guise, hairsplitting, hallucination, handle,
      hedging, hiddenness, hiding, hocus-pocus, hoodwinking,
      hugger-mugger, hugger-muggery, illusion, interment, intrigue,
      invisibility, joker, juggle, jugglery, kidding, knavery,
      lame excuse, little game, locus standi, logic-chopping, maneuver,
      mask, masking, mirage, move, mystification, nit-picking,
      obscuration, obscurement, occultation, ostensible motive,
      outwitting, overreaching, paltering, parrying, pass, pettifoggery,
      phantasm, plot, ploy, poor excuse, pretense, pretension, pretext,
      prevarication, protestation, public motive, pussyfooting, put-off,
      putting away, putting on, quibbling, racket, red herring, refuge,
      ruse, scheme, screen, screening, scurvy trick, secrecy, secretion,
      secretiveness, secretness, self-deception, semblance, sham, shift,
      shifting, show, shuffling, sidestepping, sleight, sleight of hand,
      sleight-of-hand trick, smoke screen, snow job, song and dance,
      spoofery, spoofing, stalking-horse, stratagem, strategy, swindling,
      tactic, tergiversation, the dark, trichoschistism, trick, trickery,
      trickiness, tricking, uncommunicativeness, varnish, veil,
      victimization, vision, wile, willful misconception, wily device,
      wishful thinking