dog and pony show

• dog-and-pony show

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dog and pony show (plural dog and pony shows)

1. (historical) A small traveling circus featuring animals as entertainment.
2. (idiomatic) Any presentation or display that is overly contrived or intricate, while lacking real substance.

   They put on a whole dog and pony show for the investors, but I'm not sure they've convinced anyone.

   • 2012 January 8, Elizabeth Popp Berman, Creating the Market University: How Academic Science Became an Economic Engine‎^[1], Princeton University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 119:

     Here, the academics put on a bit of a dog-and-pony show, demonstrating their latest breakthroughs and giving sponsors a chance to meet students who are about to receive their PhDs and start looking for jobs. […]

   • 2012 November 28, “Please Click On Our Website's Banner Ads”, in The Onion‎^[2]:

     Look, I know this may all seem somewhat untoward, and we can go through a whole dog-and-pony show here where I pretend that this column exists as a forum for ideas, and that I act as an independent voice who isn't beholden to advertisers, and the power of the First Amendment, and blah blah, etc. etc. But let's get real for a second here, okay?

• dog and pony show on Wikipedia.Wikipedia