Presidential material

Carlos Santoscoy of On Top Magazine flops out the bastardised form while reporting a possible change in the US military 'don't ask, don't tell' policy -
Such lucid messages in favor of repeal arrive as the president is being called all mouth and no trousers on the policy. Candidate Obama was a strong supporter of repeal, but as president he's offered a more muddled message.
For the record, the president usually appears to have very nicely cut trousers. The implciit doubt, as ever, is over the contents.

Terror trousers

David Spens QC shows a nice line of legal reasoning but little grasp of idiom, as reported in the Bristol Evening Post:
"Was he an Islamic extremist intent on carnage and mass murder in the heart of Bristol?" Mr Spens said. "Or was he a weak, lonely figure, living much of his life in a fantasy world, pretending to be somebody he is not. All style and no substance. Does that fit? All mouth and no trousers. Does that fit?"

Well, not really, no.

Dumbphone

An odd use of the bastardised phrase from the US, with Stevie Smith in the Tech Herald writing of the new Blackberry smartphone thingummyjig -
And, when Research In Motion describes a handset as “fully featured” it certainly doesn’t offer up a half-baked product that’s all mouth and no trousers.

Even with the proper phrase, that wouldn't have made a great deal of sense - it never quite works when applied to inanimate objects.

Green sense; PC claptrap

A couple of items from last week, one good and one bad.

From a BBC Scotland story on government failures to hit emissions targets:
Green MSP Patrick Harvie complained of "all mouth and trousers" ministers.
A classic pithy use.

And from a PC Pro blog item on some new telephones:
We’ve been hands-on with the quartet of new phones to find out if they’re up to the job – or if they’re all mouth and no trousers.
Even if they'd used the proper phrase instead of the meaningless bastardisation, that still wouldn't make much sense. Utter pish.

Golfing trousers redux

PA golf correspondent Mark Garrod sinks the ball nicely when he writes:
John Daly has taken just two tournaments in his comeback to show that he is not all mouth and trousers.

Seems like site favourite Ian Poulter has a successor.

Canterbury tales

A nice use of the proper phrase, as reported on yourcanterbury.co.uk:
County Hall Tory leader Cllr Paul Carter described the Labour publication as "all mouth and trousers".

It's particularly pleasing to see it being used right in Kent, as the bastardised phrase seems to dominate in the south-east.

Doubly confused

Roisin Burke makes a ballock of it in the Irish Independent when considering how to repair the country's image:
Branding, corporate image, PR, marketing proposition -- these are dreadful, superficial terms to many people. Understandably so, suggesting,, as they sometimes do, the trumpeting of style over substance, the 'all mouth and no trousers', 'fur coat and no underwear', brash 'great little country' take on the national image that helped get us into this mess in the first place.

Again, the trousers are part of the style, not the substance. And the use of 'fur coat and no underwear' is no better - first, the usual phrase is 'fur coat, no knickers', though that might be a bit rude for delicate Irish tastes; and second, that means something else entirely...