It's Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for April 30th.
Today's word is demagogue, spelled D-E-M-A-G-O-G-U-E.
Demagogue is a noun.
A demagogue is a political leader who tries to get support by making use of popular prejudices,
as well as by making false claims and promises and using arguments based on emotion rather than reason.
Here's the word used in a sentence from The Capital of Annapolis by Tom Muha.
You need an internal guidance system for making decisions.
Without one, your choices become heavily influenced by external forces such as peers,
television, and demagogues.
When the ancient Greeks used the word demagogos from demos,
meaning people, and agogos, meaning leading,
they meant someone good,
a leader who used outstanding oratorical skills to further the interests of the common people.
The first known use of demagogue in English comes from the introduction to Thomas Hobbes' 1629 translation of a text by ancient Greek historian Thucydides.
It need not be doubted,
but from such a master Thucydides was sufficiently qualified to have become a great demagogue and of great authority with the people.
Alas, the word quickly took a negative turn.
Within decades,
it was being used to refer to someone who uses powers of persuasion to sway and mislead.
With your Word of the Day, I'm Peter Sokolowski.