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鈥淣on-starter.鈥� A term from the horse-racing world, it refers to an idea critics say is so hopelessly flawed that it isn鈥檛 worth tackling.

Congressional Republicans didn鈥檛 wait until President Obama鈥檚 State of the Union speech to declare that his new tax proposal wasn鈥檛 going anywhere. Days before Obama aides leaked word that he would push expanded credits for Americans of all ages, Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz wasn鈥檛 impressed, calling the proposal a 鈥渘on-starter.鈥�

Meanwhile, at last week鈥檚 GOP retreat, another House Republican, California鈥檚 Jeff Denham, sought to quash any speculation that he was secretly working on a comprehensive immigration bill. Representative Denham reportedly told fellow Republicans that such an idea 鈥� which Democrats embrace, but many conservatives resist 鈥� is 鈥渁 non-starter.鈥�

鈥淣on-starter鈥� has its lineage across the Atlantic Ocean, according to Safire鈥檚 Political Dictionary. 鈥淚n British horse-racing jargon,鈥� it says, 鈥渁 horse entered into a race but withdrawn before the start is called a non-starter; the American term is 鈥榮cratch.鈥� From horse racing, the British term was extended into business usage.鈥� It has long been employed in diplomatic circles, Safire added, becoming especially popular among US Foreign Service officers in the 1970s.

The word has been used on a bipartisan basis. The Sunlight Foundation鈥檚 Capitol Words.org site, which searches the Congressional Record database for the popularity of terms, says that over the past two decades, Democrats have invoked it on the House and Senate floors more often than Republicans.

It can encompass an entire category of behavior. 鈥淪ince taking the House in 2011, Republicans have focused almost exclusively on passing bills that have the support of only Republicans and have little chance of becoming law,鈥� Century Foundation Fellow Michael A. Cohen wrote last October in the Boston Globe. 鈥淥utreach to Democrats or President Obama has been a non-starter.鈥�

Non-starters can begin at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue. President George W. Bush鈥檚 final two years in office facing an opposition Democratic Congress 鈥� the inverse of President Obama鈥檚 current predicament 鈥� included rhetorical non-starters on a near-daily basis.

In May 2007, Democrats in the House and Senate pushed legislation that would have withdrawn US combat troops from Iraq by August 2008, or sooner. The Bush White House didn鈥檛 see it that way. "It would unnecessarily handcuff our generals on the ground, and it's safe to say it's a non-starter for the president," said White House Counselor Dan Bartlett.

Do non-starters ever actually start? In arguing for a right-to-work law, West Virginia鈥檚 Charleston Daily Mail observed in a 2012 editorial that Michigan recently had become the 24^th state to enact legislation seeking to guarantee that workers cannot be compelled to join or not join a labor union. 鈥淎 proposal once considered a non-starter is now law in almost half of the 49 states that West Virginia competes with to win investment, economic growth, jobs, young people, income gains and lower poverty levels,鈥� it said. 聽

Chuck McCutcheon and David Mark write their "Speaking Politics" blog exclusively for Decoder Voices.