Word info

have it both ways

Verb

Meaning

have it both ways (third-person singular simple present has it both ways, present participle having it both ways, simple past and past participle had it both ways)

(idiomatic) Synonym of have one's cake and eat it too

Source: en.wiktionary.org

Examples

As for me, I am deeply a democrat; this is why I am in no way a socialist. Democracy and socialism cannot go together. You can't have it both ways. Socialism is a new form of slavery. Alexis de Tocqueville

You can't have it both ways. You can't tell me that you're taxed enough already, and that you want constitutional government and then in the next breath say, 'Bring me home some bacon.' The pig has been picked clean. Rand Paul

You can't have it both ways. Either our rights come from God, as our Declaration of Independence says, or they come from human choice. If they come from human choice, then our whole way of life is meaningless, it has no foundation. Alan Keyes

What had happened? As he asked himself the question, he knew the answer. That no one had thought fit to tell him! No one! It was a bitter pill for him to swallow. He had been forgotten. Yet he had always wished to be forgotten. He could not have it both ways. Mervyn Peake

With the growing urgency of climate change, we cannot have it both ways. We cannot shout from the rooftops about the dangers of global warming and then turn around and shout even louder about the "dangers" of windmills. David Suzuki

You can't have it both ways. English Proverb

Close letter words and terms