Buck passing
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- For the racehorse, go to Buckpasser
Buck passing or passing the buck is the action of transferring responsibility or blame unto another person. It is also used as a strategy in power politics when the actions of one country/nation are blamed on another, providing an opportunity for war.
The saying "the buck stops here" derives from the slang expression "pass the buck" which means passing the responsibility on to someone else. The latter expression is said to have originated with the game of poker, in which a marker or counter, frequently in frontier days a knife with a buckhorn handle, was used to indicate the person whose turn it was to deal. If the player did not wish to deal he could pass the responsibility by passing the "buck," as the counter came to be called, to the next player.
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