steamroller
/ˈstiːmrəʊlə
/noun
1A heavy, slow-moving vehicle with a roller, used to flatten the surfaces of roads during construction: after each truckload of earth fell, a steamroller flattened it...
- Then he brought in steamrollers to flatten the rubble like parking lots.
- Watched by thousands, almost 5,000 weapons were flattened by a steamroller or burnt in a pyre.
- Mr Oldfield, of London Road, Clacton, drove steamrollers used to surface the town's first roads and many in the surrounding district in the early half of the 20th century.
1.1An oppressive and relentless power or force: victims of an ideological steamroller...
- America is the steamroller of modernity, and its forcing the Europeans to adapt.
- But I also hope that, god forbid, if their magazine against all odds becomes a financial success, their love of books and concern for writers isn't crushed out by some corporate steamroller.
- This is hardly the place to rehearse the errors and elisions in his original article, or the way it allows its thesis like a steamroller to flatten the facts.
verb [with object]
1(Of a government or other authority) forcibly pass (a measure) by restricting debate or otherwise overriding opposition: the government’s trying to steamroller a law through...
- This will certainly give opponents another point of attack, once the Government steamrollers the bill through Parliament.
- The second chamber needs both independence and a level of strength to prevent any one government steamrollering ill-conceived legislation through parliament.
- If that happens, then the threat of the use of the Parliament Act to steamroller the Bill into law looms large.
1.1Force (someone) into doing or accepting something: an attempt to steamroller the country into political reforms...
- Global strategies can steamroller people who have a profound insight in local markets for the grace of outsourcing and other large management techniques.
- This wouldn't matter if the material were intrinsically funny, and the performances were strong enough to steamroller the audience into acceptance of the authors' premise.
- In 1996, the Scotsman simply steamrollered him, before Ebdon, who abandoned academia to serve his apprenticeship at Kings Cross Snooker Club, finally took on the mantle of the master.