But although Lord Lawson may not be altogether wrong to describe this as a "PR ploy", it could well be a useful and important PR ploy to secure political acceptance for some very grim decisions to come.
When her twins were born, in 1999, her career prospects in academia were, she wrote, "grim" and the decision to stay home "not difficult".
While that all looks grim, the appeals court decision means that the Supreme Court will probably have to eventually decide if gay marriage is a constitutional right.
On the day of the announcement, posters went up around Buenos Aires reading "True sovereignty means taking back what is ours" above the YPF logo.The medium-term economic costs of the decision could be grim.
Four men convicted of a brutal gang rape were sentenced Friday to die by hanging, "a decision met with grim satisfaction from the victim's parents and triumphant cheers" from the crowd outside the courthouse in Delhi, where some held up pictures of bodies in nooses, Ellen Barry wrote in The New York Times.
"This is for potentially very grim situations in which difficult decisions have to be made".
The decision followed news of grim economic data around the world, including data on U.S. payrolls and Chinese manufacturing.
Sanders addressed the very real concerns of young voters that our future is grim, and it's because of decisions made by our predecessors.
The grim statistics resulting directly from that fateful decision are now, sadly, all too familiar.
