gadfly

Fleming, meanwhile, hasn’t had much to spend, and has always been somewhat of a gadfly going back to his years in the House of Representatives.

From Slate ● May 16, 2026

A gadfly candidate for mayor of Chicago, Lar Daly, secured a quirky FCC ruling.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 8, 2026

For decades, he also relished his role as a brutally insulting critic — sometimes of the bands he worked with — and a gadfly who pushed uncomfortable buttons about race, politics and sex.

From New York Times ● May 14, 2024

Aside from labeling the diatribes as “off topic,” there was little the supervisors could do to stop Herman, 56, an infamous gadfly at both L.A. city and county meetings.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 20, 2023

And the suitors mad with fear at her great sign stampeded like stung cattle by a river when the dread shimmering gadfly strikes in summer, in the flowering season, in the long-drawn days.

From "The Odyssey" by Homer

The Legislature was coming after the gadflies like Gilbert.

From Salon ● Aug. 17, 2025

Exxon Mobil’s action against Arjuna and Follow This opens a new chapter in the long battle between corporate managements and shareholder gadflies.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 14, 2024

Working the polls has long been something that retirees did, along with nice church ladies, neighborhood busybodies, local political gadflies and civics geeks.

From Washington Post ● Nov. 8, 2022

Accusations that the company resembles a Ponzi scheme are thrown around casually; if the online investigators and crypto gadflies are right, it would be the biggest in history, surpassing Bernie Madoff’s $64.8 billion scam.

From Slate ● Oct. 19, 2021

Then all at once a swarm of buzzing gadflies came out of the bush and fastened fiercely on the palfrey which bore the fair Gerda.

From Legends of the Rhine by Wilhelm Ruland