英語の表現（８）— ‘Pie in the sky’

I still remember my ex-tutor using this expression while we were talking something about Japanese politics. My tutor then was quite critical of some of the Japanese politicians who in his words tend to have too much of ‘wishful thinking‘. He said something to the effect of: ‘Almost all the things they (Japanese politicans) promise to do at the time of a national election are pie in the sky.’

One of  the examples from the DVD edition of the BNC (British National Corpus)’ is as follows:

‘Some argue that while this may be desirable, it is not possible; it is pie in the sky, since it ignores reality. ‘