On a related note, has anyone noticed the growing use of "pretty" as a hedge against ever being wrong? Also, "not", as in "not the fastest" or "not the hottest".

It could be 46C/115F outside and you say "wow, today is unbearably hot", to which someone retorts "nah, it's fine. It's not the hottest day". That's pretty good hedging. You can make infinite technically correct statements this way without ever saying anything meaningful