Objection 1: Hedging is just a pretentious linguistic term for sloppy language and should not be encouraged.

Boy, not for me! I use hedge language very precisely. For example:

It is believed that a Spanish galleon lies submerged beneath the waters of California's Salton Sea, the remains of a ship that sailed up the Colorado River and ran aground before a subsequent earthquake closed the passage from the Sea of Cortez and allowed the Mojave Desert to dry out.

This allows me to bring up a bit of amusing mythology for subsequent discussion. Often someone who thinks I'm being sloppy assumes I actually believe such things myself, but closer reading makes it clear that I've made no such claim; it is believed, just not by me.