When the Words Do Get in the Way
I'm trying to make up for lost time here. Lots of readin' and no writin'. Let's see if I can get my collected critters into the corral in something like the order I planned. Open sesame latent Tetris skills. A fair number of words, but we know exercise is good.
First out of the gate would be Mr. Froomkin, who you may recall from that elitist back-East paper the Washington Post. This is from his daily blog of today, serving as intro to the next piece, but I strongly encourage you to follow link to Froomkin's full "White House Briefing" post - as always he does an excellent job of synopsizing recent events - especially helpful for those of us who have been exercising vocab on misbehaving software.
War Is Peace
Yesterday marked three years of war in Iraq -- but not to President Bush. To Bush, it was "the third anniversary of the beginning of the liberation of Iraq."
In fact, as Nedra Pickler noted for the Associated Press, Bush didn't use the word "war" at all in his brief remarks .
To hear Bush tell it, what's going on in Iraq -- whatever it is -- is fundamentally about progress, victory and peace. "We are implementing a strategy that will lead to victory in Iraq," he said. "And a victory in Iraq will make this country more secure, and will help lay the foundation of peace for generations to come."
Bush's avoidance of the word "war" in the context of Iraq is the rule, not the exception. In the carefully chosen lexicon of White House speeches, that particular word is almost exclusively reserved for the "global war on terror."
So there is no war, except for the war that never ends, and we're winning.
It's a little reminiscent of George Orwell's 1984, where the three slogans of the ruling party were "War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength."
Since the disclosures about Bush's warrantless domestic surveillance program, Bush critics have been citing that other dominant slogan from Orwell's book: "Big Brother is Watching You."
But there are plenty of potential Orwell analogies in Bush's use of language, and his historical revisionism, as well.
Of Straw Men
Another aspect of 1984: the daily "Two Minutes Hate" aimed at Emmanuel Goldstein, the enemy of the people. Unlike the obvious contemporaneous analogue, Osama bin Laden, the Goldstein character was actually a straw man -- a made-up figure created by Big Brother just to be knocked down.
Jennifer Loven, in a bold departure for the Associated Press, wrote a whole story on Saturday about Bush's extensive and generally unchallenged use of straw-man arguments.
[clip]
So, speaking of Loven:
Bush Using Straw-Man Arguments in Speeches
"Some look at the challenges in Iraq and conclude that the war is lost and not worth another dime or another day," President Bush said recently.
Another time he said, "Some say that if you're Muslim you can't be free."
"There are some really decent people," the president said earlier this year, "who believe that the federal government ought to be the decider of health care ... for all people."
Of course, hardly anyone in mainstream political debate has made such assertions.
When the president starts a sentence with "some say" or offers up what "some in Washington" believe, as he is doing more often these days, a rhetorical retort almost assuredly follows.
The device usually is code for Democrats or other White House opponents. In describing what they advocate, Bush often omits an important nuance or substitutes an extreme stance that bears little resemblance to their actual position.
He typically then says he "strongly disagrees" — conveniently knocking down a straw man of his own making.
Bush routinely is criticized for dressing up events with a too-rosy glow. But experts in political speech say the straw man device, in which the president makes himself appear entirely reasonable by contrast to supposed "critics," is just as problematic.
Because the "some" often go unnamed, Bush can argue that his statements are true in an era of blogs and talk radio. Even so, "'some' suggests a number much larger than is actually out there," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
A specialist in presidential rhetoric, Wayne Fields of Washington University in St. Louis, views it as "a bizarre kind of double talk" that abuses the rules of legitimate discussion.
"It's such a phenomenal hole in the national debate that you can have arguments with nonexistent people," Fields said. "All politicians try to get away with this to a certain extent. What's striking here is how much this administration rests on a foundation of this kind of stuff."
[clip]
Now stick with me here. Honestly, I think you'll find there is a storyline of merit. Next I have a couple slightly dusty historical snippets from Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo, who I continue to track despite his elitist Ivy League background.
First this, from post entitled "Confidence Men":
Let's be honest. As upset as you may have been in January 2001 that George W. Bush was going to be president, you had to admit he had a pretty impressive team. They had beaten a sitting vice president with seemingly every advantage; they outmuscled and outmaneuvered the Gore camp during the Florida recount; and despite the abbreviated transition, they quickly and smoothly assembled a seasoned White House staff. Many top appointees were in their second or third tour of government service; they exuded experience and know-how--and not just in the splendid isolation of academia or the permissive chaos of campaign work, but in the rugged practicalities of commanding American industry. Dick Cheney was the signature figure: a former White House chief of staff, congressman, and wartime defense secretary, whose vaunted government savvy had been validated in the private sector as CEO of the energy giant Halliburton. Like the administration, Cheney was right-wing, but in a way that was at once daunting and oddly reassuring. You may not have liked what he was doing. But you had little doubt that he knew what he was doing.
Today, that record doesn't look nearly so impressive. We now know that as CEO, Cheney got snookered into a disastrous merger that has since sent Halliburton's stock price plummeting, while signing off on dubious balance sheets that have sparked a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation. His mastery of the Beltway is similarly in question. Last year's Cheney-led energy task force produced an all-drilling-no-conservation energy bill that went nowhere.
[clip]
The same applies to the Bush administration generally. After some early successes, like the tax cut and the education bill, most administration initiatives have gone nowhere. The White House's cocky bullheadedness turned Vermont Sen. Jim Jeffords into an Independent and gave the Democrats the Senate. Its budget predictions were in shreds well before September 11. Social Security privatization went bust long before the market did. During the California energy crisis, the administration refused for months to cap wholesale energy rates. This ill-advised move looked like payback to price-gouging energy firms like Enron and drove California even further beyond Republican reach, probably for years to come.
[clip]
This unfamiliarity and heightened expectation, matched with the trappings of competence, gave potency to what has turned out to be the Bush administration's signature political tactic: the confidence game. The confidence man is a stock figure in American culture, originating--perhaps not coincidentally--in the boomtowns of the Old Southwest. He's the snake-oil salesman, the wildcat land speculator who mixes boundless optimism with quick talk, bluff, and bluster. The administration is led by such men.
[clip]
Until now, the Bush administration has been trading on the promise that all of these things would work out. But that leaves them in the position of a company that borrows against future profits (Enron, for instance) or an overextended investor who is buying stock on margin. When the bubble bursts, they will have a long way to fall.
[clip]
And then this, from "Vice Grip - Dick Cheney is a man of principles. Disastrous principles":
Early last December, Vice President Dick Cheney was dispatched to inform his old friend, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, that he was being let go. O'Neill, the president's advisers felt, had made too many missteps, given too much bad advice, uttered too many gaffes. He had become a liability to the administration. As Cheney himself once said in a different context, it was time for him to go. It couldn't have been a fun conversation--especially since it was Cheney who had picked O'Neill two years earlier.
O'Neill stormed off to Pittsburgh and within days the White House had announced his replacement. Yet the new treasury secretary nominee turned out not to be much of an improvement. Like O'Neill, John Snow was a veteran of the Ford administration who ran an old-economy titan (the railroad firm CSX) and seemed to lack the global market financial experience demanded of modern day treasury secretaries. Like other Bush appointees, Snow came from a business that traded heavily on the Washington influence game. And--again typical of the president and his men--the size of Snow's compensation package seemed inversely proportional to the returns he made for his shareholders. Of the three new members of the president's economic team nominated in early December, Snow was the only one to get almost universally poor reviews. He was also Dick Cheney's pick.
Week after week, one need only read the front page of The Washington Post to find similar Cheney lapses. Indeed, just a few days after Cheney hand-picked Snow, Newsweek magazine featured a glowing profile of National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice that began with an anecdote detailing her deft efforts to clean up another Cheney mess.
[clip]
All of which leads me to some fascinating recent poll results. The entire article at this Pew Research site seems to cry out for attention (just not mine, not right now!).
The nexus for purposes of this post though is captured well by this post on Democratic Underground, describing one in particular of a multitude of great charts and diagrams illustrating life in these United Snakes right now:
I LOVE this poll by Pew Research - One word description for Bush
"The single word most frequently associated with George W. Bush today is "incompetent,"and close behind are two other increasingly mentioned descriptors: "idiot" and "liar." All three are mentioned far more often today than a year ago."
Okay. Now for you diehards, a contest. Who will be first to reply with correct citation for source of post title?
If you've got 'em, smoke 'em.
First out of the gate would be Mr. Froomkin, who you may recall from that elitist back-East paper the Washington Post. This is from his daily blog of today, serving as intro to the next piece, but I strongly encourage you to follow link to Froomkin's full "White House Briefing" post - as always he does an excellent job of synopsizing recent events - especially helpful for those of us who have been exercising vocab on misbehaving software.
War Is Peace
Yesterday marked three years of war in Iraq -- but not to President Bush. To Bush, it was "the third anniversary of the beginning of the liberation of Iraq."
In fact, as Nedra Pickler noted for the Associated Press, Bush didn't use the word "war" at all in his brief remarks .
To hear Bush tell it, what's going on in Iraq -- whatever it is -- is fundamentally about progress, victory and peace. "We are implementing a strategy that will lead to victory in Iraq," he said. "And a victory in Iraq will make this country more secure, and will help lay the foundation of peace for generations to come."
Bush's avoidance of the word "war" in the context of Iraq is the rule, not the exception. In the carefully chosen lexicon of White House speeches, that particular word is almost exclusively reserved for the "global war on terror."
So there is no war, except for the war that never ends, and we're winning.
It's a little reminiscent of George Orwell's 1984, where the three slogans of the ruling party were "War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength."
Since the disclosures about Bush's warrantless domestic surveillance program, Bush critics have been citing that other dominant slogan from Orwell's book: "Big Brother is Watching You."
But there are plenty of potential Orwell analogies in Bush's use of language, and his historical revisionism, as well.
Of Straw Men
Another aspect of 1984: the daily "Two Minutes Hate" aimed at Emmanuel Goldstein, the enemy of the people. Unlike the obvious contemporaneous analogue, Osama bin Laden, the Goldstein character was actually a straw man -- a made-up figure created by Big Brother just to be knocked down.
Jennifer Loven, in a bold departure for the Associated Press, wrote a whole story on Saturday about Bush's extensive and generally unchallenged use of straw-man arguments.
[clip]
So, speaking of Loven:
Bush Using Straw-Man Arguments in Speeches
"Some look at the challenges in Iraq and conclude that the war is lost and not worth another dime or another day," President Bush said recently.
Another time he said, "Some say that if you're Muslim you can't be free."
"There are some really decent people," the president said earlier this year, "who believe that the federal government ought to be the decider of health care ... for all people."
Of course, hardly anyone in mainstream political debate has made such assertions.
When the president starts a sentence with "some say" or offers up what "some in Washington" believe, as he is doing more often these days, a rhetorical retort almost assuredly follows.
The device usually is code for Democrats or other White House opponents. In describing what they advocate, Bush often omits an important nuance or substitutes an extreme stance that bears little resemblance to their actual position.
He typically then says he "strongly disagrees" — conveniently knocking down a straw man of his own making.
Bush routinely is criticized for dressing up events with a too-rosy glow. But experts in political speech say the straw man device, in which the president makes himself appear entirely reasonable by contrast to supposed "critics," is just as problematic.
Because the "some" often go unnamed, Bush can argue that his statements are true in an era of blogs and talk radio. Even so, "'some' suggests a number much larger than is actually out there," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
A specialist in presidential rhetoric, Wayne Fields of Washington University in St. Louis, views it as "a bizarre kind of double talk" that abuses the rules of legitimate discussion.
"It's such a phenomenal hole in the national debate that you can have arguments with nonexistent people," Fields said. "All politicians try to get away with this to a certain extent. What's striking here is how much this administration rests on a foundation of this kind of stuff."
[clip]
Now stick with me here. Honestly, I think you'll find there is a storyline of merit. Next I have a couple slightly dusty historical snippets from Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo, who I continue to track despite his elitist Ivy League background.
First this, from post entitled "Confidence Men":
Let's be honest. As upset as you may have been in January 2001 that George W. Bush was going to be president, you had to admit he had a pretty impressive team. They had beaten a sitting vice president with seemingly every advantage; they outmuscled and outmaneuvered the Gore camp during the Florida recount; and despite the abbreviated transition, they quickly and smoothly assembled a seasoned White House staff. Many top appointees were in their second or third tour of government service; they exuded experience and know-how--and not just in the splendid isolation of academia or the permissive chaos of campaign work, but in the rugged practicalities of commanding American industry. Dick Cheney was the signature figure: a former White House chief of staff, congressman, and wartime defense secretary, whose vaunted government savvy had been validated in the private sector as CEO of the energy giant Halliburton. Like the administration, Cheney was right-wing, but in a way that was at once daunting and oddly reassuring. You may not have liked what he was doing. But you had little doubt that he knew what he was doing.
Today, that record doesn't look nearly so impressive. We now know that as CEO, Cheney got snookered into a disastrous merger that has since sent Halliburton's stock price plummeting, while signing off on dubious balance sheets that have sparked a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation. His mastery of the Beltway is similarly in question. Last year's Cheney-led energy task force produced an all-drilling-no-conservation energy bill that went nowhere.
[clip]
The same applies to the Bush administration generally. After some early successes, like the tax cut and the education bill, most administration initiatives have gone nowhere. The White House's cocky bullheadedness turned Vermont Sen. Jim Jeffords into an Independent and gave the Democrats the Senate. Its budget predictions were in shreds well before September 11. Social Security privatization went bust long before the market did. During the California energy crisis, the administration refused for months to cap wholesale energy rates. This ill-advised move looked like payback to price-gouging energy firms like Enron and drove California even further beyond Republican reach, probably for years to come.
[clip]
This unfamiliarity and heightened expectation, matched with the trappings of competence, gave potency to what has turned out to be the Bush administration's signature political tactic: the confidence game. The confidence man is a stock figure in American culture, originating--perhaps not coincidentally--in the boomtowns of the Old Southwest. He's the snake-oil salesman, the wildcat land speculator who mixes boundless optimism with quick talk, bluff, and bluster. The administration is led by such men.
[clip]
Until now, the Bush administration has been trading on the promise that all of these things would work out. But that leaves them in the position of a company that borrows against future profits (Enron, for instance) or an overextended investor who is buying stock on margin. When the bubble bursts, they will have a long way to fall.
[clip]
And then this, from "Vice Grip - Dick Cheney is a man of principles. Disastrous principles":
Early last December, Vice President Dick Cheney was dispatched to inform his old friend, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, that he was being let go. O'Neill, the president's advisers felt, had made too many missteps, given too much bad advice, uttered too many gaffes. He had become a liability to the administration. As Cheney himself once said in a different context, it was time for him to go. It couldn't have been a fun conversation--especially since it was Cheney who had picked O'Neill two years earlier.
O'Neill stormed off to Pittsburgh and within days the White House had announced his replacement. Yet the new treasury secretary nominee turned out not to be much of an improvement. Like O'Neill, John Snow was a veteran of the Ford administration who ran an old-economy titan (the railroad firm CSX) and seemed to lack the global market financial experience demanded of modern day treasury secretaries. Like other Bush appointees, Snow came from a business that traded heavily on the Washington influence game. And--again typical of the president and his men--the size of Snow's compensation package seemed inversely proportional to the returns he made for his shareholders. Of the three new members of the president's economic team nominated in early December, Snow was the only one to get almost universally poor reviews. He was also Dick Cheney's pick.
Week after week, one need only read the front page of The Washington Post to find similar Cheney lapses. Indeed, just a few days after Cheney hand-picked Snow, Newsweek magazine featured a glowing profile of National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice that began with an anecdote detailing her deft efforts to clean up another Cheney mess.
[clip]
All of which leads me to some fascinating recent poll results. The entire article at this Pew Research site seems to cry out for attention (just not mine, not right now!).
The nexus for purposes of this post though is captured well by this post on Democratic Underground, describing one in particular of a multitude of great charts and diagrams illustrating life in these United Snakes right now:
I LOVE this poll by Pew Research - One word description for Bush
"The single word most frequently associated with George W. Bush today is "incompetent,"and close behind are two other increasingly mentioned descriptors: "idiot" and "liar." All three are mentioned far more often today than a year ago."
Okay. Now for you diehards, a contest. Who will be first to reply with correct citation for source of post title?
If you've got 'em, smoke 'em.
posted by Sir Gumbo at 10:26 PM
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