I took the time to slog through the text of BushCo's latest speech before a room of people who support him. This time it was the Republican Governors' Association.
Daddy Protector is at it again using the dependency-creating language that he favors to control us. Since he was addressing governors, he stuck to using "we" instead of his prefered "I". Although there is this classic bit:
You and I are living in a period where the stakes are high and the challenges are difficult, the choices are clear and resolve is needed.
None of us will ever forget that week when one era ended and another began. September the 14th, 2001, I stood in the ruins of the twin towers. I remember a lot that day. Workers in hard hats were shouting, "Whatever it takes." One fellow pointed at me and said, "Don't let me down."
As we all did that day, these men and women searching through the rubble took it personally. I took it personally. I have a responsibility that goes on. I will never relent in bringing justice to our enemies. I will defend America, whatever it takes.
Wow, huh?
He didn't whine as much as I've gotten used to - see the 2004 SOTU and his Meet the Press appearance for examples of what I mean. But about a third of the speech was devoted to maintaining the negative framework that he works so hard to keep alive in our minds. From Dr. Reanna Brooks:
Bush is a master at inducing learned helplessness in the electorate. He uses pessimistic language that creates fear and disables people from feeling they can solve their problems.
And so we got the following:
Great events will turn on this election. The man who sits in the Oval Office will set the course of the war on terror and the direction of our economy. The security and prosperity of America are at stake. Our course is clear. The next four years, we'll keep our enemies on the run and extend the frontiers of liberty.
and
Our future also depends on America's leadership in this world. The momentum of freedom in our time is strong, but we still face serious challenges. Al Qaida's wounded, but not broken. Terrorists are testing our will in Afghanistan and Iraq. Regimes in North Korea and Iran are challenging the peace. The actions we take and the decisions we make in this decade will have consequences far into this century.
If America shows weakness and uncertainty, the world will drift toward tragedy. That will not happen on my watch.
and
We still face thugs and terrorists in Iraq who would rather go on killing the innocent than accept the advance of liberty. They know that a free Iraq will be a major defeat in the cause of terror. This collection of killers is trying to shake the will of America and the civilized world.
and
After the chaos and carnage of September the 11th, it is not enough to serve our enemies with legal papers. With those attacks, the terrorists and their supports declared war on the United States. And war is what they got.
The rest of the paragraphs I noted that invoked September 11th or terrorism portrayed the country, under BushCo's strong leadership, as having taken action to stamp out the dangers that threaten to consume us. Most of them went like this:
We learned that, on September 11th, our homeland is no longer protected by vast oceans. So we reorganized our government and created the Department of Homeland Security to safeguard the ports and borders and to better protect the American people.
That's what Dr. Brooks calls empty language. She says, "Dominators use empty language to conceal faulty generalizations; to ridicule viable alternatives; to attribute negative motivations to others, thus making them appear contemptible; and to rename and "reframe" opposing viewpoints.
"
More examples are:
In the next four years, we'll help more Americans to find that there are opportunities in a changing economy. In the next four years, we will stand for the values that make us a good and decent country.
and
We must do more to keep this economy growing. We need to protect small business owners and employees from frivolous lawsuits and needless regulation. We need to control the cost of health care by passing medical liability reform. No one has ever been healed by a frivolous lawsuit.
That frivolous lawsuit line is one of BushCo's favorites.
and
Others would have chosen differently. They now agree that the world is better off with Saddam out of power. They just didn't support removing Saddam from power.
Play along. It's especially easy to find empty language in a BushCo speech.
But the coverage I read was all about how now BushCo has taken off the gloves and brought it on. Fight! Fight! The headline in the NYTimes was "Robust Defense Offered". Here are the first two paragraphs of Richard W. Stevenson's story:
WASHINGTON, Feb. 23 — President Bush kicked off his general election campaign on Monday night, shedding his above-the-fray posture to deliver a robust defense of his record and begin an assault on the Democratic front-runner, Senator John Kerry.
Facing declining poll numbers and concerted Democratic criticism, and urged by many Republicans to accelerate his timetable for partisan engagement, Mr. Bush used a speech here to assert that the election would present a clear choice between his steady leadership and Democrats who could not be relied on to make the tough decisions necessary to deal with the economy and the threat from terrorism.
Mr. Stevenson also said that "Much of the speech was forward-looking. It sought to position Mr. Bush as optimistic and steady in the face of serious challenges to the country and relentless attacks by Democraats who, he said have failed to say how they would deal with the challenges that United States faces at home and abroad."
In reality, every candidate has offered strategies to deal with the threat of terrorism, the diaster in Iraq and the disaster of our economy at home. These are the kind of statements that, when the DemCans made them during debates, drew fire. And here . As of last night BushCo is officially campaigning and it's finally time to hold his remarks in that capacity to the same standards that have been set up for the Democrats.
UPDATE: I feel like comparing Mr. Woodward's column and Factcheck.org with the NYTimes, which is how the above paragraph reads is unfair. I should have found examples from the NYTimes instead. Here's one by Adam Nagourney about John Edwards' campaign style.
"In truth, though, Mr. Edwards, a former trial lawyer and first-term senator from North Carolina, is much more likely to show that booklet than to slog through the details in its pages. As he campaigns across the nation, drawing a portrait of an Edwards presidency, his has become a candidacy of broad brush strokes and biography, drawing attention more for his distinctive style than for substance . "
And, to be fair, there's still time for Mr. Woodward to comment on BushCo's style and FactCheck.org to take on the speech from last night.
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