On Language, Retractions, and Words

During the recent House Democratic retreat, President Bush wore the proverbial hairshirt and apologized for excising the suffix '-ic' from the phrase "Democratic Majority." The oft-reprinted joke from the public meeting:

"Now look, my diction isn't all that good," Bush said. "I have been accused of occasionally mangling the English language. And so I appreciate you inviting the head of the Republic Party."

Anyone with even a passing interest in modern American politics will tell you emphatically that words matter. What you say is often more important that what you do. I often surrender to my artifactual idealism and contend the truth about public life and politics in general is unfortunate. However, no amount of lamentation on my part will make it any less true - words matter.

So when, during the State of the Union address, Bush referred to the "Democrat Majority", he meant it. This was a different situation than the one Joe Biden found himself in recently, after calling Barack Obama "clean" and "articulate." It was a wholly assailable set of terms, and Biden realized that and responded accordingly. He'll get beaten up about it for a while, mostly for being goofy rather than devious. One of these cases implies a lack of discipline, especially concerning message; one implies a dedicated regimen of message. You should know which is which.

Language in politics can be and is often a deliberate thing. In Bush's case, the story that it was a mistake would be understandable if I didn't know that Republican strategist Frank Luntz has led an effort to revive "Democrat" as a linguistic slight for years. In one story about its origination, Senator Joe McCarthy started saying "Democrat Party" because to him, there was nothing democratic about them. It is a fixture of talking points memos distributed to the Republican caucus. It is more of an idea than a well-defined slur; it is not ethnically or economically based; it is meant for, sent to, and received by a very specific group of people to whom it actually means something, although what that meaning is remains obfuscated.

"Democrat Party" is an expression of elitism. It is akin to when I refer to someone who engages a low level of technology as a "Luddite," which happens from time to time. Wikipedia describes: "The Luddites were a social movement of English textile workers in the early 1800s who protested - often by destroying textile machines - against the changes produced by the Industrial Revolution." Do people that are afraid of computers destroy them? Is that a qualification for my usage of the term? It is not. In my case, as I learned it, "Luddite" means someone who doesn't have the internet at their house. Or, if I'm feeling particularly superior for whatever reason, someone who still uses dial-up and is as such unclean.

Trying to discern what "Luddite" means to the entire tech culture is useless past severe generalities. It means someone who is low tech, and therefore, in some morally ambiguous or cultural way, inferior. It is not a best practice, and although I intend no overt maliciousness, the derision is there. It is something I shouldn't say. "Democrat Party" is the same way.

Ever since George Lakoff started publishing books on framing, Democratic activists all over the country have become amateur linguists and started asserting that, for example, elections could be won by painting the local Republican as "anti-choice." The problem with most of the linguistic foils progressives cook up is that they don't work. Pro-Life, cut-and-run, Democrat Party - these are sales slogans for a product. That product, which you and I know as fear, has a flat head and a mean mouth; it waits behind the door of a lot of American homes that are just as good as yours. It is readied for battle by clever language that is borne of a purpose: not to communicate, but to define.

Words matter. The Democratic Party is in search of a resonant message that will capitalize on recent accomplishments, a message that communicates the integrity of the unified party's goals. That yearning to communicate may be precisely why progressive language has sometimes failed to catch on.