Obama’s Economy: Like a Rock

Let the campaign begin! The president’s first campaign speech, cloaked in his term’s last State of the Union address, deployed two central metaphors: the economy is a car, and it’s also a playing field.

An economy built to last, where hard work pays off, and responsibility is rewarded.

While Figaro hates the clumsy rhythm and passive voice, he likes the trope. It uses the auto industry’s success as a model for what the rest of the economy can do. Thanks in part to government intervention (never mind that disaster in Japan), GM is back on top as the world’s number-one car company. Chrysler is accelerating, the industry is creating a growing number of jobs… And the feds provided the jumper cable.

Figaro would like to see Obama make the connection more overtly, saying something like, “What we did for the auto industry, we are doing for the whole economy.” Not socialism. Jump-starting. Building the economy Ford tough. Taking the economy from zero to, um, more than zero in under a decade!

Still, the trope works. Why? Because it focuses on the future, the long term, and the modest progress made so far. The Republicans know this, which is why their “prebuttal” and rebuttal work hard to shift the focus from the future to the present misery. The election will come down to a Reaganesque “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” versus Obama’s slow build for the future.

Obama has the steeper road. The economy is already like a rock—a barely movable object. The Republicans’ present carries more emotional weight than the Democrats’ future. Besides, Obama described the future four years ago, and it’s now a bald-tired present.

Which is why Obama pulled out his second trope, the playing field. The present is shabby, he argues, because some players aren’t playing fair.

We can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well while a growing number of Americans barely get by, or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, and everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules.

At last, the Democrats are catching on: Forget the figures. It’s the tropes, stupid.

Interrupters Aren't People

The tribal rhetoric gets better and better. Mitt Romney, the inevitable Republican candidate who can’t seem to convince Republicans of his inevitability, uses a strong syncrisis to define “99 percent” protesters. They shouted, “We are the people.” Romney shouted back. 

No, actually, these are the people. These are the people; you’re the interrupters. We believe in the Constitution. We believe in the right to speech. And you believe in interrupting. Take a hike.

Mitt Romney in Ormond Beach, Florida, quoted in the L.A. Times 

syncrisis (SIN-crih-sis), the contraster. From the Greek, meaning “compare with.” Weighs two points side by side with similar clauses: “These are the people; you’re the interrupters.” 

As Figaro explains in his first book, tribal rhetoric focuses on values and the present—unlike deliberative rhetoric, which deals with the future. The most tribal-tastic tribal rhetoric of them all defines “the people”—that is, who’s in and who’s out of the tribe. Romney supporters are people. People, according to Romney, are a species who believe in the Constitution. Interrupters aren’t people. (Corporations are people, too; they obviously don’t interrupt.)

But wait, it gets better. The 99 percenters started chanting “USA! USA!” and the People took up the chant. For a moment both the People and the Interrupters chanted their tribal slogan together.

No one got persuaded, nothing got decided, and soon everybody took a hike.

Gingrich Goes White!

Newt Gingrich pulled off a superb virtue tactic at last night’s GOP debate. Fully prepared for the first question, Gingrich declared himself to be “appalled.” He got a standing ovation and, probably, a bunch more votes in tomorrow’s South Carolina primary. Why? Because he fought virtue (the rhetorical kind, not to be confused with the real kind) with virtue (ditto).

The moderator, CNN reporter John King, began by asking about a former wife’s revelation that Gingrich asked for an open marriage. Gingrich responded by attacking King.

I am appalled that you would begin
a presidential debate on a topic like that.

King replied that Gingrich mentioned Monica Lewinsky in every speech during the Clinton scandal. But it didn’t matter. CNN, and the “mainstream media” in general, make an easy target for the Republican Party’s right wing.

And, as we’ve pointed out before, virtue makes for one of the most powerful rhetorical tools—one that Obama lacks, by the way.

One of the three aspects of ethos, or character, virtue makes people believe you share their values and live by those values. So how does a serial marriage-vow-breaker employ virtue? By calling the accusation a sin. Whether you think King’s question was sleazy doesn’t matter. What matters is whether South Carolina voters thought it was sleazy. And, judging by the reaction of the audience, they did. Sleazier, presumably, than Gingrich’s marital antics.

Virtue is a topic of demonstrative rhetoric, the language of preachers. It deals with right and wrong, with sinners and those sinned against. It’s the most tribal form of rhetoric, and the kind of rhetoric you hear most in politics today. Which is unfortunate.

Aristotle designated deliberative rhetoric, the language of choices, as the rhetoric of politics. But public discourse today deals with tribes and values, not problems and decisions. That’s one big reason why Congress just sits there, appalled.

Figaro especially loves the word “appalled.” It means, literally, “turned pale.” Coming from the whitest of all candidates, that word is just perfect.

Figaro's Favorite Campaign Ad

The ad—brought to you by Newt Gingrich’s “Take that, Bain Boy”superpac—accuses Mitt Romney of being (a) from Massachusetts and (b) French. You know, like John Kerry.

The voiceover employs a dirimens copulatio, the but-wait there’s more figure. (Here’s an explanation and pronunciation.) You see the device a lot on infomercials: But that’s not all! This thing not only slices and dices, it speaks French! 

Quibblers might say that the clip actually proves that Mitt actually can’t speak French. He mouths third-grade Frog with an accent that’s positively gauche.

Others might say that Massachusetts—you know, that place with one of the lowest unemployment rates, highest education levels, most innovative health care, and most annoying accent—isn’t something to be entirely embarrassed about. 

But Figaro knows for a fact that some of those Massholes actually know foreign languages. Which makes anyone from that state completely unqualified to be president.

So why do we love the ad? Because of the Frenchy music in the background! It’s so bad that it makes it impossible to see Kerry—um, we mean Romney—without thinking of a bagette. First-rate ethos work, Newtons!

LOL Punditcats

Meghan McCain, daughter of a former presidential candidate and hapless political commentator, pulled off a marvelous malapropism on MSBC.  The Obamas, she said, deserve “an emoticon of privacy.” OMG! They absolutely do!!! 

malapropism (MAL-a-prop-ism) or acyrologia(a-keer-o-LO-gia), the fortunate mix-up.

The malapropism is an eponym named for the addlebrained literary character, Mrs. Malaprop.  But credit the Greeks for coining the figure two and a half millennia before.  The acyrologia (“unauthorized speech”) swaps a word with a like-sounding but fortuitously wrong substitute.

The ideal screwup achieves a higher addled wisdom. Props to you, Ms. M! But it’lll take you many years to achieve the addled wisdom-ness of Yogi Berra. 

Say Tomahto and I'll Kill You

If someone pronounces Iraq “eye-rack,” he’s probably not a liberal. If he refers to the “Democrat Party,” he’s certainly not a liberal. If he uses the word “community” unironically? Bingo, a liberal. So what do you call this sort of tribal password? 

shibboleth (SHIB-oh-lith), the password. From the Hebrew, meaning “grain stalk.” 

The word comes from the Hebrew Bible—Judges 12:5-6—in a scene that describes the aftermath of a battle between two tribes. The tribe from Gilead beat the one from Ephraim, then blocked the retreating survivors from crossing the Jordan back to their homeland. Anyone claiming to be a Gileadite was given a test: pronounce the word “shibboleth.” If he said “sibboleth,” that proved he was an  Ephraimite, and he was killed on the spot.

According to the scripture, 42,000 Ephraimites were slaughtered over a mispronunciation. Sounds like something Figaro’s terrifying fourth-grade grammar teacher would write.

In fact, grammar itself counts as a kind of systematic shibboleth. There’s no such thing as “correct” grammar. There’s just upper-class grammar and everything else.

And just by saying that, Figaro has proved himself a grass-combing Ephraimite. He’s preparing himself for the slaughter.