Loaded language

An undeniable success of the reactionaries is that they have consistently been able to frame issues in terms of their choosing.  I have no insight as to why that’s the case—are ad agencies hotbeds of ideological neo-conservatism?—but you can’t get around the fact.

The clearest recent example is the loaded phrase death tax, used to disparage and overturn the estate tax.  By the way, is the world outside of Washington state aware that William Gates Sr., Bill’s dad, is strongly and publicly opposed to estate tax repeal?  A recent Seattle Times story about that topic is here.  In fact Gates Sr., who recently chaired a statewide special commission that recommended introducing a state income tax, has even co-authored a new book in support of retaining the estate tax.

The conservatives won control of pro-life ages ago, leaving the progressives with pro-choice, a term that’s certainly descriptive of our position but not the winner when it comes to snappy advertising sloganeering.

Even when the loaded term-of-choice is objectively negative in its implications, the reactionaries embrace it and, amazingly, are able to convince large segments of the population that it’s a valid, positive selling point for their position.  The phrase I’m thinking of in this instance is trickle-down economics.  The Reaganites were proud as punch of that phrase, trumpeting it proudly.  But doesn’t it really tell us unashamedly that the intent of their policy of cutting rich people’s taxes was to allow a mere dribble of financial wherewithall to reach the general public?  What was (and still is) needed was gush-down or cascade-down, yet the Republicans somehow managed to frame the discourse in their own favor so thoroughly that the public accepted the scraps tossed their way as if they were receiving a huge windfall from on high.

And now we come to double-taxed dividends, marketed as if it’s the only class of income that is potentially subject to taxation at more than one point in the financial system.

I can offer no reasonable avenues for progressives to explore to counteract this phenomenon.  I merely observe (and rue) it.

Comments

“Trickle-down” was originally a gaffe.  I recall that in ‘81 a lesser member of the Reagan administration used the phrase to describe how the benefits to the rich would eventually end up helping everyone.  It came across as condescending and became a staple of stand-up comedians and Democrat politicians.  How it has transformed into a positive connotation is beyond me.

Thanks for that perspective on “trickle-down”.  I hadn’t heard about that, and it would be ineresting to investigate ... since it really predates the Web, googling might not be able to trace it completely. 

Whatever its origin as a mistake and then a criticism, however, it clearly transformed into an attribute.  In that process, its “image” lost all semblance to its underlying anti-populace reality.

In general, if you don’t have any memory of the first 2 years of the Reagan revolution, but you’re interested in the politics of the Bush administration, then it’s probably worth the effort to scan through the opinion pages of a major newspaper during that time. 

The first impression you may get is that the news media were far more skeptical of Presidential claims back then than they are now.  What’s happening under Bush 2 is unprecedented.  Bush 1 himself didn’t enjoy this kind of free ride from the media, even during Gulf War 1.  Of course, in 81-82 you didn’t have AM hate radio and 4 channels of predominantly right wing cable “news” ... at that time Reagan hadn’t overturned the regulations requiring equal time to opposing viewpoints.

Second, you may get the impression that the liberal-moderate-conservative columnist ratio was roughly a 3rd of each, unlike the 1-3-6 ratio of today.

This third thing you might notice is that the Democrats actually acted like an opposition party (remember, the Repubs controlled the Senate 81-87, leaving the dems with only the House), except for a brief period following the assassination attempt.

Finally, you may notice that the outrages being daily perpetrated by the Reaganites ... those things that caused every one of the original cabinet to be indicted with a large percentage of convictions ... are tepid compared to what Bushites are doing today.

<< Back to main