When Words Have No Meaning

Well, Republicans have been using language to deceive (0.00 / 0)

since at least the eighties, as far as I am aware.  They pushed urban renewal when they really meant urban removal--getting rid not just of the residents but of the hearts of cities themselves.
I tend to think it was all in response to the perception that the combination of universal suffrage, access to public information, and the uncoupling of money from precious metals made the public a hazard to traditional power structures.  Somehow the rabble needed to be controlled and spreading them out over the landscape seemed like a solution.  Of course, now that people are connected electronically, the advantage of keeping them separated has dissipated.  I sometimes think of people as being similar to iron filings clustering around a magnet.  People getting together is a force of nature.

The Medicare thing is easy to explain.  Medicare Advantage partially privatized the program.  So, when people signed up and were offered plans (which the SSA was under orders to offer--i.e. act as a shill for private insurance that public dollars pay for), those who signed on with Humana or Kaiser or Mayo or United Health, had no idea that these entities were just middlemen taking a cut out of the Medicare fund.  Medicare is going to be cut.  That's the truth.  But what's going to be cut is the size of the middleman's take, even as more people are added and the providers get more pay.  The proponents of the middle men couldn't admit the whole truth.  So, they were at a disadvantage and, as they always do, tried to distract and confuse the issue with death panels (which also exist in insurance company offices).
What we have to be aware of is half truths and limited hang outs and prevarications and confabulations.  And we have to call them on it.

Because of the way we account for things, direct federal management of health care funding will show up as a reduction of the GDP, even though more people will get better and more efficient service.  The "economy" is that trade and exchange carried out for money by the private sector and tracked by various agencies.  If it isn't being counted, it's not happening.  If it's provided by the public sector, it's not in the economy.  If it's not paid for with money, it's not happening.  Which is why there are now estimates that as much as the equivalent of 25% of GDP is occurring in the "shadow economy" the "underground economy" or the black market.  Greece, that recent reprobate has a shadow economy equal to 30% of the regular flavor (GDP).

I think our Great Recession would have been a whole lot worse, if we hadn't had the underground cushion.  Did you know that every time you mow your own lawn or paint the woodwork you're part of the underground?

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by: hannah @ Tue Apr 20, 2010 at 06:31:01 AM CDT

Orwell (4.00 / 2)

Now, it is clear that the decline of a language must ultimately have political and economic causes: it is not due simply to the bad influence of this or that individual writer. But an effect can become a cause, reinforcing the original cause and producing the same effect in an intensified form, and so on indefinitely. A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts. The point is that the process is reversible. Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step toward political regeneration: so that the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers.

-- George Orwell, from "Politics and the English Language," 1946

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/...

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by: JimC @ Tue Apr 20, 2010 at 20:35:37 PM CDT

Yesterday's Sentinel editorial (0.00 / 0)

was really about the functions of language in the politics of division. Worth a read and a moment's thought, IMO.

Republicans believe government is bad - then they get into office and prove it.

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by: GreyMike @ Tue Apr 20, 2010 at 22:08:59 PM CDT

Perfect (0.00 / 0)

The Sentinel makes no distinction between the purposeful distortion of the name of a political party to scorn, mock, and ridicule, and the use of a self-designed name to identify a member of a movement.  I don't get it.

The Rovewellian concepts of the Republican party are used by the Republican party.  Democrats, in general, don't engage in that type of activity, not because we're not capable of mocking and ridicule (see plenty of that here:>), but mostly because progressive ideas require a constructive dialogue.  It really comes down to the simple dynamics - Republicans, lacking any new ideas (how long can you be the party of status quo when the world is changing so rapidly?)are best served by reducing all discussions to playground fights using adolescent logic.  Democrats, who understand the sentiments of the TR quote Dean posted, are best served when the discussion is elevated and the body politic is served rather than the political body.

The obvious caveats - there are exceptions to every generalization, and I can sling insults with the best of them (I grew up in a large Catholic family - if there's one thing we did well, it was exploit weaknesses.:>)    

"Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world." A. Einstein

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by: StraffordDem @ Wed Apr 21, 2010 at 07:39:20 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

did you really mean conflagration? (0.00 / 0)

or should that have been conflation? I suppose conflation might lead to conflagration. The copy editor in me is just checking.

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by: beverlywoods @ Wed Apr 21, 2010 at 09:28:33 AM CDT

Both, but (0.00 / 0)

conflation is more correct.  

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by: Jennifer Daler @ Wed Apr 21, 2010 at 10:19:11 AM CDT

[ Parent ]