Posted on 05/28/2007 9:09:22 PM PDT by jazusamo
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
It has long been recognized that those on the political left are more articulate than their opponents. The words they choose for the things they are for or against make it easy to decide whether to be for or against those things.
Are you for or against "social justice"? A no-brainer. Who is going to be for injustice?
What about "a living wage"? Who wants people not to have enough money to live on?
Then there is "affordable housing" and "affordable health care." Who would want people to be unable to afford to put a roof over their heads or unable to go to a doctor when they are sick?
In real life, the devil is in the details. But the whole point of political rhetoric is to make it unnecessary for you to have to go into the specifics before taking sides.
You don't need to know any economics to be in favor of "a living wage" or "affordable housing." In fact, the less economics you know, the more you can believe in such things.
Conservatives, on the other hand, have a gift for phrasing things in terms that are unlikely to arouse most people's interest, much less their support.
Do words like "property rights," "the market" or "judicial restraint" make your emotions surge and your heart beat faster?
There are serious reasons to be greatly concerned about all these things. But you have to have a lot more facts and more understanding of history, economics, and law before you see why.
An issue can be enormously important and well within most people's understanding. Yet the way words are used can determine whether people are aroused or bored.
One of those issues is what legal scholars call "takings." There is a masterful book with that title by Professor Richard Epstein of the University of Chicago Law School.
But if you are in a bookstore and see a book with the title "Takings" on its cover, are you more likely to stop in your tracks and eagerly snatch it off the shelf or to yawn and keep walking?
Takings are not a complex idea. But it needs explaining.
Let's suppose you live in a $400,000 house.
If, on a Wednesday afternoon, the government announces that it is planning to "redevelop" the area where your home is located -- that is, demolish the area so that something else can be built there -- by Thursday morning, your $400,000 house could become a $200,000 house.
The market reacts very quickly in anticipation of future events.
Several years later, when the government actually gets around to demolishing the area, they may offer you $200,000 for your property -- or perhaps $150,000, if they use an appraiser who knows that he is more likely to get more business from the government if his estimates are on the low side rather than the high side.
In either case, you are out at least a couple of hundred grand. Has the government "taken" that much from you, without paying you the full compensation for your property, as required by the Constitution of the United States?
Such theoretical questions were made vividly real, and people were vividly outraged, when the Supreme Court in 2005 declared that governments at all levels had the power to seize private property, not only for such government activities as building reservoirs or highways, but also for turning the property over to private developers to build shopping malls, casinos, or whatever.
The Constitution says that government can take private property for "public use" if it compensates the owner. The Supreme Court changed that to mean that the government could take private property just to turn over to others, so long as they called it a "public purpose" like "redevelopment."
Politicians are experts at rhetoric, especially if that is all that is needed to justify seizing your home and turning it over to someone else who will build something that pays more taxes.
All hell broke out, once people now understood that the issue called "takings" was about politicians being able to seize their property, virtually at will, for someone else's benefit. But it was a liberal court decision, not the words of conservatives, which created that understanding.
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute and author of Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy.
Thomas Sowell for President. Or Supreme Court for that matter.
Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." -Manuel II Paleologus
Thomas Sowell for ANYTHING that helps reduce FedGov to a size that we can drown in a bathtub...
Yes, Sowell is dead-on, as usual. As my brother once said: “The Left has all the slogans.”
A very wise man to be sure.
“[Liberal’s] choice of “buzz words” ensure few people will disagree with about the issues they highlight.”
Conservatives are no less prone to euphemize. It didn’t take long for anti-abortion to become pro-life so as to render an impression of less negativity.
The man is brilliant.
I think the pro-life moniker was mostly to counter the ridiculous "pro-choice" title adopted by the left. How ludicrous to be pro-choice when the choice is killing an innocent and defenseless human being. It's like being "pro-choice" about rape. "I don't believe in it myself but I think it should be left up to a persons own conscience whether to rape or not". Insanity.
“Social Justice” for humanity begins before conception to include sanctifying the very nature of sexual procreation.
“Living Wage” demands a free market economy where “affordable housing” follows the prices that both buyer and selling agree upon.
“Affordable Health Care” will happen when health services and prescription drugs are as globalized as my very affordable automobile.
“Imminent Domain” means that we are legally obligated to turn a judge’s property into a parking lot.
Reactionary rhetoric is a necessary gift and one should pray and prepare for using it the same way one defends his nation and his very family. Rhetoric becomes easy when using the simplest of definitions that can be stated in one breathe. Foolishness is stuffed quickly and the demons of contempt dive into hell rather than face the music of their folly.
“There are too many guns, they should be outlawed!” states an angry rubber stamp voting Democrat union official.
“So you are saying that Bush should have all the guns?”
...silence follows.
Retort: The 2nd Amendment is as necessary as Unions (and vice versa).
...no argument, common ground is found.
Education on firearms follows to disrupt the false notion of “assault rifles”:
“The smooth bore muzzle loading musket was the assault rifle of its day. Properly employed, it shot with more devastation than wheeled artillery. American colonists seeking independence from Imperialism used the muzzle loading musket as it was the most advanced firearm of its day. The writers of our Constitution understood the concept of “assault rifle” because, even though rifling didn’t apply to much of the weapons used on their battlefields, the nation’s fathers weren’t going to hobble their future children from defending themselves against a tyrannical government...even one that’s home grown.”
Satan loves to neuter our intellectual reasoning. The devil’s best at cunning. And it’s Reason that must confront madness. In confronting supernatural enemies, we can’t hope to achieve success without Supernatural help.
Atheism: “There’s no such thing as God, Satan, Heaven, or Hell. How can you believe in something you can’t see?”
Reactionary rhetoric: “Then you must not believe in air, wind, vapor, Love, Hate, hunger, atoms, molecules, x-rays, radiation, lies or Truth. In fact, if you continue to cover your eyes and scream really loudly, perhaps the whole world will disappear and everyone in it.”
Of course there’s God. We can’t see Him, but we can’t see wind either. We can feel wind, though. And in a similar manner, we can sense God as His Presence is written into all Creation. Silence the voices of mankind and the very stones will sing praises to God.
So, the sale of temptation demands master reactionary rhetoric to stifle and stuff the Satan tempting sin and death.
The best Master stuffer was, is, and will always be Jesus Christ. Where Adam & Eve failed in the Garden of Eden, Jesus pwn3d (owned) while making a 40 day fast in the desert. Every time Satan offered disobedience and death, Jesus spiked the lie right into the devil’s face. Satan limped away whimpering. This is because God speaks with Commands and there isn’t rhetoric. He IS.
God speaks and Creation happens. When we reflect the Love He gives us, our rhetoric has meaning. When words are used against the better of mankind’s nature, those words are lies. Like the Angels separating saint from sinner, rhetoric will be dissected into reason and lies. There won’t be a middle ground or gray area. What tries to be neither is meaningless babble serving not the advancement of creation but the stymieing of man from knowing His God. “Global Warming” falls into just such a category. It’s meant to waste our time, efforts, and money. It’s a distraction tactic that’s been long exposed.
“Global Warming” is the fault of a hotter sun.
Look at your bank account. Pull out a check for that account. Write an amount that you can cover with that account. Can you cash that check? Then know that when Jesus took a piece of bread, Blessed it, broke it and passed it to His disciples; and raised a cup of wine, Blessed it, shared it—He wrote a check for our Redemption and cashed it in the very next day. Mercy is the New Covenant given to all mankind. His physical Sacrifice is Spiritual too and thus, timeless for all of our sins. There was no symbolism in “This is my body.” Is the check you wrote a mere “symbol” of value? Or, does it carry the full weight and meaning of what you wrote? Do we do as Jesus commanded and Remember? Yes, we do.
Satan fails today because the Sacraments prove their Eternal value. In a war waged in popular vote between a man pretending to value the Eternal gifts of the Sacraments versus a man not fully engaged in the Universal Church, he who mocked Catholic Sacraments was embarrassed by children who pointed to his nakedness. Evil continues to flail and will hasten upon its own demise when more Mercy is poured upon wounded death.
Thus, when immigrants demand “Justice” let them know that Justice demands deportation. Illegal immigrants should ask for “Mercy” instead.
When vice-loving perversion demands marriage and children, give all a “flat rate tax” which ensures fair treatment for all law abiding citizens. A graduated tax scale lends twisted logic that homosexuals not privy to marriage are unfairly treated and must wed and take children from natural couples to financially survive. Let all be fairly taxed so that none may be forced into marriage and forced t care for children.
Recognize and reject temptation and sin and its author, the evil one. Mercy drives away the last vestiges of sin. Forgiveness is the key unlocking the door to Heaven. Forgiving others grants absolution to your own soul. God grants Mercy to the penitent heart who bears no ill will against fellow man.
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I disagree. Just because there is one example, done deliberately to counteract a specific situation does not mean conservatives are "no less prone".
Liberals have the Orwellian twisting of language down to an art form.
I don't know if you're trying to be clever or this is just a typo, but the actual phrase is "Eminent domain". The phrase you wrote implies that the government will definitely be seizing our private property eventually, and it is therefore imminent.
Actually... I think I prefer it your way after all.
Be that as it may, the left doesn’t have an exclusive on euphemisms, contrary to what the author implies.
How many examples would it take to convince you that no one has a monopoly on virtue? Only the kool-aid besotted see themselves and, by extension, fellow believers and their institutions as selfless saviors out to do nothing but good.
How about the Patriot Act, which is a tool for doing unpatriotic things to Americans?
No Child Left Behind — the federalization of K-12, which leaves behind children’s education.
Sending prisoners to countries that torture — rendition.
Faith-Based Initiatives — taxpayer funding of religious endeavors.
Compassionate conservatism — liberalism.
Feel free to add your own.
It's sad to see such a great one as Sowell make such a basic error. In Kelo the majority upheld precedent going back to the 1800s on the meaning of public use. They have long deferred to the states to decide for themselves what it means to take for public use. The Court did not "change" anything in this ruling.
It was the "conservative minority" who pushed the radical agenda in that case. O'Connor's take was especially stupid when she wrote the beneficiaries [of the decision] are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms as if that weren't true of 99% of all government action.
I disagree with your assessment. I did NOT say anyone had a monopoly on virtue. YOU said that. I did not say conservatives DO NOT use this approach. YOU said conservatives were “no less prone” to resorting to this, which, in my experience, is clearly false.
For example, you use the Patriot Act as an example. Do you have any idea what the “Patriot Act” IS? Do you know why it is named the “Patriot Act”?
Just so you know, “PATRIOT” is an acronym for “Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism”. It is an acronym, something the government uses frequently.
And by the way, I support the concept behind the Patriot Act.
And so on. Your comments in your first paragraph are redolent of moral relativism.
I agree with that nobody has a monopoly on virtue, but not with your specific examples. Said examples are generally of Republican bills, rather than conservative ideas, other than “compassionate conservatism” which, if it is a euphemism, is a clumsy one, since it implies that conservatism is not intrinsically compassionate and needs modification to be such. In fact, that was President Bush’s point in using the term-— he did think conservatism needed to be modified, that it shouldn’t seek to “balance the budget on the backs of the poor”.
“Rendition” isn’t a euphemism-— it’s a word with a specific meaning that can’t be spelled out by politicians for national security rather rhetorical purposes-— and it’s been the practice of Democratic and Republican administrations alike.
“Faith-based initiative” didn’t describe public funding of religious endeavors, but the government doing some funding, but mostly getting out of the way of religious institutions doing public endeavors, i.e. feeding the hungry. I suppose you could have called it “Faith based institution” iniative, but such nit-picking makes for clunky exposition.
Your description of “No Child Left Behind”, which I know Sowell was against, is similarly inapt. The title of the act refers to its purpose, not to whether that purpose was fulfilled, which is of course a matter of dispute.
In short, your criticisms miss the point of what a euphemism is. I suspect that, while Sowell would disagree with you (as I do) on the Patriot Act’s effects, he might agree it stands as your one good example.
However, the fact is, is that bills by their nature have more than one name— the official, bureaucratic one, and the popular one. This is different from changing the language around a general practice or aspect of society or government into soundbites for political purposes.
Nor does Sowell decry this practice-— he is merely pointing out that the right has to catch up to the left in it, in the area of economics. You’ve confused Sowell’s point, which was not about Conservatives or Democrats, but Left and Right. Can you think of similar “rightwing” soundbites in the area of economics? Maybe a few, but in general, I at least can’t-— if I could, I’d use them more.
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