unSpun

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Authors: Brooks Jackson
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somehow move from governmental control to private ownership, which wasn’t at all what Bush was proposing. At a time when massive corporate fraud was being exposed at Enron and other major corporations, and the stock market had taken a huge dive, “privatizing” even part of one’s retirement nest egg was a frightening idea; it implied taking the retirement program out of the hands of the government and turning it over to Wall Street speculators. In 2002, CNN correspondent John King asked the president about “your plan to partially privatize Social Security,” and Bush protested: “We call them personal savings accounts, John.”
    Bush, of course, was trying to frame the issue his way; calling the accounts “personal savings” made it sound as though the owners would control their retirement money themselves, as they would a checking account. In fact, the accounts Bush eventually proposed allowed only a handful of investment choices, with little or no choice in how money could be paid out at retirement. Both sides used misleading words in the debate, but Bush’s nomenclature didn’t catch on. When he made a strong push for passage in 2005, opponents kept calling the plan “privatization,” and the idea was quietly dropped for lack of support. The issue had not been framed as Bush wished, as one of potential gain for younger workers. It had been framed as one of potential loss for Social Security beneficiaries generally.
    George Lakoff, a professor of linguistics at the University of California–Berkeley, has argued in a best-selling book,
Don’t Think of an Elephant,
that conservatives have been far better than liberals at framing issues in this way. He says that President Bush successfully framed the tax debate by talking about “tax relief,” as though taxes were an affliction, rather than “your membership dues in America,” as Lakoff would prefer. He also cites Bush’s use of terms such as “compassionate conservatism” and “No Child Left Behind” to make Republican policies more palatable to swing voters. “This is the use of Orwellian language—language that means the opposite of what it says—to appease people in the middle,” he argues.
    Lakoff’s solution, however, is more such language—from the left. His Rockridge Institute is working on a “Handbook for Progressives” to assist his side. Even that title is instructive: note that the term “progressive” sets us up to think of people in favor of “progress,” advancing toward a bright future. Had he called it a “Handbook for Liberals” he would have used a more neutral term—but one that has lost popularity.
    For the ordinary citizen or voter, the important thing is to recognize that both sides try to use words that we’ll automatically accept or reject without thinking too much. Indeed, sometimes just choosing a word means choosing sides. When discussing abortion, which word do you choose, “fetus” or “baby”? Are you “pro-choice” or “pro-life”? But there’s generally much more to any issue than a name or a slogan can tell us. Judging an issue or a product by its name is as foolish as judging a book by its cover. Better to say to yourself, “Okay, that’s what they want me to think. Now what’s the rest of the story?”
    TRICK #3:
Weasel Words
    A NYONE WHO HAS GONE TO A SALE AT A RETAIL STORE IS FAMILIAR with the principle of “weasel words.” Weasel words suck the meaning out of a phrase or sentence, the way that weasels supposedly suck the contents out of an egg, leaving only a hollow shell. In “Up to 50 percent off,” the empty shell of a phrase is “50 percent off,” the weasel words are “up to.” “Fifty percent off” means half price, period. Having added the words “Up to,” the store can

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