Rhetorical Flourishes

The Metastasis Continues

2009-11-05T08:26:00.000-08:00

In the field of rhetoric the term Metastasis is the transference of "blame from one person to another." In a Reuters article today entitled "One year on, Obama cites struggle with Bush legacy" we see that the President continues to blame his lack of concrete accomplishment on his predecessor. Maybe it's tiem he does as mark Steyn suggested and appoint a Blame Czar.

Cross Words Acrostic

2009-10-30T05:38:00.000-07:00

Numerous are stories of legislators sneaking pork barrel projects and giveaways into bills when they think no one is looking. Below we find a tacky twist on this old trick: the Governor giving a legislator the verbal middle finger when someone is looking:

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has made American political discourse a little cruder – which is saying something. As California journalists noted, he sneaked an obscene acrostic into a veto message. The first letters of the middle paragraphs lined up to spell “F*** you.” A spokesperson for the governor half-heartedly suggested that it was a coincidence. Yeah, right. The odds against those seven letters appearing in that specific order by chance are 8,031,810,176 to one.

The Governator should be ashamed of himself.

From Metaphor to Metastasis

2009-10-25T09:14:00.001-07:00

In an article entitled Barack Obama must stop campaigning and start governing, the Telegraph (UK) takes note of this decidedly unbecoming shift in President Obama's rhetorical style.

Essentially, however, Mr Obama won because of his persona – post-racial, healing, cool, articulate and inspirational. In a sense, therefore, his greatest achievement in life is being Barack Obama. Or the campaign version, at least.

Therein lies the problem. While campaigning could centre around soaring rhetoric, governing is altogether messier. It involves tough, unpopular choices and cutting deals with opponents. It requires doing things rather than talking about them, let alone just being.

There is nothing new in this criticism. Pundits mostly from the right-of-center have complained for months of Obama's permanent campaign. In doing so several have repeated the old saw about campaigning in poetry and governing in prose. Now, though they don't use exactly that term, commentators are taking note of the substitution of metaphor with metastasis:

Now, he is stumping for Democratic candidates in states he won last year but which are now in danger. ... And as he always does, Mr Obama blamed every economic woe on the Bush years, conveniently forgetting that Republicans are no longer in office and it's been his mess for nine months now.

The most widely accepted definition of "metastasis" is one that describes a pathological state, specifically the "transmission of pathogenic microorganisms or cancerous cells from an original site to one or more sites elsewhere in the body." In texts on rhetoric the term refers to the transference of "blame from one person to another". If this finger pointing and blame-gaming by the administration continues, it may become as a cancer on the body politic.

Why Some Bay State Gays & Lesbians Voted for Obama

2009-10-23T20:09:00.000-07:00

The Boston Heraled explains why many on the left in the bluest state in the US are not feeling the love:

Gays and lesbians are furious with Obama for forsaking campaign vows to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act and the ban on gays serving openly in the military.
About 150 members of gay marriage advocate Join the Impact-MA plan to converge on the Hub hotel to give the commander in chief an earful.
“I voted for him because of his speeches and rhetoric and his promises,” said Paul Sousa, the group’s co-founder. “I thought he’d act on those promises.”

Peggy Noonan on something Obama dropped

2009-10-23T19:56:00.000-07:00

Peggy Noonan is not impressed with Obama's dropping of the "g"

This is not a sign of confidence. Nor were the president's comments to a New York fund-raiser this week. Democrats, he said to the Democratic audience, are "an opinionated bunch." They always have a lot of thoughts and views. Republicans, on the other hand—"the other side"—aren't really big on independent thinking. "They just kinda sometimes do what they're told. Democrats, y'all thinkin' for yourselves." It is never a good sign when the president gets folksy, dropping his g's, because he is by nature not a folksy g-dropper but a coolly calibrating intellectual who is always trying to guess, as most politicians do, what normal people think. When Mr. Obama gets folksy he isn't narrowing his distance from his audience but underlining it. He shouldn't do this.

George Will on the Obama's Rhetorical Strategy at the IOC

2009-10-06T19:45:00.000-07:00

President Obama is known as a capable and inspiring orator. George Will notes that curiously little has been said about the rhetoric employed in the President and the First Lady's speeches to the IOC.

In the Niagara of words spoken and written about the Obamas' trip to Copenhagen, too few have been devoted to the words they spoke there. Their separate speeches to the International Olympic Committee were so dreadful, and in such a characteristic way, that they might be symptomatic of something that has serious implications for American governance.
Both Obamas gave heartfelt speeches about . . . themselves. Although the working of the committee's mind is murky, it could reasonably have rejected Chicago's bid for the 2016 Games on aesthetic grounds -- unless narcissism has suddenly become an Olympic sport.

And what made these speeches narcissistic?

In the 41 sentences of her remarks, Michelle Obama used some form of the personal pronouns "I" or "me" 44 times. Her husband was, comparatively, a shrinking violet, using those pronouns only 26 times in 48 sentences. Still, 70 times in 89 sentences conveyed the message that somehow their fascinating selves were what made, or should have made, Chicago's case compelling.

But those are not the only problems Will detected. There was also the overdose of hackneyed cliches:

The president told the Olympic committee that:

"At this defining moment," a moment "when the fate of each nation is inextricably linked to the fate of all nations" in "this ever-shrinking world," he aspires to "forge new partnerships with the nations and the peoples of the world."

Good grief. The memory of man runneth not to a moment that escaped being declared "defining" -- declared such by someone seeking to inflate himself by inflating it. Also, enough already with the "shrinking" world, which has been so described at least since Magellan set sail, and probably before that. And by the way, the "fate" of -- to pick a nation at random -- Chile is not really in any meaningful sense "inextricably linked" to that of, say, Chad.

And then there were things that Will thought were logically and empirically indefensible:

Becoming solemn in Copenhagen, Obama said: "No one expects the Games to solve all our collective problems." That's right, no one does. So why say that? Then, shifting into the foggy sentimentalism of standard Olympics blather, he said "peaceful competition between nations represents what's best about our humanity" and "it brings us together" and "it helps us to understand one another." Actually, sometimes the Olympic Games are a net subtraction from international comity. ...
It was gallant of the president to say to the Olympic committee that Michelle is "a pretty big selling point for the city." Gallant, but obviously untrue. And -- this is where we pass from the merely silly to the ominous -- suppose the president was being not gallant but sincere.

George Will on Obama's Olympics Rhetoric

2009-10-05T02:18:00.000-07:00

UN-Original Speech: Recycled Rhetoric from Obama's Inaugural Address Used in his UN Speech

2009-09-26T00:42:00.000-07:00

There is a perfect parallel between the opening sentence of Obama's Inaugural Address and the second sentence in his recent speech at the UN.

Inaugural Address: I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.

UN Speech: I come before you humbled by the responsibility that the American people have placed upon me, mindful of the enormous challenges of our moment in history, and determined to act boldly and collectively on behalf of justice and prosperity at home and abroad.

This level of similarity does not happen by accident. Clearly, both sentences feature the same three-fold parallelism, as discussed here. Given the identical structure, one might reasonably conclude that (1) the same hand is at work and (2) that he/she is pleased enough with the opening of the Inaugural Address that it was intentionally recycled for the UN speech. Not that there is anything wrong with this. It's just an observation.

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentences 10-13

2009-09-21T09:21:00.000-07:00

[10] Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. [11] Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. [12] Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. [13] Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

The most notable figures of speech here are Anaphora, "repetition of the same word or group of words at the beginning of successive clauses, sentences, or lines" and Parallelism, "similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses."

Anaphora is a very frequently used figure of speech. Martin Luther King's use of it in the "I Have a Dream" speech was masterful. Obama and/or his speech writer don't rise to that level here, but still what we see is very skilful indeed.

Specifically what we see is that sentences 10 and 11 begin with the word "Our"-- "Our nation is at war..." and "Our economy is badly weakened..." These sentences stress what wrong, what's lacking or missing. Anaphora, the repetition. underscores this. Sentence 12 takes a pause from the repetition in form--it does not begin with "Our"-- but it continues the theme by repeating the problems by which we are beset. Specifically we are told that "Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered."

This is wonderfully constructed. The sentence is in three parts, all in parallel, all brief--homes lost, jobs shed, businesses shuttered. The terminal consonants are all the same--lost, shed, shuttered. This is called Consonance, they reverse of Alliteration. Also, the consonant is hard, and it's a "mute", i.e. a consonant that cannot be sounded at all without a vowel and which at the end of a syllable suddenly stops the breath.

More over, to underscore that something is amiss, we see that they feature Ellipsis, as well, i.e. the omission or suppression of parts of words or sentences." Specifically, the words "have been" are implied but not stated in the last two parts of the sentence. This may be taken to suggest that there are other problems known but not stated or that there the causes of these problems are known but not stated.

In sentence 13 we see a return to form--"Our health care is too costly; our schools fail to many..." And so there is a parallelism or correspondence here, as well. Two sentence begin with "our" then a pause that features paralellism and ellipsis and hard mute consonants--- and then two more sentences beginning with "our." And as if that were not enough, we see a final flourish at the end with "Our" used twice more--"and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet."

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 9

2009-09-17T21:18:00.002-07:00

[9]That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. [10] Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. [11] Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. [12] Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. [13] Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

Sentence 9 reads: "That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood." This is a topic sentence and an assertion of fact. The sentences that follow expound on the nature of the crisis we are "understood" to be experiencing. The sentence itself is poorly constructed from a metrical standpoint. It appears to begin in iambic meter, i.e. an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one:

"That we are in the midst of cri-sis is now..."

The problem comes with the last two words "..well understood." If the former had been omitted, then the meter would be iambic hexameter

In the strictest and most literal sense, the "well" that has been inserted throws off the meter. And for anyone reading the words syllable-by-syllable might have stumbled here. But Obama doesn't. There is a very deft and subtle inflection that gets him out of what might have been a jam for a less-capable orator.

If you click click here and listen to this sentence (it's at the 2:06 mark), you can hear for yourself that he paused by did not stuble on the words. What he does is take a caesura, i.e. "a break or pause (usually for sense) in the middle of a verse line." And it comes at a very interesting place, right after the word "crisis." Pausing here surely serves to underscore the import of that word. But what is really interesting is what comes next.

First note that "crisis" is a two-syllable word, the first of which is stressed, i.e. cri-sis. And it followed by the two-letter word "is", the same two letters with which "crisis" ends and which are not part stressed.

Here's what's really interesting. The syllable "-sis" is not stressed in "crisis." And by the metrical pattern laid down already, the word "is" should be. That is to say, we should see this "...cri-sis is now.." but we don't. And if you listen carefully you see tht Obama glosses over the distinction between these two syllables. If you listening closely, he almost doesn't form the word "is", as he trails off after "crisis" he barely fills the auditory gap with "is."

This ellision allows him to resume the metrical pattern as follows "...cri-sis [is] now well un-der-stood." Here the words "now" is stressed and the sentence has a masculine ending, i.e. ends with a stressed syllable, "stood." So end the end we have this iambic line of seven feet.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

The structure and meter of this sentence stress the ideas that Obama goes on to emphasize in the four remaining sentences of this paragraph. Even if you don't buy what he's selling, it's important to recognize he's doing a good sales job.

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 7-8

2009-09-16T07:32:00.000-07:00

Sentence 7: So it has been.

Sentence 8: So it must be with this generation of Americans.

As noted in the analysis of Sentence 4, three types of Parallelism are found repeatedly in this speech: synonymous (tides & waters); antithetic (rising vs. still), and constructive, i.e. the same grammatical structure. The latter is most evident when Sentences 7 and 8 are examined together. The grammatical structure of Sentence 7 is Adverb-pronoun-auxiliary verb-infinitive. Specifically, that works out to be "So-it-has-been" in the first sentence and "So it must be" in the first four words of the second sentence.

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 6

2009-02-06T00:18:00.001-08:00

Sentence 6: At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears, and true to our founding documents.

I was at first puzzled by the lack of perfect parallelism in the final two phrases:

faithful to the ideals of our forbears
true to [ ] our founding documents

Obviously the phrases "faithful to" and "true to" exhibit parallels in structure and sense given that "faithful" and "true" are synonyms. Similarly, the noun phrases "our forbears" and "our founding documents" are also parallel, but less exactly so. They begin with the same word but the second includes an adjective "founding" which the former lacks. Perhaps the alliteration between "forbears" and "founding" is adequate compensation. But still, to my eyes and ears, it seems that something is missing after the word "to" in the second phrase.

Whether something has been omitted by design or by neglect is, of course, open to interpretation. And if it is by design, there is further subjectivity involved in ascertaining what was elided. The figure of speech known as Ellipsis is invaluable in making this determination.

By the figure of speech known as Simple Repetitive Ellipsis we ask whether a noun (or noun phrase) from a preceding (or ensuing) phrase (or clause) should be repeated in the empty slot. One obvious candidate would be the word "vision" used earlier in this sentence. If this is what is intended, then we understand the sentence as if it read as follows:

At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears, and true to [the vision of] our founding documents.

By the Relative Ellipsis we can have a missing noun implied by an existing verb, e.g. paint and painter or race and racer. The most obvious choice here would be to use the verb "true" and take "truth" to be omitted. If so, then Sentence 6 should be understood as if it read as follows:

At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears, and true to [the truth of] our founding documents.

By Absolute Ellipsis we have to infer the omitted words from the nature of the subject matter and the context. This can obviously be a very subjective exercise. One noun that could fill in the blank here is "intent" or perhaps the noun phrase "original intent." If the former of the two were implied then we would understand Sentence 6 as if it read as follows:

At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears, and true to [the intent of] our founding documents.

Again, there is no sure way to determine whether the omission was intended or not, and if intended what was meant to fill in the blanks. One figure of speech that was surely intended, however, is the use of the phrase "We the People" instead of "we citizens" or just "we." The name for this is "Antonomasia" or "Name Change" about which EW Bullinger said:

...when a name of some office, dignity, profession, science, or trade is used instead of the proper name of the person: e.g. when we speak of the Queen as Her Majesty, or of a nobleman as his lordship or when a wise man is called a Solon or a Solomon, etc. When we speak of David as "the Psalmist" or of Paul as "the Apostle" we use the figure Antonomasia. (Figures of Speech Used in the Bible, p. 682)

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 5

2009-02-05T23:34:00.000-08:00

Sentence 5: Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms.

As noted in the last installment of this series, Sentence 4 contains two metaphors- "rising tides of prosperity" and "still waters of peace." These were used to characterize times during which some of the other US presidents had take the oath. And taken together these metaphors work well because "peace" and "prosperity" are complementary terms. But they only tell half of the story; they are a "two-legged stool" for as we all know, history is comprised of good times and bad times. Thus, these two metaphors need their counterpart, the flip-side of the coin. Sentence 5 provides just that with the equally evocative phrases "gathering clouds" and "raging storms."

There is an important difference between the metaphors of sentence 4 and what we see in Sentence 5- Hypocatastasis. EW Bullinger defined and described this figures as follows:

Hypocatastasis is a figure of speech that by implication declares or implies a resemblance, representation or comparison. It differs from a metaphor, because in a metaphor the two nouns are both named and given; while, in hypocatastasis, only one is named and the other is implied, or as it were, is put down underneath out of sight. Hence hypocatastasis is an implied resemblance or representation: that is an implied simile or metaphor. A hypocatastasis has more force than a metaphor or simile, and expresses as it were a superlative degree of resemblance.

So in the phrases "gathering clouds'" and "raging storms" the antitheses of "peace" and "prosperity" are implied but not directly stated as "war" and "depression."

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 4

2009-02-02T22:28:00.000-08:00

Sentence 4: The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace.

This is the first attempt at metaphor. There are two examples: "rising tides of prosperity" and "still waters of peace." They are related to each other through three types of Parallelism: synonymous (tides & waters); antithetic (rising vs. still), and constructive, i.e. the same grammatical structure:

adjective (rising, still) +
noun (tides, waters) +
prepositional phrase (of prosperity, of peace)

We could further note that the object of the preposition, which is also the final word of the phrase, begins with the letter "p", thereby adding Alliteration to ways in which the words and phrases are related.

Although the imagery is clearly evocative, the thought is not complete. The problem, as I see it, lies largely with "prosperity" and "peace" being complements rather than opposites. Right now this sentence is a very attractive two-legged stool. There are two options: (1) add a third leg or (2) a third and fourth.

The former option could involve the use of tricolon, i.e. add a third parallel phrase like in the opening sentence, something that works the way melody-harmony-rhythm or father-mother-child or subject-verb-object all work together.

The latter option involves adding two new phrases, each one antithetical to the two already in place. The problem with this option is that it can make the sentence run-on. The best move is to add them into the next sentence. As we will see from the analysis of Sentence 5, this is exactly what the Obama speech-writers chose to do.

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 3

2009-01-31T00:18:00.000-08:00

Sentence 3: Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath.

The consonant "f" clearly stands out in the first words of the sentence. Obviously, there is Alliteration involving "f" (Forty-four). There is also consonantal echo, defined by Turco as the "repetition of consonant sounds, whether stressed or unstressed, anywhere among the words of poems." The echo is found the word "have", the terminal consonant of which is very similar in sound to "f" (Forty-four...have)

There is also consonantal echo involving the letter "n" (Americans have now taken
the presidential...)

Above the "sonic" level we have two very important figures of speech here, the first of which is Meiosis, defined by EW Bullinger as "the belittling of one thing to magnify another." What is being belittled is Obama himself; he is intentionally downplaying or diminishing the significance of his accomplishment. What is being magnified is the tradition to which he has become heir, the illustrious and exclusive "club" which he has joined. If he had said "I am now the 44th American to taken the presidential oath" it would have been a factually correct statement and conveyed the same literal truth; but it would not be Meiosis.

Association, defined by Bullinger as "When the speaker associates himself with those whom he addresses, or of whom he speaks" is again present here. There is also a little something added, a subtle rebuke of the people who question both Obama's patriotism, his citizenship, and his fitness for office because of some circumstances of his birth.

The audience knows Obama has taken the oath of office; they know that only Americans are allowed to take the oath of office. Obama here has subtlely reminded his listeners, particular the American ones, and especially certain detractors, that he is one of them- an American. We might also call this Syllogismus or Omission of the Conclusion, a figure whereby "the conclusion, though implied, is unexpressed, in order to add emphasis to it."

Click here for an analysis of Sentence 4.

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 2

2009-01-28T19:32:00.000-08:00

Sentence 2: I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

In this sentence we find examples of two figure of pathos- Encomium and Eucharistia. The former refers to praise of "a person or thing, but occuring on a smaller scale than an entire speech." The person being praised, of course, is President Bush. Another definition stresses praise of "inherent qualities." Those qualities are generosity and cooperativeness.

The latter is defined as "giving thanks for a benefit received, sometimes adding ones ability to repay." Clearly the outgoing President's eight years of "service"are the benefit which has been received. Obama does not, however, employ any language suggesting an inability to "repay."

Another fine thing about this sentence is the use of the word "our." It shows that Obama, at least at this point in the speech, is keeping with the theme of association struck in the the three-word address ("My fellow citizens") and repeatedly in the first sentence. If Obama had wanted to distance himself further from Bush, he could have said "service to the nation."

This is classy. However, if later in the speech Obama can't resist the urge to get in jabs at the Bush, it will look much less so. If he commends what the outgoing administration has done correctly, it will look all the more classy.

Click here for the analysis of Sentence 3.

Rhetoric and Figures of Speech in Obama's Inaugural Address: Sentence 1

2009-01-25T23:30:00.000-08:00

Sentence 1: I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.

The most immediate and apparent figure of speech here is the tri-fold parallelism of three adverbial phrases:

humbled by the task
grateful for the trust
mindful of the sacrifices

The structure of these parallel phrases is adverb-preposition-definite article-noun.

We might also note two more subtle forms of parallelism combined with two other figures of repetition. As we can see the nouns in phrases 1 and 2 (task, trust) share the same initial consonant (Alliteration). The adverbs of the phrases 2 and 3 (grateful, mindful) share the same ending (Homoioteleuton).

humbled by the task
grateful for the trust
mindful of the sacrifices

Note as well the alternation here, the a1-b1-a2-b2 pattern, that is set up. task-grateful-trust-mindful

When we look at the phrases in their entirety, we see further combinations of parallelism, alliteration, and association.

humbled by the task before us,
grateful for the trust you have bestowed,
mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.

Obviously, there are three words beginning with "b" found in the latter half of each phrase (before, bestowed, borne). We also find in the second half the use of plural pronouns. EW Bullinger might have called this "Association" where "the speaker associates himself with those whom he addresses, or of whom he speaks."

We find it in the words "us", the objective form of "we", the 1st person plural. In the second phrase we have "you", clearly the second person plural. In the third we have our, the possessive form of "we". And here is chiastic pattern (a-b-a): 1st person (us/we)- 2nd person (you)- 1st person (our/we).

This use of plural pronouns also serves to reinforce "Association" evident in the opening three words: "My fellow citizens."

Substantively, the heart of the three phrases are the initial nouns- task, trust, and sacrifices. Subsequent analyses will consider if and how these ideas are reinforced. What can and should be noted here is that of the three, the last is surely not the least. All three are emphasized, but not in the same manner. Recall that "task" and "trust" are linked by Alliteration. The third word, "sacrifices" would seem to stand on its own. Yet, when the meter of these phrases is considered, we see that it is actually strongly emphasized.

humbled by the task before us
grateful for the trust you have bestowed
mindful of the sacrifices borne by our an-cestors.

In the above lines the boldface has been added to that syllables that naturally receive stress. The meter of these lines is predominantly trochaic, i.e. the stress falls on the first of each two-syllable pairs. Notably, each of the three keywords - task, trust, and sacrifices- are placed in the line such that their stressed syllables is aligned with the meter of the preceding words.

The last of the these three parallel phrases is slightly off, however. The word "ancestors" has the stress on the first syllable; but given the rhythm that has been established, we'd not expect stress there. One option is simply to not stress "our", which makes sense given that the other "associated" words (us, you) have not been stressed. Given the relative lack of stress on these words, as well as the clear emphasis on "task", "trust", and "sacrifices", the phrases could be reduced to:

humbled by the task ahead
grateful for the trust bestowed
mindful of the sacrifices borne by our forebears.

If it is deemed desirable to keep the "association" then the phrases then only the last line need be changed:

humbled by the task before us
grateful for the trust you have bestowed
mindful of the sacrifices borne by our forebears.

With or without my proposed edits, it is worth noting the increasing length of these three phrases: the third is longer than the second which, in turn, is longer then the first. This gives more emphasis to "sacrifices" than "trust", and more to "trust" than to the "task." This is an example of what EW Bullinger termed "anabasis" or "gradual ascent", defined as "an increase of emphasis or sense in successive" sentences, clauses, or phrases. It is tempting at this point to say that, intended or not, "sacrifices" is the keynote of this sentence and, by extension, the speech as a whole.

On the whole this is an impressive first sentence- at least when considered in isolation. Much and much of import have been packed into it, a rightly so: it is the speech's topic sentence. To the degree that the rest of the speech reinforces the themes articulated here, the more successful is the speech.

Click here for the analysis of Sentence 2.

Reaction to the Rhetoric of Obama Inaugural Address

2009-01-20T22:25:00.000-08:00

I expect that reaction to the rhetoric in Obama's Inaugural Address will be mixed and possibly break down along party lines.

Michael Gerson writing in RealClearPolitics: "rhetorically flat and substantively interesting."

Peter Robinson (Forbes): "At Best Obama's Speech Earns a "B"

John B. Judis (The New Republic): "A Disappointing Hodgepodge"

Noam Scheiber (The New Republic): "Solid Themes, But No Style Point"

Yuval Levin (National Review): "surprisingly flatly written and uninspired speech"

Ed Pilkington (The Guardian): "Words of History...written by a 27-year-old in Starbucks."

Paul Kengor (American Thinker): "Curious"

John Heilemann (New York Magazine): "Spare Inaugural Rhetoric Signals Strategic Mastery"

Edward Hudgins (The Atlas Society): "Mixed"

Ian Griffin (Professionally Speaking) "measured... somber...hopeful"

Judith Fischer (Brandeis Law School Blog): "effective use of rhetorical devices and figures of speech."

From Frum

2009-01-18T23:09:00.001-08:00

In a Newsweek column entitled "How the GOP can rise again", David Frum makes four points, the second of which is:

2. Republicans need to modulate our social and cultural message. Not jettison. Not reverse. Modulate. For example: we are a pro-life party, but every Republican platform since 1980 has gone much further, calling for a federal constitutional amendment to ban all abortions in all states under almost all circumstances. We don't mean it. We don't act on it. Yet we keep saying it.

I don't know what it is called, but I recognize that Frum seeks to underscore his point by following it with three short emphatic "sentences." I put that word in quotes because clearly they are not grammatical- something Frum clearly intended for emphasis.

Emphasis is increased by the use of Anaphora, the "repetition of the same word or group of words at the beginning of successive clauses, sentences, or lines" (Not jettison. Not reverse. )
These two short sentences are clearly parallel in structure- the word "Not" followed by the infinitive form of a verb (jettison, reverse).

The use of two "negatives" in such a short space is what EW Bullinger called "Repeated Negation" or "Many Noes", "the repetition of two or more negatives for the sake of emphasis."

Of course the word "not" is being used here to contrast "jettison" and "reverse" with "modulate"- a clear example of Antithesis.

The third sentence in the series is a single word "Modulate.", the same word that appeared in the middle of the sentence that preceded the series. This could be an example of Epanalepsis, "repetition at the end of a line, phrase, or clause of the word or words that occurred at the beginning of the same line, phrase, or clause."

Hill Figures

2009-01-17T21:55:00.001-08:00

There are several figures of speech contained in this excerpt from Senator Hillary Clinton's confirmation hearing:

The president-elect and I believe that foreign policy must be based on a marriage of principles and pragmatism, not rigid ideology. On facts and evidence, not emotion or prejudice. Our security, our vitality, and our ability to lead in today's world oblige us to recognize the overwhelming fact of our interdependence.

The words "principles" and "pragmatisim" are an example of Antithesis, the "juxtaposition of contrasting ideas or words." In a rather nice flourish, the "marriage" of these two words are then contrasted with the phrase "rigid ideology."

The next line echoses the same ideas but not in a similar , though not precisely parallel, fashion: "facts and evidence" are contrasted with "emotion or prejudice."

In the third sentence we see first the repetition of the same word at the beginning of three successive phrases (Anaphora), "Our security, our vitality, and our ability..." Also we see that the three nouns that are qualifed by "our" have same ending. Because they are in a parallel position, this would be an example of the figure Homoioteleuton.

At the end of the sentence we find a phrase ("our interdependence.") that parallels the one with which the sentence began ("Our security..."). This is known as Epanalepsis, "Repetition at the end of a line, phrase, or clause of the word or words that occurred at the beginning of the same line, phrase, or clause."

Now in the unlikely event that should one read the entire transcript, it is immediately apparenet that that Senator Clinton has made abundant use of the word "our": it appears 126 times throughout her prepared remarks. The word "we" is used 86 times, "us" another nine, and "ourselves" just two. Two figures of speech are apparent. The first is Repetitio, defined by EW Bullinger as "repetition of the same word or words irregularly in the same passage." Or we migh refer to it as Traductio, repeating the same word variously throughout a sentence or thought.

The use of "our" plus several others so closely related could be an example Synonymia, "the repetition of similar in sense but different in sound and origin." In a few cases, it could be an example of Paregmenon, the repetition of words derived from the same root, or Polyptoton, the repetition of the same part of speech in different inflections.

Finally we should make note of the content of this oft-repeated word. All of this first-person plural, all this we, our, ours, ourselves, and us is used, one presumes, to emphasize unity and community, not isolation and division. And Senator Clinton sees herself as one of this number, this greater whole- perhaps as a first among equals. We might call all of this an example of Assocation or Inclusion where "the speaker associates himself with those whom he addresses, or of whom he speaks."

On and on and on: Polysyndeton

2006-12-26T20:12:00.000-08:00

Here is the opening paragraph of a recent Washington Post article entitled "Ethiopians Closing In On Capital Of Somalia" :

Ethiopian troops fought their way closer to the Somali capital of Mogadishu on Tuesday, pushing back militias loyal to the Islamic Courts movement that has until now controlled much of the country and vowed to wage a guerrilla war against Ethiopia lasting "years and years and years."

The phrase "years and years and years" is an example of the figure of speech known as polysyndeton, the use of "several conjunctions in close succession, especially where some might be omitted."

Commentary

Of Polysyndeton, EW Bullinger wrote:

(when we find) “many-ands” there is never any climax at the end. Instead of hurrying us on, breathlessly, to reach the important conclusion; we are asked to stop at each point, to weigh each matter that is presented to us, and to consider each particular that is thus added and emphasized.

Thus, by their use of the phrase "years and years and years" it seems that the Union of Islamic Courts means to emphasize the duration of the war they intend to wage rather than its ferocity.

Tags: somalia | ethiopia | | polysyndeton | rhetoric | figures of speech

Egyptian Kangaroos

2006-02-21T23:01:00.000-08:00

The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) provides this excerpt of "a mock trial of U.S. President Bush, British PM Blair, and Israeli PM Sharon, staged by the Union of Arab Lawyers and aired on Al-Jazeera TV on February 2-5, 2006. "

Secretary-General of the Union of Arab Lawyers Ibrahim Al-Simlali: "Humanity is in a transitional phase in which chaos reigns in the world order.The U.S. is trying to control the world, using the law of power instead of the power of the law. The U.S. is also trying to impose its will on the international legitimacy [i.e. the U.N.]. This policy - which primarily targets Arabs and Muslims - and the negation of our identity by implementing the so-called Greater Middle East plan,which is spearheaded by the Zionist entity , sums up, to a great extent, the philosophy of the administration of philosophy of George Bush Jr. This philosophy is based on the belief in superiority over the rest of mankind, on America's right to subjugate humanity and to plunder its natural resources, and is based on America's opportunity to sit on [the throne] of the world, as an absolute dictator that has the right to annihilate whoever strives for freedom and dignity, and refuses to be a slave."

There are several figures of speech in the above exceprt. Two especially caught my attention: Antimetabole and Periphrasis. The former is defined as "the repetition of words, in successive clauses, in reverse grammatical order."

the law of power instead of the power of the law.

One of the most popular uses of this figure comes from a spech by late president John F. Kennedy who said:

Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.

If we learn anything from this example, it is that the same rhetorical devices are neutral. The same device can be used to advance both great ideals and absolute hogwash.

The second figure in question, Periphrasis , is defined as "the substitution of a descriptive word or phrase for a proper name." It is used here in a rather unflattering way, one which reveals much about the motivations of the lawyers and political figures convening the trial in question. Instead of referring to Israel by its proper name, it is called "the Zionist entity." Clearly, doing so denies Israel the legitimacy and legal standing that so much of the rest of the world accords it. Regardless of what one thinks about Israel, there's no denying that the substitution of "the Zionist entity" instead of its name is both intentional and meaningful. The only thing I can't figure out is why the "trial" wasn't staged in Australia rather than Egypt- it's clearly a kangaroo court.

Tags: israel | egypt | trial |

Identical Endings, Deadly Seriousness

2005-06-15T14:12:00.000-07:00

The title of Nicolas Kristof's recent NY Times article, Raped, Kidnapped, and Silenced employs Homoeoteleuton, i.e. similar or identical word endings. he also employes it inthe article's opening paragraph:

No wonder the Pakistan government can't catch Osama bin Laden. It is too busy harassing, detaining - and now kidnapping - a gang-rape victim for daring to protest and for planning a visit to the United States.

Last fall I wrote about Mukhtaran Bibi, a woman who was sentenced by a tribal council in Pakistan to be gang-raped because of an infraction supposedly committed by her brother. Four men raped Ms. Mukhtaran, then village leaders forced her to walk home nearly naked in front of a jeering crowd of 300.

Ms. Mukhtaran was supposed to have committed suicide. Instead, with the backing of a local Islamic leader, she fought back and testified against her persecutors. Six were convicted.

Then Ms. Mukhtaran, who believed that the best way to overcome such abuses was through better education, used her compensation money to start two schools in her village, one for boys and the other for girls. She went out of her way to enroll the children of her attackers in the schools, showing that she bore no grudges.

All of this was fine with the government until:

A group of Pakistani-Americans invited Ms. Mukhtaran to visit the U.S. starting this Saturday. Then a few days ago, the Pakistani government went berserk.

On Thursday, the authorities put Ms. Mukhtaran under house arrest - to stop her from speaking out. In phone conversations in the last few days, she said that when she tried to step outside, police pointed their guns at her. To silence her, the police cut off her land line.

After she had been detained, a court ordered her attackers released, putting her life in jeopardy. That happened on a Friday afternoon, when the courts do not normally operate, and apparently was a warning to Ms. Mukhtaran to shut up. Instead, Ms. Mukhtaran continued her protests by cellphone. But at dawn yesterday the police bustled her off, and there's been no word from her since. Her cellphone doesn't answer.

What makes the use of "similar or identical endings" such an effective rhetorical strategy here is how it highlights Ms. Mukhtaran's refusal to let her life story from have an ending similar to that of other Pakistani women. Here's a link to the organization that invited Ms. Muhktaran to the US. They have information on how we can help give this story a different ending.

Hype(rbole) and Tripe from the Jackson Camp

2005-06-14T16:42:00.000-07:00

As everyone on the planet now knows, pop icon Michael Jackson was found "not guilty" on all 10 child-molestation related charges he faced. He was not found "innocent" as many supporters have declared. For what it is worth, there's a big difference.. Understandably, many of Jackson's family members are elated about the outcome of the trial. Jermain Jackson engaged in some understandable hyperbole on Larry King last night, saying:

"Like we always felt from the very beginning and knew, he was one thousand percent innocent," he said. "It takes one person to tell the truth, but it takes many to concoct a lie."

I also found several aspect of the second part of his remarks intriguing. The rhetoric is clumsy: while triple antithesis often sounds good, here the opposition of "one person" "tell" and "truth" with "many" "concoct" and "lie" just rings hollow. And for good reason: it is demonstrably false.

Second, I searched google for several variants of "one person to tell the truth" + lie and got back very little: the only person who is seems to have ever said this is Jermaine Jackson, someone who seems like a decent individual, but certainly is not to be mistaken for a astute observer of the human condition, let alone a profound moral philosopher. After all, if he were, he could have pressed some of those talents into use with his younger sibling(s). Reading that statement did lead me to wonder if this was the kind of nonsense and illogic that passed for moral instruction in the Jackson household. If so, it would explain alot, an awful lot.

I don't have any expectation that bon mot not will ever be repeated by anyone else besides Jermaine. And from him, I expect to hear it alot. The number of times he's said it suggests that he's clearly smitten by it.

Beginning of the Endings

2005-06-13T18:45:00.000-07:00

A few years ago I heard a hilarious send up of civil rights activist, professional provacatuer, race baiter and all-around gadfly Jesse Jackson. In it, virtually every other word ended with -ation. If it wasn't this one , it was one alot like it:

My dearest congregation: During an NAACP celebration for a victory over discrimination - where I felt righteous indignation - for my brothers in this troubled nation, in the heat of my elation (after several strong libations) due to my intoxication..

The figure of speech which was employed here is known formally as Homoeoteleuton, similar or identical endings. I found another humorous use of that figure recently about an individual who is even more well-known than Mr. Jackson, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. The event that occasioned the use of this rhetorical device was today's announcement that Governon S. has called for a special election in California this fall.

The SF Chronicle compiled reactions to the announcement from several California politicians. The one that caught my eye is by Tom Lantos who riffed on the ending of Arnold's most famous role, The Terminator, as well as his political nickname, the Governator:

"It's especially outrageous that the idea arises from the man who went to Washington in October 2003 bragging that he would be the "collectinator," using his newfound clout to scoop up federal funds for state projects, a promise that turned out to be merely rhetorical. Now that he's ready to be such a spendthrift, he should call himself the 'profligator.'" — U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Burlingame.

Should Arnold fail in his attempts turn California's budget crisis around, you can expect to see a lot of piling on by the state's political and media establishment, accompanied, to be sure, by a heavy helping of Homoeoteleuton.

Who and What is Extreme

2005-06-13T02:38:00.000-07:00

Colin McNickle, writing in the Pittsburg Tribune Review, examines the rhetoric and underlying logic of comments made by newly appointed Federal Appeals Court Judge Janice Rogers Brown, comments that have driven her detractors to distraction and given them cause to label her an "extremist". According to McNickle, only a socialist, the real extremists, would be bothered by her ideas:

To get a starkly disturbing idea of how deeply American liberals have failed in understanding, honoring and executing the Founders' republican mission, all one has to do is, amazingly, look at the front page of last Thursday's New York Times.
David D. Kirkpatrick offers a stellar profile of Janice Rogers Brown, a black "daughter of Alabama sharecroppers" finally confirmed the day before by the Senate to sit on the D.C. federal appeals bench.

Given the liberal bent of The Times, it would be easy to read the headline -- "Seeing slavery in liberalism" -- in the mocking tone that one normally associates with a leftist broadsheet's profile of a prominent conservative.

But a funny thing happened on the way to what normally would have been a hatchet job: The Times' showed Judge Rogers Brown's sight to be 20/20 while showing liberals to be suffering from macular degeneration.

Mr. Kirkpatrick quotes selectively, but quite nicely, from some of Rogers Brown's public comments. Among the best:

"In the heyday of liberal democracy, all roads lead to slavery."

"We no longer find slavery abhorrent. We embrace it."

"If we can invoke no ultimate limits on the power of government, a democracy is inevitably transformed into a kleptocracy -- a license to steal, a warrant for oppression."

In the first two quotes, Rogers Brown obviously is talking about how liberal social policies foster not independence but dependence and how they usually have the exact opposite effect of their promoter's "beneficent" purposes.
In the third quote, she's obviously talking about government as a maniacal Leviathan, and a leviathan with no constitutional warrant for most of what it does.
Yet, Kirkpatrick quickly notes, these are precepts that liberals cited as examples of Rogers Brown's "extremism."
How instructive. How sad. How frightening. Some of the fundamental building blocks of our constitutional republic are considered "extreme" by Democrats and their liberal moneybags.
Blogging on LewRockwell.com last month, poster William Anderson offered some other Rogers Brown quotes that had turned apoplectic the "progressives" (i.e., socialists) at People for the American Way. Please indulge me as I share some more of her "extremism":

"I have argued that collectivism was (and is) fundamentally incompatible with the vision that undergirded this country's founding. The New Deal, however, inoculated the federal Constitution with a kind of underground collectivist mentality. The Constitution itself was transmuted into a significantly different document."

"Some things are apparent. Where government moves in, community retreats, civil society disintegrates and our ability to control our own destiny atrophies. The result is: families under siege; war in the streets; unapologetic expropriation of property; the precipitous decline of the rule of law; the rapid rise of corruption; the loss of civility and the triumph of deceit."

"Where government advances -- and it advances relentlessly -- freedom is imperiled; community impoverished; religion marginalized and civilization itself jeopardized. ... When did government cease to be a necessary evil and become a goody bag to solve our private problems?"

"Government acts as a giant siphon, extracting wealth, creating privilege and power, and redistributing it."

And, finally, the complete second slavery quote that was truncated by The Times:
"(W)e no longer find slavery abhorrent. We embrace it. We demand more. Big government is not just the opiate of the masses. It is the opiate. The drug of choice for multinational corporations and single moms; for regulated industries and rugged Midwestern farmers and militant senior citizens."
These truths are self-evident. And it's pretty rough stuff -- for socialists, that is. The good judge's critics find such prose to be "extreme" because it is anathema to the collectivist mind-set of which Judge Rogers Brown warns.
A threatened socialist, of course, is a vindictive socialist. He rails and flails about "the system," its "failures" and its "lack of social justice." But the very "solutions" proposed by the socialist involve a wholesale dismantling of the best system ever devised to promote justice -- giving equal opportunity (not equal results, mind you) to those willing to work (versus those all too willing to work the system).
The socialists' solution is, in a word, a lie. And it's a prevarication with a long rap sheet -- history.
Janice Rogers Brown will spend the next several years cutting her federal teeth on one of the most important appellate courts in the land. And don't be at all surprised if she's someday nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court. She'd be a great addition to the high court. But attempts again will be made to cast her as an "extremist."
Perhaps by then good republicans will have reclaimed the word and expose the real extremists. Perhaps.

I am going to enjoy watching this...

Why Noonan Earns the Big Bucks

2005-06-10T12:26:00.000-07:00

In Thursday's Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan shows why she is one of the best opinion columnists in the country. In an article entitled "Seeing Red" she provides a beautiful illustration of what is wrong with the rhetoric of the current democratic party. Her are some excerpts:

...in some key ways in Washington, the most politically engaged individuals in both parties do not understand each other. This expresses itself in certain assumptions. Democrats think Republicans are mean. Republicans know Democrats are the mean party.

Knowing that, let's do a thought experiment. Close your eyes and imagine this.
President Bush is introduced at a great gathering in Topeka, Kan. It is the evening of June 9, 2005. Ruffles and flourishes, "Hail to the Chief," hearty applause from a packed ballroom. Mr. Bush walks to the podium and delivers the following address.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. I want to speak this evening about how I see the political landscape. Let me jump right in. The struggle between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party is a struggle between good and evil--and we're the good. I hate Democrats. Let's face it, they have never made an honest living in their lives. Who are they, really, but people who are intent on abusing power, destroying the United States Senate and undermining our Constitution? They have no shame.
But why would they? They have never been acquainted with the truth. You ever been to a Democratic fundraiser? They all look the same. They all behave the same. They have a dictatorship, and suffer from zeal so extreme they think they have a direct line to heaven. But what would you expect when you have a far left extremist base? We cannot afford more of their leadership. I call on you to help me defeat them!"
Imagine Mr. Bush saying those things, and the crowd roaring with lusty delight. Imagine John McCain saying them for that matter, or any other likely Republican candidate for president, or Ken Mehlman, the head of the Republican National Committee.
Can you imagine them talking this way? Me neither. Because they wouldn't.

Messrs. Bush, McCain, et al., would find talk like that to be extreme, damaging, desperate. They would understand it would tend to add a new level of hysteria to political discourse, and that's not good for the country. I think they would know such talk is unworthy in a leader, or potential leader, of a great democracy. I think they would understand that talk like that is destructive to the ties that bind--and to the speaker's political prospects.

Why don't Hillary Clinton and Howard Dean know this? And what does it mean that they do not know it?
For as you know, the color-coded phrases in the "Bush speech" above come from speeches and statements given by Sen. Clinton and Democratic chairman Dean recently. (Mrs. Clinton's comments are in green and Mr. Dean's in purple, and I changed "right" to "left.")

Clinton is likely the next Democratic nominee for president. Mr. Dean is the head of the Democratic Party. They are important and powerful. They may one day run the country. It is disturbing that they speak as they do.

How do people who are not part of the Democratic base react to their statements? I think something like this: What's wrong with these people? Don't they understand they lower things with their name calling and bitter language? If this is how they feel free to present themselves in public, what will they do and say in private if they ever run the country?

If Mr. Bush ever spoke this way, most Republicans would feel embarrassment. I would be among the legions who would denounce his statement. Democrats are half the country; it is offensive to label them as hateful, it's wrong. Even though we're torn by disagreements, there is an old and unspoken tradition that we're all in this together, we're all citizens together. It is destructive to act against this tradition.

One assumes all the media, especially the MSM, would treat the speech as if it were an epochal event in the Bush presidency, and the beginning of the end. They would say he was unleashing the dark forces of division; they would label his statement as manipulative, malevolent, immature.

And they'd be right.

The thing that I wondered when I read this passage was this: If this is what the rhetoric looks like with 3-1/2 years to go until the next election, what can we expect as it draws nearer? Can this kind of animus even be sustained for that long, and if so at what cost to the people using it? And finally, what proportion of the US voting age population is really inspired by this rhetoric. I pray that it is not as much and Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Dean believe.

EUrospeak

2005-06-10T08:10:00.000-07:00

Roger Scruton of National Review has an excellent article on the problems with the EU Constitution, particulary its misuse of language. Here's an excerpt describing the principle of "subsidiarity" which is supposed to govern the extent of the devolution of power to member states:

The malign spirit of Marxism has now fled from the European landscape, having stunted the growth of the disciplines on which it alighted, but leaving the rest to grow — so we hoped — in more humane and natural ways. Unfortunately our hopes were premature. For no sooner had Marxist Newspeak evaporated than Eurospeak — the official language of the European Union — came in place of it. Turn to that extraordinary document on which the future of Europe now depends — the official constitution of the European Union — and you will again see language used as it was used by the Communists, not to describe reality, but to subdue reality to a ruling purpose.
Take the critical term “subsidiarity,” with which the constitution promises to protect the vestiges of national sovereignty. This term invariably occurs in the vicinity of a seriously damaging question, namely: What remains of the democratic forms of government achieved by the nation-states when the EU takes charge of their legislation? The answer is that we must apply the “principle of subsidiarity,” according to which decisions are all to be taken at the “lowest level compatible with the project of Union.”

What is this lowest level, you may ask, and who decides which decisions are to be taken there? The only possible answer to the second question — namely, the EU apparatus, including the European Court of Justice — removes all meaning from the first. To say that the nation-states have sovereignty in all matters that they are competent to decide, but that the EU apparatus decides which matters those are, is to say that the nation-states have no sovereignty at all, since all their powers are delegated. In other words, “subsidiarity” effectively removes the sovereignty that it purports to grant.

The full article is tough to read but a makes many valuable points of about how vague and bureaucratic language can be used to mask the usurpation of rights. Not having read any of the EU constitution myself, I can't really properly evaluate the merits of the arguments that Scruton puts forth.

The Wrath of Khan II

2005-06-05T18:25:00.000-07:00

In a previous post regarding Irene Khan's preposterous comparison of the Guantanamo Bay to The Soviet GULAG, I wrote:

From a rhetorical standpoint she failed Amnesty and disserved the people who it claims to help. File this one under Hyperbole (exaggeration), Meiosis (the belittling of one thing in order to magnify another), and Absence of a Moral Compass.

The last part of that sentence was a veiled reference to something I read in a book by former Soviet dissident and Israeli Knesset member Natan Sharansky entitled "The Case for Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny & Terror." Early in that book he makes a point about how people in free societies lose their moral clarity. Here's and excerpt from the preface:

... in the free world the competition of ideas and parties flourishes, and allegiances are often based on a single common principle or purpose that struggles against a competing point of view.

Through generally healthy for a society ,this competition can be quite dangerous if we lose sight of the fact that there is a far greater divide between the world of freedome and the world of fear that there is between the competing factions within a free society. If we fail to recognize this, we lose moral clarity. The legitimate differences among us, the shades of gray in a free society, will be wrongly perceived as black and white. Then, the real black-and-white line that divides free societies from fear societies, the real line that divides good from evil, will no longer be distinguishable.

A lack of moral clarity is why an Israeli journalist compared a kippah to a prison. It is why people living in free societies cannot distinguish between religious fundamentalism in democratic states and religious terrorists in fundamentalist states. It is why people living in free societies can come to see their fellow citizens as their enemies, and foreign dictators as their friends.

Here's what Mr. Sharansky had to say about the recent dust-up between Amnesty and the US over the scurrilous Guantanamo/GULAG analogy (by way of Fox News):

A former Soviet prisoner who is a well-known human rights activist says comparing Gitmo to a Soviet gulag is off base.

"In Guantanamo Bay, there was a very serious violation of human rights and it's very important to deal with this and to correct it," said Natan Sharansky, a former Soviet dissident and political prisoner who was a prominent member of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's cabinet until May 2. "But the comparison of Amnesty International is very typical, unfortunately, for this organization, which has no moral clarity."

Sharansky argued that Amnesty International compromises its work by refusing to differentiate "between democracies where there are sometimes serious violations of human rights and dictatorships where no human rights exist at all."

"This comparison between gulag and Soviet Union and United States of America, erases all these differences," he said. "It makes moral equivalence between these two very different worlds and that's unfortunately very a typical, systematical, mistake of Amnesty International."

To that end, Schulz said his group has no favorites and they are "equal opportunity offenders."

"We do our best within the limits of human fallibility," he said. "To apply one universal standard -- one plumline to every society -- to China and to the U.S. to Israel and to Cuba, to Afghanistan and Zimbabwe."

But Amnesty International critics say that may be part of the problem.

They point out that the group's international report has multiple pages criticizing Israel and milder critique of the Palestinian Authority. Meanwhile, the report devotes a similar amount of space to the slaughter in Sudan as it does poor treatment by police officers in Switzerland.

Human rights expert Anthony Arend from Georgetown University said calling Guantanamo Bay a 'gulag' prevents people from focusing on real abuses in the world.

"That's why I think Amnesty needs to get out on top of it to clarify what the report really says and to note that the use of the 'gulag' phrase was an unfortunate phrase, it's the wrong phrase, it's the incorrect phrase, and did not accurately categorize what the U.S. is doing," Arend said.

While Arend said dismissing Amnesty International's work is the wrong thing to do, he said he can see where the use of the term, 'gulag' would lead people to draw that conclusion.

While I don't agree with Sharansky that serious human rights abuses have occured at Guantanamo (if any readers know what they are, please let me know), the rest of his condemnation is hard to find fault with. Moreover, having spent 12+ years inside Soviet era forced labor camps gives him credibility on this issue that the spoiled, jet-setting Ms. Khan and her ilk can never and will never have.

I'll end with another excerpt from the preface. Readers knowledgeable in the terminology of formal rhetoric will no doubt notice that a good measure of the effectiveness of the following paragraphs is derived from the skillful use of several figures of speech, not the least of which are Apposition , Synonymia and Climax:

Those who seek to move the earth must first, as Archimedes explained, have a place to stand. Moral clarity provides us with a place to stand, a reference point from where to leverage our talents, ideas, and energies to create a better world. Without moral clarity, without a reference point, those same talents, ideas, and energies are just as likely to do harm as good.

This is the tragedy of that has befallen the contemporary struggle for human rights. the great dividing line in that struggle is the line that separates free societies that thrive on dissent from fear societies that ban it. Societies that do not allow dissent will never protect human rights.

But today, detached from the concept of a free society, human rights have no reference point. the concept of human rights has come to mean sympathy for the poor, the weak, and the suffering. To be sure, this sympathy is essential if we want to live in moral societies, and should be encouraged and cultivated by families, faiths, schools, and governments. Yet, without moral clarity, sympathy can also be placed in the service of evil.

A world without moral clarity is a world in which dictators speak about human rights even as they kill thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, even tens of millions of people.

And if you want to read something even more interesting, see on page 20 of the preface what Sharansky had to say about the moral clarity, or the lack thereof, of former President Jimmy Carter, someone who to unprecendented steps to help Sharansky after he was arrested. Every bit of what he writes there aptly characterizes the problem with Ms. Khan, and for that matter, far too much of the rest of the human rights movement. The most depressing thing about all of it is that they are so full of self-righteous indignation that they're not even listening.

Bad Karma

2005-06-05T03:24:00.000-07:00

Sometimes words in one language sound somewhat or exactly like words in another. An example would be the French word “oui”, which means “yes” and the English word “We”, the second person plural pronoun. Unless the two languages are from the same family, e.g. French and Spanish are both “romance” or Latin languages, the meanings of the two words will be quite different. Scholars of rhetoric have given a name to this phenomenon, Parechesis.

Although there are limitless possibilities for word play with words meeting these conditions ( e.g. Season 3, Episode 1 of Monk) I rarely, if ever, come across this figure of speech in contemporary political discourse. It did, however, come to mind as I read this NY Times story about the discovery by Marines of a large underground bunker complex used by “insurgents” in the Anbar province of Iraq.

American marines have discovered an elaborate series of underground bunkers used recently by insurgents in western Iraq, with heavy weapons, a kitchen and fresh food, furnished living quarters, showers and even a working air conditioner, the military said Saturday.

The bunkers were fashioned from an old rock quarry north of the town of Karma, an insurgent stronghold in hostile Anbar Province that lies near the city of Falluja, just 35 miles west of Baghdad. The quarry measures about 546 feet by 883 feet, and the series of bunkers is the largest underground insurgent hideout to be discovered in at least the last year, if not during entire guerilla war, said Capt. Jeffrey S. Pool, a spokesman for the Second Marine Division, charged with controlling western Iraq.

…

"Marines were out patrolling and looking for weapons caches when out in the middle of the desert they see a lone building," Captain Pool said. "They went to go and check it out. In one room there was a large, chest-style electric freezer. The Marines moved it and found the hidden entrance to the to the underground quarry system."

"I can tell you that it is the largest underground system discovered in at least the last year," the captain added.

There was no one in the building at the time, Captain Pool said. But the fresh food in the kitchen indicates that insurgents had been there recently. The underground lair was not new and was one of several smaller subdivisions that formed the rock quarry, the captain said.

In one section of the hideout, troops discovered machine guns, mortars, rockets, artillery rounds, black uniforms, ski masks, compasses, log books, night vision goggles and fully charged cell phones, the military said in its written statement.

The insurgents had apparently installed the creature comforts of home within the hideout. The complex included four fully furnished living spaces, two showers and an air conditioner, the military said. Temperatures in the deserts of Anbar Province can approach a scorching 130 degrees in the summertime.

It was the name of the town where this bunker was found, Karma, along with the fact that the head-choppers have been denied this air-conditioned lair, that led me to think of this as an example of “bad karma.” Hence the title of the post. And had the Marines been waiting for the insurgents to return, it would have undoubtedly been a case of worse karma.

For the Love of God and Country

2005-06-03T14:40:00.000-07:00

Most of my friends, family members, and colleagues are what I’d called liberal Democrats. I love each and every one of them. This much they know. And they love me too. That despite the fact that as a registered Republican in Massachusetts, I present as somewhat of an odd bird to them - a “club-carrying Neanderthal” is how one friend put it, with a big smile on her face.

I take no issue with the sincerity of my liberal friends' political beliefs or with them as individuals. Only with their judgment. Howard Dean, the Democrats' National Committee chairman, in remarks made recently at the “Take Back America” rally, provides a compelling example of why I don’t trust the current Democratic leadership. Here’s what he’s reported to have said:

Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean advised party activists Thursday to reach out to evangelicals and voters in all 50 states, but then risked alienating potential GOP converts by suggesting many Republicans don't work for “an honest living.”

Dean's comment came as he recalled conditions at crowded Ohio polling stations last fall. He wondered who could expect voters to work all day and then stand in line for eight hours to vote. “Well, Republicans, I guess, can do that because a lot of them have never made an honest living in their lives,” he said, drawing some surprised “oohs” from his audience.

So to all my friends and family and other loved ones I say, once more, don’t you see that hate is a very poor organizing principle? Animus and Ad Hominem attacks (attacking the character of the person(s) rather than their ideas or actions or arguments) are not only in poor form, they’re a tacit admission of a lack of ideas. In order for a two-party system to work, we need to have two strong, vibrant parties. So for the love of God and country, please distance yourself from this man, or at least withhold your donations until he begins to behave more respectably. He’s speaking in your name after all and, as your friend, I think you deserve better and can do better than him.

The Wrath of Khan (was "Bush Bad! Amnesty Good!)

2005-06-03T08:19:00.000-07:00

Having taken a verbal pounding in numerous media outlets for her use of the term "gulag" to describe Guantanamo Bay, Amnesty International Secretary General Irene Khan responded to Washington's dismissals yesterday while in Tokyo. According to several news reports she made the following remarks

Our answer is simple: if that is so (that the allegations are unfounded), open up these detention centres. Allow us and others to visit them.

Here it seems that Ms. Khan has forgotten, or is unaware, that the International Red Cross has been allowed to visit detainees at Guantanamo almost from its outset. A Google Search on Guantanamo + "Red Cross" returns over 192,000 hits. And its not like they have had good things to say either. Surely she must know that.

What is interesting is that we are actually getting response from the US government for the first time in more than three years, Khan said. “We welcome an opportunity to sit down and have a debate with them on the issue."

This is odd, bordering on bizarre. Who does Ms. Khan think that she is, a head of state? Does she presume that her organization, which has done very valuable work in the past, is political equivalent the United States government? Does she think that Amnesty should be serving as the moral tutor of the United States?

She said the human rights watchdog had used the gulag reference in its annual report to “send a strong message”, not to set off debate in itself about the analogy to the infamous Soviet prison camps.

This strikes as an extremely disingenuous remark. With her original rhetorical strategy having backfired, Ms. Khan should have left well enough alone. Instead she tries to make it seems as if the original blunder was tactical and strategic, i.e. designed to elicit a response from the administration and bring attention to the plight of the Guantanamo detainees. Instead, as I pointed out in a previous post, her hyperbolic rhetoric has diminished the stature of the organization she leads, the historical importance of the GULAG, and the suffering of those who perished in or survived it. Moreover, she has run the risk that fewer people will pay attention to the rest of the report which details very serious human rights abuses in places Darfur, North Korea, Syria, and Iran. And if that is not enough, she's made herself look like a rhetorical hack who doesn't have enough sense to know when to backpedal or apologize for rhetorical excesses.

So just in case Ms. Khan happens to read this post, I'll offer her one suggestion. Since you either didn't read the Gulag Archipelago, by Alexander Soltzenhitsyn, or GULAG, by Anne Applebaum, or didn't comprehend what you did read, here's something that you might try reading instead- Animal Farm by George Orwell. You'll find it can be read comfortably in one sitting. Take a copy with you on your next flight.

There's a rhetorical gem in that book which you'll no doubt find appealing. It comes in an oft-repeated line by the sheep on the farm, one that the pig Napolean encourages them to repeat everytime his authority is questioned or when other animals complained that life under the humans wasn't really so bad. What Napolean did was have the sheep bleat "Four legs good! Two legs bad!" over and over again until the opposing viewpoints were drowned out. Pretty clever, wouldn't you say. Get's right to the heart of the matter. And its oh so adaptable. You can replace "four legs" and "two legs" with any number of other names and identities, e.g. Bush Bad! Amnesty Good!. I am sure with little or no effort you can come up with far better examples. After all, Animal Farms are the only place you can pick up a bad case of hoof-in-mouth like the you one you've contracted.

Meiosis and Hyperbole from Amnesty International

2005-06-02T12:57:00.000-07:00

On May 25th, Amnesty International issued its annual Human Rights Report. In the forward of that report, Secretary General Irene Khan likens Camp X-ray, the Guantanamo Bay detention facility where enemy combatants from the Global War on Terror are held, to the Gulag (forced labor camp system) of the Soviet Era. Here's the quote, in context:

Despite the near-universal outrage generated by the photographs coming out of Abu Ghraib, and the evidence suggesting that such practices are being applied to other prisoners held by the USA in Afghanistan, Guantánamo and elsewhere, neither the US administration nor the US Congress has called for a full and independent investigation.

Instead, the US government has gone to great lengths to restrict the application of the Geneva Conventions and to "re-define" torture. It has sought to justify the use of coercive interrogation techniques, the practice of holding "ghost detainees" (people in unacknowledged incommunicado detention) and the "rendering" or handing over of prisoners to third countries known to practise torture. The detention facility at Guantánamo Bay has become the gulag of our times, entrenching the practice of arbitrary and indefinite detention in violation of international law. Trials by military commissions have made a mockery of justice and due process.

Not surprisingly, the Bush Administration has denied this claim, as they ought. I recommend Dympha's fisking for a primer on what's wrong with the comparison, the report, and with Amnesty as an organization. Countless editorials in the last week have blasted Khan's hyperbolic rhetoric.

After reading these remarks I wondered if Ms. Khan had ever read either Solzhenitsyn's classic "Gulag Archipelago" or the Anne Applebaum's Pultizer Prize winning "GULAG: A History" . The reason why I wonder is that there was something about Ms. Khan's use of the term that caught my eye- she used the term in lower case letters. Perhaps she is unaware that its an acronym for "Glavnoye Upravleniye Ispravitelno-trudovykh Lagerey" which translate roughly as "The Chief Directorate of Corrective Labour Camps". If she has read either of them, then she is to be taken to task if for no other reason that this: by likening a Guantanamo (600 prisoners) to the GULAG (18 million prisoners, millions of whom were starved and tortured to death), the latter is trivialized. That is a shame because, as Applebaum points out, too little attention has been paid to this most massive and enduring system of slave labor camps that the Soviets erected. When someone in a high-profile position like Khan speaks as she did, all that is accomplished is the diminishment of Amnesty and its causes.

From a rhetorical standpoint she failed Amnesty and disserved the people who it claims to help. File this one under Hyperbole (exaggeration), Meiosis (the belittling of one thing in order to magnify another), and Absence of a Moral Compass.

Hyperbole, Cataplexis, and Just Plain Vulgar

2005-04-09T04:16:00.000-07:00

Several matters related to the choice of words caught my eye this morning. FoxNews reports on the US 9th circuit ruling in the case of Jonathan Lincoln:

A federal appeals court Friday overturned an inmate's conviction for writing a crude, rambling letter endorsing President Bush's death at the hands of terrorists — two weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The letter from Oregon State Penitentiary prisoner Jonathan Lincoln, who was charged with threatening the president and given an 18-month sentence last year, read, in part: "You will die too George W Bush real Soon they Promised That you would Long Live Bin Laden." Corrections officials intercepted the letter; Lincoln had been serving a 46-month sentence for robbery.

A unanimous three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the letter was protected under the First Amendment, calling it "Lincoln's crude and offensive method of stating a political opposition to the president." The court noted "such political hyperbole does not constitute a 'threat."' The decision reversed a ruling by Judge James A. Redden (search), who tried the case without a jury. Redden ruled the letter constituted a "true threat" when combined with statements Lincoln made six months earlier to a Secret Service agent that he wanted to assassinate the president.

I agree that the remarks are crude. And since I have no first hand knowledge with the case, I will refrain from juding the judges. Still, 100 lashes with a wet noodle, or more, would have been appropriate punishment for Mr. Lincoln's Eulogia (commending or blessing a person or thing) for Bin Laden.

A link on the same page leads to an article entitled "Is Writing about a School Shooting a Crime?"

Police in Winchester, Ky., say Winston Poole would have been the nation's next school shooter, had they not intervened.

"All the bells and whistles went off on this case," said Steven Caudill, a detective with the Winchester Police Department. "Our No. 1 goal is crime prevention and law enforcement, not just here in our community. But the nation as a whole. All the warning signs were here in our community. We saw it. We acted on it."

Poole, 18, has been charged with terroristic threatening for allegedly trying to recruit fellow students he called "soldiers" to participate in a school shooting. His grandmother turned him in after finding his journal.

Apparently it was exceprts like this that got the police worried:

"They yelled, 'kill them.' All the soldiers of Zone 2 started shooting. They are dropping all of them. Then after five minutes, all the people are laying on the ground, dead," Poole wrote in his journal.

Poole's lawyer said the journal was a school assignment, that Poole is passionate about horror films and that he was writing about zombies. But police said Poole didn't have a writing assignment for English class.

It is hard to know what to call statements like these. Terms like Optatio, a wish exclaimed, comes to mind. Yet that doesn't say much about the content. Perhaps Cataplexis threatening punishment, misfortune, or disaster; threatening or prophecying payback for ill doing would be better. For the police, it seems to be a damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don't situation. As for the grandmother, I guess she believes in "tough love."

Over a the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler political rhetoric is taken to "a whole nother level", unfortunately a lower one, with these remarks about the President's immigration policy (hat tip: 4th rail)

Hey, don't be too rough on Dubya. He really does want to secure the borders, it's just that his words aren't as clear as one might wish, which is mainly due to the Mexican Presidente's reproductive organs tickling his uv**a.

There is a name for this kind of vulgarity. Several, actually. The ones that come immediately to mind are Tapinosis, undignified language that debases a person or thing; Enargia: vivid description, especially when depicting things graphic in nature; and Emphasis, implying more than is actually stated. There is also Hypocatastasis, implied metaphor and perhaps Exouthenismos, an expression of feeling by way of contempt.

There is no joy in pointing out any of these examples today, especially this last one.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin, Maggie Gallagher, and Ann Coulter are being called things that no woman should ever be called. This kind of thing makes we wonder whether public and political discourse is less enlightened than it used to be or whether the modern communication technologies make it easier for crassness and vulgarity to be heard.

Goldberg v. Krugman

2005-04-06T15:19:00.000-07:00

Jonah Goldberg’s most recent NRO essay is entitled “BullKrug.” The “Krug” in “BullKrug” is short for Krugman, as in Paul Krugman, economist and NY Times opinion columnist. I’ve read plenty of Goldberg pieces in the last year and that’s as strong of a statement as I have seen him make. “Ouch” is what I said to myself as I read the title.

Anyhow, as I have come to expect from Goldberg’s writing, there are several nice rhetorical flourishes in this piece. Here’s an example of Anaphora (starting consecutive phrases with the same words), Homoeoteleuton (like word endings), Parallelism (similarity in phrase or sentence structure) and Asyndeton (the absence of conjunctions) all used in the same sentence:

Krugman notes, interestingly but obviously, that self-selection (among university faculty) is a major factor. I do think there's a lot to this. People of a leftish bent want to change the world by speaking truth to power — in the classroom, in the newsroom, in the art gallery.

Quite obviously there is a bit of sarcasm, as well.

Goldberg also employs Onomatopoeia (Using or inventing a word whose sound imitates that which it names) to humorous effect:

Indeed, if this were an Airplane! movie, a giant spear would fly through the room and stick in the wall behind Lloyd Bridges for extra dramatic emphasis. Thwaauunnnggggg!!!!!

There’s more, of course, in the way of figures of speech in this essay, plenty more. And plenty to learn, as well, from this insightful analysis about flabby rhetoric and flabbier reasoning.

SIMCTRDTSOMF

2005-04-04T16:00:00.000-07:00

ROTFLMAO, an acronym for "Rolling on the Floor, Laughing My A** Off", is one piece of internet slang for which I care little. Perhaps it's because I rarely, if ever, use profanity, even the mildest sort. Perhaps it's because I get turned off by hysterical laughter. And perhaps it's because I can't remember when I ever laughed that hard about anything. All that having been said, this phrase did pop into my mind yesterday when I read Mark Steyn's lastest column, The Conservative Crack Up Cracks Me Up. As the title suggests, Steyn takes issue with all the talk of late about dissension in the ranks of the GOP. After taking Norman Lear to task for his utterly disingenuous People for the American Way ads, Steyn turns his rapier wit on the 59 former diplomats who are now on record as opposing the nomination of John Bolton to the post of UN Ambassador. Here's what he had to say:

Then there's the 59 striped-pants colossi of the Nixon-Ford-Reagan State Department who've sent a letter to the Senate calling on them to reject John Bolton's nomination as U.N. ambassador. According to the Associated Press report, the signatories include: "Princeton Lyman, ambassador to South Africa and Nigeria under Presidents Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton; Monteagle Stearns, ambassador to Greece and Ivory Coast in the Ford, Carter and Reagan administrations; and Spurgeon Keeny Jr., deputy director of the Arms Control Agency in the Carter administration."

Princeton Lyman? Monteagle Stearns? Spurgeon Keeny Jr.? If Norman Lear's shows had wacky characters like that, they'd still be in syndication. It's a good rule of thumb that anything 59 economists, bureaucrats or diplomats are prepared to sign an open letter objecting to is by definition a good thing. But that goes double when the 59 panjandrums lined up against you are Princeton Monteagle Jr., President Nixon's ambassador to the Spurgeon Islands; Spurgeon Monkfish III, President Ford's ambassador to the Lyman Islands; Dartmouth Monticello IV, President Johnson's personal emissary to His Serene Highness the Monteagle of Keeny; Columbia Long-Playing-Album, the first diplomat to be named by President Carter to the State Department's Name Control Agency; and Vasser Peachy-Keeny, the first woman to be named Vasser Peachy-Keeny. One sees their point, of course: Let a fellow called "John" Bolton become ambassador and next thing you know Earl and Bud will want the gig.

My reaction to reading this piece could best be described by this acronym SIMCTRDTSOMF. It stands for Sitting in My Chair, Tears Rolling Down the Side of My Face. I coined it in that brief interval, about two seconds in duration, when I stopped laughing long enough to catch my breath before laughing some more. I am left to wonder, now, whether it had the same effect on others. I sure hope so.

Right Click for Left-Leaning Bias

2005-04-04T08:28:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, my day job is as a college professor at a university in Cambridge, MA. I recently began a study of figures of speech in banner ads appearing in the web editions of the nation's 100 top newspapers. The first stage of the data collection phase of this study entails downloading the GIF- and JPG-formatted ads from the news pages.

I download each advertisement individually, by right-clicking on it and then saving it to my hard drive. Sometimes the file names are very long so I rename and/or truncate them. It's not particularly exciting work, but it's a necessary work. Moreover, I often learn things when I collect some of the data, things I might not have learned if I'd let a research assistant do it all. Today was one of those days. Here's what happened.

One of the papers from which I downloaded ads this morning was the Birmingham News. I found something rather peculiar with regard to the ad for a book by former Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore , the 10 Commandments judge. First, let me show you how the ad looks on the page:

At firt glance, there is nothing unusual about the ad. In fact, given that Judge Moore is from Alabama, the Birmingham News is the place I'd expect to see an advertisement for a book signing. What struck me as very unusual, however, is what I saw when I right-clicked on the image. The name for the ad is "monster72.gif"

This makes no sense to me. At first I thought that, perhaps, the file was misnamed because, just maybe, Monster.com does or had shared the same space with the ad for Moore's book. Now I can't speak to what ads have been on this page in prior days and weeks, but I can say this much:

(1) I refreshed the page 10 times and saw no advert for Monster.com here or anywhere else on the page.

(2) I have been collecting data on this project for two weeks and now have almost 500 JPG and GIF-formatted banner ads from the 100 top US papers. Not one of them has been for Monster.com. To be fair, I must note that I have spied several Flash ads for Monster during my data collection, but again, not a single GIF or JPG-formatted one.

(3) No other advertisement on this page has a file name remotely like the one for Moore's book; the Books A Million advert for the book "The Memory of Running" has for its file name "memory_of_running_bannner.gif" (and yes, banner had three n's);

(4) the file name for the ad for the Gulf Coast resort known as Kiva Dunes is "kivatraveltile.gif". Go figure!

(5) The file name for the advert for the University of Alabama-Birmingham's MBA program is "UAB_MBA_Skyscraper.gif"

So what could account for the use of the Epithet "monster" in the file name for an advert for a book and booksigning by Justice Moore? Why would all the other ads on the page have file names that match the content and/or advertiser? Here's an idea. Maybe someone at the B-News mistook Moore for Aileen Wournos , the serial killer who became the subject of the movie Monster.

Somehow I think not.

My guess is that the file name for Moore's book was not an accident. I have a sneaky feeling that someone responsible for the placement of this ad has a very low opinion of Judge Moore and his views about the 10 Commandments. I don't know if this someone is an employee of the B-News or not, but I think I'll send them an email and find out. If I get a reply, I'll post it.

A Veritable Cornucopia

2005-04-02T04:06:00.000-08:00

I started teaching again this week so posting may be light for the next month or so. Here's something that I hope to look into when classes are finished, the "Full text of Human Rights Record of the US in 2004" published by China's State Council and appearing in the People's Daily Online.

This report is veritable cornucopia of misstatements, half-truths, logic lapses, recycled Marxist cant, anti-American rhetoric, over-wrought cliches, and pie-in-the-sky utopianism. Reading it made me wonder about the producers and consumers of this rhetorical product, about the wellspring from which they draw their inspiration, about what makes people hate liberty so, so much.

Invasion of the Heartland and the Homeland?

2005-04-02T02:59:00.000-08:00

In a recent editorial , Froma Harrop of the Providence Journal laments the devastation visited upon Iowa and other parts of the Heartland by crystal meth:

Iowa broke up 1,472 meth labs last year alone. And the state now cares for 1,000 children abused by their parents' meth habits. Methamphetamine is responsible for 62 percent of the admissions into state prisons. Iowa's heartache is shared across the Heartland -- from Idaho to Nebraska to Indiana to Oklahoma.

Throughout the article, Harrop's genuine sense of compassion for all those affected, especially the children of those addicted to crystal meth, shines through. But all the compassion in the world does not an argument make. And nowhere is that more obvious than when Harrop moves from description to prescription, from effect to cause. For example, guess at whose feet she lays some of the blame?

And how has the Bush administration responded? By cutting drug-treatment programs. The proposed new budget would also slash federal funding for meth-related law enforcement and environmental cleanup by 50 percent.

She further asserts that while the "states do what they can"

Our congressmen in Washington, meanwhile, don't seem very interested. They prefer lining up to denounce the use of steroids in Major League Baseball.

I, for one, reject this comparison. We are a large and resourceful country. We don't have to choose between fighting crystal meth dealers and investigating steroid use by major leaguers. In fact, given the lucrative anti-trust benefits that baseball enjoys, they deserve scrutiny. Nor, for that matter, do we have to choose betwen drug enforcement efforts in the Heartland and drug interdiction efforts linked to the GWOT and the protection of the Homeland, as Harrop would seem to suggest:

The Defense Department is requesting -- and will probably get -- $257 million to slow the drug trade in Afghanistan. After all, heroin trafficking helps fund terrorism. There's a difference, one supposes, between foreigners terrorizing Americans and Americans terrorizing each other. But an invasion is still an invasion. Iowa knows all about it.

Harrop has it right: there is a difference between these two things and she appropriately highlights that difference with Chiasmus, the repetition of a word(s) or idea(s) in a reverse order for the purpose of opposing one them to each other, and A-B-B-A sequence:

The Defense Department is requesting -- and will probably get -- $257 million to slow the drug trade in Afghanistan. After all, heroin trafficking helps fund terrorism. There's a difference, one supposes, between foreigners terrorizing Americans and Americans terrorizing each other. But an invasion is still an invasion. Iowa knows all about it.

There's problem, however, with the next figure she uses, Epizeuxis, the repetition of the same word in the same sense:

There's a difference, one supposes, between foreigners terrorizing Americans and Americans terrorizing each other. But an invasion is still an invasion. Iowa knows all about it.

Even if we accept that these two invasions are more similar than not, it is not the case that we have to choose between defending ourselves against one or the other. Protection of the Home is not coming at the expense of protection of the Hearth.

Death by Euphemism

2005-04-01T07:41:00.000-08:00

I had been planning a post on the euphemisms that populated the debate surrounding Terri Schiavo. The Editors of the National Review beat me to it. It's just as well, I don't think I could have done any better. Regardless of your stance on Terri Schiavo's life and death, if you have an interest in the power of words, this is a must read. Rather than excerpt their analysis, I'll just quote their chilling conclusion:

Next time it will be easier. It always is. The tolerance of early-term abortion made it possible to tolerate partial-birth abortion, and to give advanced thinkers a hearing when they advocate outright infanticide. Letting the courts decide such life-and-death issues made it possible for us to let them decide others, made it seem somehow wrong for anyone to stand in their way. Now they are helping to snuff out the minimally conscious. Who's next?

Bad Rhetoric, Bad Man

2005-03-31T13:40:00.000-08:00

In recent weeks I have blogged here and here about the rhetorical excesses of one Hassan Nasrallah, chief of Hezbollah. In Nasrallah's Mind Numbing Repetition I wrote that

...Nasrallah's over-reliance on one rhetorical device, Anaphora, suggests a real lack of imagination, a certain dullness of mind, a kind of cognitive rigidity that is frankly scary. The only thing scarier is the people who are moved by this kind of rhetoric.

In "Nasrallah Talks People to Death" I said:

Nasrallah wants so badly to see the death of his enemies that he's willing to see the death of his associates, his fellow believers, and himself as part of the bargain. On second thought, I'm not so sure about that last part. I don't believe that he wants his own death. I don't believe he is quite so willing to die. His job, after all, is to talk other people to death, a job that requires that he stay alive whilst others do the dying. Still, I wouldn't doubt if he's sleeping with one eye open these days.

It seems that I am not the only one who has been parsing Nasrallah's words, however. The good folks at MEMRI posted a translation of excerpts from an editorial from the Kuwaiti Daily, written by the Editor in Chief, no less. It is entitled "Nasrallah Has Lost His Mind."

"Nasrallah is speaking the language of the Fifties and Sixties. He is acting in line with the slogans of Syrian students, who in those days used to chant 'half of the Americans died in Vietnam and we will kill the other half.' It is unfortunate some wise people are delivering such speeches to the Syrians and Lebanese. Such speeches may jeopardize the lives of the people in Syria and Lebanon because neither Syria, nor Hezbollah, can fill the huge gap in the balance of power with their adversaries. It appears Hassan Nasrallah has lost his mind because he has abandoned his political wisdom and angered the only superpower in the world instead of calming his people. The Lebanese are aware of the capabilities of the United States. They, and all Arabs, know the real size of this man and his threats."

And there's this:

"Hassan Nasrallah, who has a sharp brain, is aware of the oncoming dangers and has built a network of connections through southern Beirut, Damascus, and Tehran. In his wisdom, Nasrallah has vowed to inflict a disgracing defeat on the U.S. troops if they approach Lebanon. This man has chosen to adopt an arrogant attitude, similar to that of Saddam Hussein, knowing fully well how Saddam's power and authority came to an end.

Said it before and I'll say it again: bad rhetoric, bad man. Or better yet: bad rhetoric, mad man.

UPDATE: Here's a bio on Mr. Nasrallah written by the Middle East Intelligence Bulletin. It is quite long and thorough. Down near the bottom is a "handshake" photo of Nasrallah shaking hands with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. Who'd have thunk that leading "Death to Israel! Death to America!" cheers could gain you an audience with the likes of the UNSG?

Hoagland's Antithesis, II

2005-03-31T11:10:00.000-08:00

Jim Hoagland has an insightful analysis in today's WAPO entitled "DeGaulle's Tattered Legacy". His final paragraph skillfully employs three figures of speech to highlight the crisis of confidence which the French government now faces. The first is Antithesis, juxtaposition of contrasting words or ideas

This suggests that instead of growing clarity, there could be growing confusion on Europe and other matters. In a Paris courtroom, acid drops daily on the bedrock of credibility and integrity that has empowered modern French rulers to govern, and to explain.

The second is Parallelism, similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses:

This suggests that instead of growing clarity, there could be growing confusion on Europe and other matters. In a Paris courtroom, acid drops daily on the bedrock of credibility and integrity that has empowered modern French rulers to govern, and to explain.

The third is Hypocatasis, metaphor by implication:

This suggests that instead of growing clarity, there could be growing confusion on Europe and other matters. In a Paris courtroom, acid drops daily on the bedrock of credibility and integrity that has empowered modern French rulers to govern, and to explain.

This is the second article in a row where I have noticed the use of Antithesis and Parallelism together in an essay by Hoagland. In and of itself, that's not remarkable. It is, after all, a very common combination. The skillful way in which he uses them is, however.

Hillary's Hyperbole

2005-03-31T10:40:00.000-08:00

It wasn't me that noticed Hillary's Hyperbole. It was the New York Sun:

"Just as the conventional wisdom is falling all over itself depicting Senator Clinton as a sensible centrist, along comes a letter signed by the senator herself to remind us of just what an irresponsible extremist she can be when she thinks no one is looking.

Our opponents will do anything rather than talk about the issues. They don't want to talk about their plans to destroy Social Security, to roll back our civil and constitutional rights, to undermine American security by reducing the number of allies who will work with us around the world

reads a passage from a fundraising letter signed by the junior senator from New York. The letter, sent by e-mail, was obtained yesterday by The New York Sun. The Democrats mock Republicans for not being part of the "reality-based community," but this rhetoric from Mrs. Clinton is falser than any pre-war claim of the Bush administration. You can criticize the Bush administration for a lot of things, but not wanting to talk about their plans for Social Security sure isn't one of them. The president spoke about it for nearly half of his State of the Union address. He devoted his weekly radio address to the issue on February 12, February 26, and March 12."

The Sun's conclusion:

Mrs. Clinton's letter makes reference to the "right wing attack machine." But what she's engaging in are the tactics of the left wing attack machine. If Mrs. Clinton is to succeed in building a reputation as a centrist capable of bipartisan cooperation - the kind of reputation she will need to be elected president or to withstand what could well be a formidable challenge from Edward Cox in the 2006 Senate race in New York - she may want to be more careful.

Note to Hillary: you can fool some of the people some of the time but you can't... you know the rest girl!

The Verdict is In

2005-03-30T07:36:00.000-08:00

The verdict is in: Kojo lied, Volcker Tried, Kofi Denied.

Kojo Lied

For reasons that parents everywhere will understand, the most difficult and painful moments for me personally throughout this past year have been those when it appeared that my son, Kojo, might have acted inappropriately or might not have told me the full truth about his actions.

Volcker Tried

… while Cotecna has cooperated with the committee on a number of important respects, the committee finds that both Cotecna officials and Kojo Annan acted to disguise their continuing business and financial relationship, misleading the secretary general himself, other U.N. officials and the public in the process.

It is a failure of the U.N. officials to discover and of Cotecna and Kojo Annan to fully disclose these relationships that has contributed so heavily to the questions about the integrity of the U.N. administration and the need for this particular report.

Kofi Denied

After an exhaustive 12-month investigation, the report states clearly that there is no evidence that the selection of Cotecna in 1998 was subject to any affirmative or improper influence of the secretary general in the bidding or selection process.

Unfortunately, lost in all this is the fact that as a result gross malfeasance on the part of the UN, many Iraqis Died

Compelling evidence recently unearthed reveals potentially massive corruption associated with the United Nations ’ Oil- for-Food Program, the U.N.’s humanitarian relief program in Iraq [for details on program, see page 8]. On January 25, 2004, the Iraqi Governing Council released documents suggesting that Saddam Hussein, U.N. officials (including Oil- for-Food program Director Benon Sevan), well-connected governments (includ ing some U.N. Security Council members), and private individuals all benefited from the manipulation of the U.N.-administered program.1
Those involved with this scandal allegedly utilized illegal oil shipments, financial transactions, kickbacks, and surcharges, all of which denied humanitarian supplies to the Iraqi people while allowing Hussein to build up his armed forces and enhance his personal wealth. The corruption and abuse of the Oil- for-Food program may have contributed to the deaths of thousands of innocent Iraqis. If the allegations prove true (currently, six Iraqi and U.S. entities are examining them), it is quite reasonable to assume that some current U.N. officials working to structure Iraq’s political future were also involved in propping up the Hussein regime and further harming the already suffering Iraqi people.

The Jury's Still Out

2005-03-30T07:12:00.000-08:00

It came as a surprise to learn of the death yesterday of famed defense attorney Johnny Cochran had died from brain cancer. I hadn’t known he was ill. Mr. Cochran was already well known in LA legal circles as an especially eloquent and competent criminal defense lawyer. And while it was his successful defense of OJ Simpson that made his a household name, the words that Mr. Cochran spoke in the trial’s closing argument have been seared, seared into the public consciousness. They were rhyming words (it, fit, acquit); consonant words (it doesn’t fit… acquit); and assonant words (if, it, fit, acquit; doesn’t, must, acquit). And they were seductive words, expressed in the form of a hypothetical proposition , to give them the semblance of logic they so clearly lacked:

“If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.”

To say that these words went on to become both famous and notorious is an understatement. The only phrase I can think of that has been parodied more is Saddam’s “Mother of all battles” from Gulf War I. Good natured man that Cochran apparently was, he joined in on the fun, partaking in more than one parody of words, often for commercial gain.

Now, I am no one to judge Cochran or his life’s work. People can and will say all kinds of things about what he did and didn't do and say, about who he helped and hurt. What I can and will do, however, is pose the following set of hypothetical questions, questions that someone else will have to answer.

What if there is an afterlife? What if there is a heaven or a hell where we either spend eternity or a very long time before reincarnating? What if, in the afterlife, there is a trial in front of a truly impartial judge and jury who determine where we go and for how long? And what if in that trial, we are convicted or exonerated by our own words? What if our time in heaven or hell consists of nothing more or less than a meditation upon the consequences borne of the words we spoke while incarnated? What if you are given a chance to be reborn and have as your life’s goal making up for words like “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.” ? Where would you ever begin?

UPDATE 4/1/2005: Colu mnist Gene Robinson of the WAPO has some insightful observations about Cochran's legacy, including these:

What other attorney could possibly have served as the model for a recurring character on "Seinfeld"? Actor Phil Morris's portrayal of smooth-talking, amoral, opportunistic, irresistible Jackie Chiles became such a part of the show that the character was honored with a big role in the ballyhooed series finale. Morris had half of Cochran down pat -- the slick theatricality, the rhetorical flourishes that were over the top but somehow sounded just right ("lewd, lascivious, salacious, outrageous") and, of course, the beautiful clothes. Cochran is said to have enjoyed the portrayal; I hope he did.

and these:

"If it doesn't fit, you must acquit." With that virtuoso couplet, Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. became the best-known lawyer in the world. Those few words came to stand for all the long weeks and months of courtroom wizardry that ultimately freed O.J. Simpson to spend his mornings on the golf course and his afternoons tracking down "the real killer."

Same Claptrap, Different Trapper

2005-03-29T07:53:00.000-08:00

First the defintions:

Claptrap (n.) - Pretentious, insincere, or empty language. Etymology- [Obs., a theatrical trick to win applause : clap + trap]

Trapper (n.) one who traps animals for their fur; one who uses strategems for catching or tricking an unwary person; someone who sets traps.

Prop (n.) any movable articles or objects used on the set of a play or movie.

The claptrap comes from a self-styled Palestinian "scholar" named Ziad Silwadi. According to Silwadi, the US is going to cease to exist sometime in the year 2007. We will be destroyed by a tsunami because of our many, many sins. Natch! But there's a twist. According the article

Silwadi said his study of the Koran showed that the US would perish mainly because of its great sins against mankind, including the Native Americans and blacks.

He continues:

"As soon as the Europeans started arriving in the new world discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492, they declared a war on the so-called Red Indians, the legitimate owners of the land," he wrote. "Then they began enslaving and humiliating Africans after kidnapping them from their countries and bringing them to America. Millions of blacks were brought to the US and treated with unprecedented harshness. Those who became ill during the journey were thrown overboard to feed the fish."

Elsewhere he sites the bombing of the Japanese at the end of WWII as another reason we'll be destroyed. If you read the article, or the excerpt on Little Green Footballs, you'll find holes in Silwadi's ill-logic big enough to sail the QE2 through. Instead of dignifying any of them with a response, I'll just put down some of the politer questions that ran through my mind as I read this incredulous rant:

Since the first duty of the speaker is to know his audience, I wonder who in the world could Silwadi hope to impress with either the claim that the US would be destroyed 2007 or that its treatments of Black and Indians is part of the reason? Who does he assume is ripe for and responsive to such tired rhetoric about things so long in the past?

Does he hope to gain the sympathy of Blacks? If so, he sure didn't get mine? "Red Indians." Can't speak for them, but somehow I doubt it.

Even if America's treatment of blacks and reds was justification for destroying the country, is it fair to kill the descendents of people who were mistreated? Would that be fair? Will anyone be spared? Black and red Muslim converts, perhaps?

Is he test marketing? Is this a "new entrant" strategy into the American race hustler industry? If so, does he know how crowded the field is already? Does he know that there are already men of the cloth in this industry, e.g. Rev. Jesse Jackson and Rev. Al Sharpton? Is he aware how much market share that self-styled (but tenured), fake "red Indian" Ward Churchill has gained in last three months, and at who's expense? Does he know that Louis Farrakhan, and Elijah Muhammad before him, already has a lock on the angry black Muslim market segment?

When did he assume that blacks and "red indians" needed an Islamist to be our advocates? If he cares so much about the mistreatment of blacks, then should we expect Sudan to be wiped out by a tsunami soon, as well? Does he assume that there is an automatice affinity or bond amongst all "oppressed peoples?"

Was he trying to sound like Al Franken or just impress him? (See the second paragraph)

Does Silwadi know how much his "argument" sounds like China's State Council report on the Human Rights Record of the United States, a report that mentions "black people" 42 times and that quotes, out of context, an infamous quote by a civil war era general about dead Indians.

Has Silwadi been turned on to hip-hop, e.g. to the late Tupac Shakur or to Master P?

If he's concerned about what happened to the Japanese at the end of WWII, is he equally concerned about Iran's expressed intent to nuke Israel? I suspect not.

Has Silwadi shed any tears about Leon Klinghoffer becoming "fish food"?

Does he really mean any of what he said about blacks and Indians and Japanese or is this claptrap in the way the term was once meant, a theatrical trick to generate applause? If so, doesn't that make blacks and Indians and Japenese mere props, just theatrical property?

Isn't it hypocritical for Silwadi to condemn the US to destruction for having treated blacks as property and for having stolen the Indian's property, and then using them in the same way but for his own purposes, as bit players in his own twisted psycho-drama?

Sensing's "Surprisingly Beautiful" Prose

2005-03-27T04:36:00.000-08:00

Donald Sensing, of One Hand Clapping, offers some elegant prose on the Schiavo case. Belmont Club , was clearly taken by it, referring to it as "surprisingly beautiful".

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

Here's my take: it's beautiful but not surprising. This sentence works so well, in part, because of its combined use of several figures of addition or repetition. Words, phrases, roots, and consonants are all repeated. All mutually reinforce one another and, more importantly, underscore the theme that the author wants to get across about the continuity of life, about life in the face of death.

There are several figures of speech relating to the repetition of the same word in the same sense. When a word is repeated at the beginning of successive clauses, it is called Anaphora.

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

The word faith is first repeated in a fashion which is termed Amplification, repeating a word while adding more detail to it, as a way of emphasizing what might otherwise be overlooked and/or ensuring the reader realizes its centrality.

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

Here the amplication is taken to a higher level than most. You don't usually see more than one amplifying phrase or clause. Here, however, we have three, the magic number.

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

And because each of those three clauses begins with the same words (faith that...), we could call that Anaphora or Cycliodes. There is also Alliteration, the repetition of initial consonants,

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

and Assonance, the repetition of internal vowels, in the last of these three amplifying clauses:

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

Finally, in the words death and dying we have the figure of speech known as Paregmenon, the repetition of words derived from the same root. And it is this last figure of repetition, Paregemenon, that sets up the Antitheses, the dividing lines that drive so much of the fierce debate about Terri's fate, the antitheses between hope and death, between dying and life:

At bottom, all these cases in all their sorrows come to be matters of faith - faith that the doctors are skilled and truthful, faith that there is a hope for the stricken even if death comes, and faith that for those who love the dying that life will continue worthwhile come what may.

As I said earlier, the words are beautiful, but not surprising. I expect that words spoken from depths of the soul to be this beautiful.

Saunders Has Some Questions of Her Own

2005-03-26T12:36:00.000-08:00

A few days back I contrasted Maureen Dowd's certainty with Peggy Noonan's humility regarding the Terri Schiavo matter. I also noted some similarities in the figures of speech they employed, particulary their use of rhetorical questions. In her recent editorial on the issue, entitled "Why Terri Must Die." , Debra Saunders of the SF Chronicle takes a tack not unlike that of Dowd and Noonan. Here's one of her rhetorical questions:

Those who argue that Terri Schiavo should die note that her doctors say her prognosis is hopeless. Doctors are always right, correct?

And here is one of her uses of Hypophora, raising one or more questions and then proceeding to answer them.

Do I have problems with Congress passing a law for one person? Do I believe it is possible that Michael Schiavo, who did go to great lengths early on trying to help his wife, still has the best interests of Terri in mind? Do I want the government to stay out of end-of-life decisions that families are forced to make at a painful, raw time in their lives? Was I appalled when I heard Bob Schindler say on TV that he told his daughter, who is starving, he would "take her out for a little ride, get her some breakfast?" Yes, yes, yes and of course.

Questions, rhetorical and otherwise, questions, answered and unanswered, do seem to be the order of the day. The one that keeps crossing my mind is best kept there, for now at least.

Simile by Vennochi

2005-03-25T15:02:00.000-08:00

This morning, Joan Vennochi of the Boston Globe opens her article, entitled "Carving up the Kerry Vote" , with this gem of a Simile :

HILLARY RODHAM Clinton continues to dissect John Kerry's political base like a frog in a biology class.

She also has this astute observation about the Kerry campaign's overuse of Logos, appeals to reason, and its ineffective use of Ethos, the persuasive appeal of one's character:

Last week, Ann Lewis, a longtime Democratic activist who is now director of communications for Hillary Clinton's political action committee, told the Forward, a weekly New York City-based newspaper aimed at a largely Jewish audience that the ... Kerry campaign ''kept trying to rationally convince, to put a presidency together, line by line, plan by plan'' and people ''don't vote for plans, they vote for presidents.''

What I gather from the article is that one of the objectives of Hillary's recent charm offensive is to avoid making this same fatal mistake.

UPDATE: I wonder whether the part about the "frog" was a subtle dig.

Hanson's Homoeoteleuton

2005-03-25T02:47:00.000-08:00

Historian Victor Davis Hanson numbers among my favorite political writers, both for what he says and for how he says it. A recent article of his he uses the figures Homoeoteleuton (similar endings) And Catabasis ( gradual descent) to extraordinary effect:

America was created by rural people. Perhaps 95 percent of its first citizens were farmers when Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. Now, despite all the talk of a "rural renaissance," less than 1 percent are—even as we are awash in food and next year will become a net food importer for the first time in our history.

Industrialization, mechanization and suburbanization did away with the agrarian culture of the traditional family farm. The latest "-zation" comes as globalization. Almost every acre of our farmland—due to instant communications, easy transportation and free trade—is in competition with its counterpart abroad.

There are several things that impressed me about this passage. The first is that Hanson seems to be aware of the fact that he's using the figure, as suggested by his statement that "the latest '-zation' comes as globalization".

Next, note how the use of Homoeoteleuton descends throughout the passage. First there are three zation words - industrialization, mechanization, suburbanization, and globalization. Then there are two "ations"- communications and transportation. Finally, there is one "tion" word - competition. Thus, there is a geomterical decrease here regarding the number of words with each kind of ending - 4:2:1. There is also gradual, linear decrease in the size of the word endings - zation (6 letters) to ation (5 letters) to tion (4 letters).

There are several names given the gradual descent of emphasis in a passage of text. This one, I think, is Catabasis or Decrementum. The use of this figure in this passage reinforces the decline mentioned in the prior paragraph- our descent from a nation comprised of 95% farmers down to just 1%. As Hanson goes on to note, it is a decline from which there is no return. And although he does not suggest that demise of the family farm heralds the decline of Western civilization, he does argue convincingly that it is an irretrievable loss of for our culture.

Here, then, is a near perfect example of the coupling of the content and form of words. Consider this a Flourishus Maximus.

And Your Not Kyrgyzstan Either

2005-03-24T15:23:00.000-08:00

A few weeks, as many no doubt recall, Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hizbollah, gave a very-pro Syrian speech to a very pro-Syrian crowd of his supporters in Beirut. I discussed that speech here. One of the things I didn't mention at the time was one of that speech's lost opportunities, at least from a rhetorical standpoint. One of the grab quotes from that speech was the line in bold text below:
 
  It is important to address some words to our partners in the country. Let us hold dialogue, an interior and international dialogue. Lebanon is an exceptional case. Lebanon is not Somalia nor Ukraine nor Georgia. If some people believe that they can topple Lebanon's government, security, stability and strategic choices through some demonstrations, slogans and media, they are wrong.
 The problem I found with the remarks is that while they possessed a definite parallelism, they lacked a clear theme connecting the three countries which were contrasted to Lebanon. If there was or is an underlying dimension to these three, some axis along which they could be compared I missed it. Somalia is a basket case, a truly lawless place. No one has tried to topple its government. It doesn't have one and hasn't had one for a decade. Ukraine just had an Orange revolution, but is nowhere near lawless. Georgia also had mass demonstrations that resulted in a change in government. But again, not lawless. Underdeveloped perhaps, but not lawless.
 
 Since this grouping doesn't seem to have a clear internal logic to it, I'll give Nasrallah one other country that he can add to his list the next time he addresses his followers: Lebanon is not Kyrgyzstan either! At least not yet. And since no one knows where the winds of change will blow next, he might do well to consider the purchase of a good windbreaker.

UPDATE:

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette tells us why Kyrgyzstan matters. Interestingly, the editorial mentions two of the above three countries:

...the evolving political situation in Kyrgyzstan may be another example of popular democracy asserting itself. If so, it would be another example in the line of what occurred in Serbia, Georgia and Ukraine where old-line leaders were forced out by demonstrators: smelly elections were held, an organized opposition with a cause refused to accept the results, and ultimately pushed Slobodan Milosevic, Edouard Shevardnadze and Viktor Yanukovich out of the way.

Maybe Nasrallah meant to say Serbia instead of Somalia? If so, then an underlying dimension is apparent- time. Serbia went first, Georgia next, then Ukraine. Also, all three have historical, cultural, and/or political ties to Russia and/or the former USSR.

Dowd's Certainty, Noonan's Humility

2005-03-24T07:20:00.000-08:00

As one might expect, Maureen Dowd and Peggy Noonan have two very different takes on the Terry Schiavo situation. Noonan's article is entitled "In Love with Death", Dowd's, "DeLay, Deny, and Demagouge." And it is not only their viewpoints that differ, so do their rhetorical strategies. Noonan's essay begins these two propositions: 

God made the world or he didn't. God made you or he didn't.

and from them infers the following:

If he did, your little human life is, and has been, touched by the divine. If this is true, it would be true of all humans, not only some. And so--again, if it is true--each human life is precious, of infinite value, worthy of great respect.
This, she goes on to assert, is what most people supporting Terri Schiavo's right to live believe. Then, Ms Noonan, does something that most people with strong opinions on a matter do not do- she confesses her ignorance about the motivations of the people who disagree with her conclusions. Note, she doesn't mock or belittle them or their ideas, she just admits that she does not "understand" where they are coming from. This she does through the use of two figures of speech- Epibole, the repetition of the same phrase at irregular intervals, and Erotesis or Rhetorical Questions. See for yourself how they read when lifted from the text and placed in order of their appearance. First the Epibole:

I do not understand the emotionalism of the pull-the-tube people.I do not understand their certainty.I do not understand why people who want to save the whales (so do I) find campaigns to save humans so much less arresting. I do not understand their lack of passion. But the save-the-whales people are somehow rarely the stop-abortion-please people.I do not understand why those who want a freeze on all death penalty cases in order to review each of them in light of DNA testing--an act of justice and compassion toward those who have been found guilty of crimes in a court of law--are uninterested in giving every last chance and every last test to a woman whom no one has ever accused of anything. 

And now the Erotesis,

[I do not understand the emotionalism of the pull-the-tube people.] What is driving their engagement? Is it because they are compassionate, and their hearts bleed at the thought that Mrs. Schiavo suffers?

If they care so much about her pain, why are they unconcerned at the suffering caused her by the denial of food and water? And why do those who argue for Mrs. Schiavo's death employ language and imagery that is so violent and aggressive?

Why are they so committed to this woman's death?

What does Terri Schiavo's life symbolize to them? What does the idea that she might continue to live suggest to them? Why does this prospect so unnerve them?
  
How do the pro-death forces "know" there is no possibility of progress, healing, miracles?

Why are ...women in America who decry spousal abuse... not taking part in the fight for Terri Schiavo? Again, what explains their lack of passion on this?

Who wouldn't feel extreme sadness at being extremely disabled? 
Dowd, also begins by invoking God, and by (kind of) asserting the existence of God, but in a rather different manner:

Oh my God, we really are in a theocracy.
She also follows up with a rhetorical question:

Are the Republicans so obsessed with maintaining control over all branches of government, and are the Democrats so emasculated about not having any power, that they are willing to turn the nation into a wholly owned subsidiary of the church?
 And here the die is cast, the rest of the article consists of a series of arguments and examples to support her thesis that this is about power and politics, not morality. So, whereas Noonan confesses her lack of understanding, and does so humbly, Dowd is plauged by no doubts. For her it is clear that:

the Bush administration is pandering to "religious fundamentalists who want to dictate how the government should be run"

our democracy is deteriorating

"morality" is being used here to lead people by the nose

the Republican party is becoming a theocracy

the beleagured Tom DeLay is using the situation to save his political career while presidential hopefuls Jeb Bush and Bill Frist are using to jumpstart theirs

"The president and his ideological partners don't believe in separation of powers. They just believe in their own power."

And there you have it: personal, political power. Triple Alliteration in P's to match the triple Alliteration in D's in the title of her article: DeLay, Deny, and Demagouge. A fourth P, principle, is conspicuously absent from her political calculus. Instead, the important "P" is privacy. Interesingly, she alliterates for emphasis:

The more dogma-driven activists, self-perpetuating pols and ratings-crazed broadcast media prattle about "faith," the less we honor the credo that a person's relationship with God should remain a private matter.

So in the end we see two of our nation's most intelligent and articulate journalists expressing different views on God, on morality, and on the role that each should play in the politics of life and death. Both are rightly concerned for what this issue says about our society and may do to our constitution. Both speak for millions. Both, I am sure, value human life. Only one, however, concedes that their are limits to her knowledge and understanding of those with whom she disagrees. Only one relegates faith to a position inferior to privacy and credo. Only one speaks humbly and, in doing so, speaks to my soul. And for me that's key. If I didn't knew where I stood on this matter before reading these two op-eds, I'd sure know now.

****

Update: John Podhoretz of the NY Post used the word "soul" in his analysis of the Schiavo affair.

We usually call that essence the "soul." Our souls define us: They make us who we are in the deepest sense. And they transcend us as well: They are our connection to the divine, to all in the universe that is unseen and unknowable but is still there.

Debra Saunders of the SF Chronicle has several questions- and answers- too:

Do I have problems with Congress passing a law for one person? Do I believe it is possible that Michael Schiavo, who did go to great lengths early on trying to help his wife, still has the best interests of Terri in mind? Do I want the government to stay out of end-of-life decisions that families are forced to make at a painful, raw time in their lives? Was I appalled when I heard Bob Schindler say on TV that he told his daughter, who is starving, he would "take her out for a little ride, get her some breakfast?" Yes, yes, yes and of course.

Little Green Synonyms

2005-03-21T12:28:00.000-08:00

Over at Little Green Footballs there's a wonderful example of the figures of speech known as Synonymia, a string of synonymous words, and Scesis Onomaton, a string of synonymous phrases or statements.

It continues to amaze me that otherwise intelligent people, people who should and do know better, are still trying to pretend that the blatantly bogus, fraudulent, fake, forged, phony CBS National Guard documents could possibly, somehow, maybe, be genuine.

I really like how these two figures are "doubled up" in this one sentence. First note the two- fold nature of the Scesis Onomaton - intelligent people, people who should and do know better. There are two synonymous phrases here. Note also the nice use of the figure Anadiplosis (the repetition of one word at the end of one phrase and the beginning of the next) involving the word people (...that otherwise intelligent people, people who should and do know better).

We also see two strings of synonymous words: there's the "bogus" string and there's the "possibly" string. It is also interesting that the first series contains two instances of Alliteration (similar initial consonants)- there's the b-series (blatantly bogus) and the "f" series (fraudulent, fake, forged, phony).

All this doubling is not without purpose. Rather, it nicely underscores the author's main thesis: that cognitive dissonance over Rathergate continues to drive several prominent members of the MSM to distraction; that the inner conflict between two competing cognitions is making them feel and behave in a manner best described as doubleplusungood.

Pres. Bush and Terri Schiavo; The Lone Ranger and Tonto

2005-03-21T02:43:00.000-08:00

According to the AP, by way of Drudge, President Bush yesterday signed into law a bill that may yet save the life of Terri Schiavo:

President Bush signed emergency legislation sent to him by Congress early Monday to allow Terri Schiavo's parents ask a federal judge to prolong their daughter's life, capping days of emotional debate over who should decide life and death.
"In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life," Bush said in a statement after signing the bill.

For what it's worth, I think Bush is doing the right thing here. So I hope this doesn't sound improper, but there was something in Bush's remarks that reminds me of the punch line of the old joke about about the Lone Ranger and Tonto. There are many versions of it, here's one:

As the Lone Ranger and Tonto were riding along towards the north, they spotted a war party of about 50 Apaches coming at them. They turned south, but another war party appeared. They turned east and met another party of 100 braves. They turned west as their last remaining hope and saw a party of 500.
The Lone Ranger turned to his friend and said, "Well, Tonto, this is the end, there's not much we can do." Tonto looked back at the Lone Ranger. "What you mean WE, white man?"

What, you may ask does this joke have to do with the Schiavo case? The answer comes in the use of the word "we". The Lone Ranger and Tonto both use it. The problem for the former is that the latter rejects its implications, and quite forcefully.

There is a name for what the Lone Ranger was trying to do in this story. It is called Association. Often times in political discourse we observe a writer or speaker seek to associate himself with those whom he addresses. This practice can take many forms.

First, the speaker can include himself in what he says for others. Two, he can include others in what he says of himself. Three, he can include many in what he says of one. One of the easiest ways to recognize this rhetorical device in action is to observe when the speaker employs plural pronouns and possessives, e.g. we, us, our, and ourselves.

As is the case with other figures, sometimes Association works and sometimes it does not. And as the old joke shows, when it doesn't the results can be devastating. Few, in fact, are more humilitating or embarrasing for a speaker than to try and create a sense of inclusion with his audience and have it rejected. With that in mind, let us return to Bush's remarks once more:

"In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life," Bush said in a statement after signing the bill.

First, let me point out that this is a very well-crafted statement, containing, as it does, several figures of speech. Among them are Alliteration (serious, substantial), parallelism and scesis onomaton (serious questions, substantial doubts), synonymia (doubts, questions), anaphora and tricolon (our society, our laws, our courts), decrementum (society, laws, courts), and, of course, association (our).

The word upon which the success of the whole sentence hinges, however, is the word "life." To my mind, this is an attempt on the part of the President to frame the Schiavo case as one about protecting the sanctity of human life. This is, of course, a message to which Bush's strongly pro-life base would be especially receptive. And rightly so. They have, after all, been at the forefront of much of the effort to keep Terri Schiavo's feeding tube in place. The phrases and figures that proceed this word, life, especially the associative ones, set the stage for its appearance. I predict that this well-crafted, well-timed, and well-targeted message will be warmly welcomed by the Schiavo supporters, in particular, and by the pro-life community, more generally. I aslo expect that this rhetoric will be roundly, and promptly rejected by the opposing camps.

There are going to be people who say, in so many words, "what do you mean by OUR, cowboy?"

Hoagland's Antithesis

2005-03-17T04:52:00.000-08:00

The figure of speech known as Antithesis is one of the most commonly found in political discourse. The figure entails juxtaposing contrasting ideas or words, often in a parallel structure. Jim Hoagland provides an effective example in his recent WAPO article entitled "Shunning Sinn Fein".

Criticizing Clinton for extending his embrace too soon and too warmly to Adams or Arafat, or Bush for withholding his, misses that point. Fate has given Bush a chance to push the peace process forward in the Middle East, and cause to pull it back in Northern Ireland. Leadership is about making distinctions in hard cases. Even politicians from heavily Irish communities have been doing that this St. Patrick's Day. They must not relapse once the spotlight leaves them or the IRA.

Several things are contrasted here: Clinton and Bush, extending and withholding, push and pull, forward and back, the Middle East and Northern Ireland, Adams and Arafat. What makes this a particularly effective use of Antithesis is how these contrasts are used to underscore the undeniable fact asserted in the next sentence- that "leadership is about making distinctions in hard cases." Thus, we don't have contrast or antithesis just for its own sake. Instead, we see the figure of speech used in the supporting role and the logic, the propositional content of speech, in the leading role. Just as it should be.

Jeff Jacoby on Marriage Newspeak

2005-03-17T03:40:00.000-08:00

If you've read George Orwell's dystopic novel, 1984, then you know the origin of the word newspeak. Wikipedia says the following on the guiding principle behind newspeak:

The basic idea behind Newspeak was to remove all shades of meaning from language, leaving simple dichotomies (pleasure and pain, happiness and sadness, good thoughts and thoughtcrimes) which reinforce the total dominance of the State. A staccato rhythm of short syllables was also a goal, further reducing the need for deep thinking about language. ... The underlying theory of Newspeak is that if something can't be said, then it can't be thought. ... Examples of Newspeak, from the novel, include: "crimethink"; "doubleplusungood"; and "Ingsoc". They mean, respectively: "thought-crime"; "extremely bad"; and "English Socialism", the political philosophy of the Party. ... The word "Newspeak" itself also comes from the language. Generically, newspeak has come to mean any attempt to restrict disapproved language by a government or other powerful entity.

For an example of Newspeak in practice, one need look no further than Massachusetts, where the state and some of its elite universities have begun in earnest to restrict the language disapproved of by same-sex marriage advocates and to reverse the curse of heteronormativeness. In a recent column, Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe astutely observes how quickly the war on words followed after the legalization of same-sex marriage:

The changes soon began. Massachusetts rolled out a new marriage license shorn of any reference to bride and groom. Couples getting married were now to be officially identified as ''Party A" and ''Party B." The department of public health has proposed a similar rewrite of the state's birth certificate, replacing ''mother" and ''father" with ''Parent A" and ''Parent B."

For those aware of the power of controlling language, the end to which efforts like this are directed could not be clearer:

What is underway here is not simply a tweaking of legal terminology. The crusade for same-sex marriage has never been aimed merely at adjusting the familiar boundaries of married life to make it more inclusive. The real target is the significance of marriage itself -- the idea, fundamental to human happiness and all successful societies, that the purpose of marriage is to bring men and women together for their mutual welfare and for the protection and well-being of any children they create or adopt. It is that deeply ingrained belief that the marriage radicals are determined to do away with. One purpose of the official marriage newspeak is to make such thoughts increasingly unthinkable.

He ends the article with this dire prediction:

This is just the start. The assault is not going to let up until the heteronormative deviants among us have been silenced. You think the marriage radicals have gone too far? You ain't seen nothin' yet.

Political correctness is but one of the many names coined for the practices outlined above. In a strictly rhetorical sense, the term Euphemism seems most suitable. Bullinger defines the term as "a figure by which a harsh or disagreeable expression is changed for a pleasant or agreeable; or where an offensive word or expression is changed for a gentle one; or an indelicate word for a modest one."

His remarks on the propensity for abusing Euphemy sound like they were written this year rather than in 1898. Noting, in particular the tendency of people to use Euphemism in a "downward direction", i.e. in "vain attempts" to cover over one's indiscretions and to pump up one's self image, the following examples are provided:

"A love-child" covers illegitimacy; "a free life" glosses a debauchee; "a gentlemen of the road" covered a highway robber. So the Romans called a thief " a man of three letters" because the Latin word for theif is "fur". On the other hand, among ourselves, "the hydraulic van" has superseded the water-cart; the shop has become an "establishment" or an "emporium"; the butcher has blossomed into "a purveyor of meat"; the hair-dresser is "an artist" or "professor"

And so it goes, up to the present day.

Kramer's Epanodos, NRO's Polyptoton

2005-03-16T07:29:00.000-08:00

NRO has just published an editorial concerning the Kramer same-sex marriage ruling. The title is of that editorial is "Rule by Ruling". It is an example of the figure of speech known as Polyptoton , the repetition of the same noun or verb in different declensions and conjugations. In their article, the editors zero in on Kramer's logic, or the lack thereof, in declaring California's prohibition against same-sex marriage unconstitutional. They take especial issue with the logic implicit in this use of Epanodos, the repetition of different words in a sentence in a reverse order:

The facts in the plaintiff's cases also confirm the obvious natural and social reality that one does not have to be married in order to procreate, nor does one have to procreate in order to be married.

What he is attempting to do with this figure is clear: he is trying to effect a divorce between two institutions- marriage and procreation- institutions that are wedded in the minds and hearts of many Americans, that are deeply embedded in the social fabric of every country on Earth, and that every government has a vital interest in supporting.

Hitchens Takes Aim at a Weasel Word

2005-03-16T03:34:00.000-08:00

Christopher Hitchens writes recently in Slate that there is yet another cliche that needs nuking- the use of the word "fuel" as a verb. As noted elsewhere, Anthimereia is the name given to the exchange of one part of speech for another. Although many people find it objectionable, there is nothing particularly illegitimate about this figure of speech. Still, as Hitchens so smartly points out, its use in certain contexts contributes to the separation of words and their meanings. Here's one excerpt from the article I especially appreciated:

However, and on the opposite side of the page or ledger, it is repeatedly asserted that some things do indeed "fuel" a perception of other things or, sometimes, the thing itself as well as the "perception" of it. For example, I would like to have a dollar for every time I have read that the American presence in Iraq or Afghanistan "fuels" the insurgency. There must obviously be some self-evident truth to this proposition. If coalition forces were not present in these countries, then nobody would or could be shooting at them. Still, if this is self-evident one way then it must be self-evident in another. Islamic jihadism is also "fueled" by the disgrace and shame of the unveiled woman, or by the existence of Jews and Christians and Hindus and atheists, or by the publication of novels by apostates. The Syrian death squads must be "fueled" by the appearance of opposition politicians in Lebanon or indeed Syria. The janjaweed militia (if we must call them a militia) in Sudan must be "fueled" by the inconvenience of African villagers who stand in their way.

Hitchens is an excellent writer and just about anything he writes is worth a read. This piece is a very insightful analysis of grammar, rhetoric, and logic. Were I to teach a class on political rhetoric, this article would be required reading.

Don't Believe the Hypophora

2005-03-15T07:53:00.000-08:00

Kevin Sullivan of the WAPO writes in a recent article that Hugo Chavez, the "elected" leader of Venezuela and Fidel Castro mini-me, is these days positioning himself as Latin America's Anti-Bush. I observe that Mr. Chavez' crude and grandiose rhetoric is perfectly aligned with his over-blown sense of self -importance and his obvious desire to be a player on the world stage. No surprise then that the Chavez resorts to two types of "hype" - Hypophora (a figure of reasoning wherein one poses a question and then immediately answers it, often characterized by the practice of raising and then settling imaginary or hypothetical objections) and Hyperbole (exaggeration, usally via comparison, simile, or metaphor).

Neither of these figures of speech are innately offensive or obnoxious. That said, their usage by Chavez makes them so, due in no small part to the demonstrably false premises that they attempt to conceal. This is also what makes these examples so instructive; they tell us much about the how the minds of petty tyrants and anti-American dictators work, particularly how they use overblown rhetoric to cover-up the truth.

One important thing to remember about dictators, as well as others with strong authoritarian tendencies, is that they care nothing for the opinions, thoughts, feelings, emotions, and intuitions of others. They brook no opposition, recognize no equal, and do not suffer fools gladly. They talk talk at people, but never with them. They seldom, if ever, employ the rhetorical device known as Anacoenosis (asking the opinion or judgment of the judges or audience, usually implying their common interest with the speaker in the matter). If they appear to do so, don't believe it. These people never pose a question without having in mind what the right answer to that question is. Anyone who expects to survive long in the presence of a dictator quickly figures out this: tell Mister-Know-It-All exactly what he wants to hear. The fates of those who do not are sad indeed. Life can be pretty good, however, for those who excel at the task of keeping the dictator's already over-blown ego full of hot air and who are willing do his bidding. In the end, however, the propensity of dictators to limit the free flow of information, to curtail debate, and to supress dissent, contributes to their eventual downfall.

The second thing to remember is that dictators always need an external enemy. This keeps the people's attention focussed the threat out there, on the devil they don't know, rather than on they one do.

These two things go a very long way to explaining the rhetorical style adopted by the dictator when he addresses the people, his beloved people. He speaks to them as an adult talking to little children. He speaks authoritatively, as if all the issues have been carefully weighed and the solutions found. He speaks as if he and his advisors have thought everything through and identified the one true course of corrective action. That's why dictators are oh so fond of showing pictures of themselves surrounded by their cadre of lackeys, syncophants, brown nosers, croneys, homeboys, third cousins, and other assorted boot lickers all sitting around a big table (with Big Man at the head of course), as if they actually deliberated something, as if they actually gave Him advice, as if the decision wasn't already a foregone conclusion- do what Big Man says do!

And this is why Chavez resorts to such obnoxious rhetoric. It's likely all he knows. He's not interested in any response to the question "What can we do regarding the imperialist power of the United States?" because it is not really a question at all. It's an assertion, based on a false premise, masquerading as a question. And such "questions" are never to be answered truthfully. Instead, the listeners are to unquestioningly accept Big Man's answer: we must unite!; not "we must liberalize" or "we must follow the rule of law." It is certainly not allowable to say "we must abandon marxist, socialist, and anti-capitalist ideas." God forbid anyone dare utter the words "we must admit or errors and take responsibilities for our self-inflicted wounds."

What is even more troubling than the Hypophora, however, is the hyperbolic rhetoric Chavez employs when addressing other dictator's beloved people.

Venezuela's energy alliances with nations such as Cuba, which receives cheap oil, are an example of how "we use oil in our war against neoliberalism," he said. Or, as he put it on another occasion, "We have invaded the United States, but with our oil."

Thus, not satisfied with his vicious slander the US and abuse of the name of our Secretary of State, Chavez has the gall to suggest that the enemies of the US should not just unite, but counter-attack, that they ought to invade the invader. And how does he suggest that they do this? Not with arms and armies, of course- he's not that stupid, dictators have very strong self-preservation instincts, afterall- but with oil, with an economic weapon. This, of course, would all be laughable if it weren't for the fact that Chavez has lately been sucking up to Iran. Talk about being on the wrong side of His story.

Ledeen: Things Can Still Go Bad

2005-03-14T08:42:00.000-08:00

In a recent article at NRO, Michael Ledeen argues that despite recent successes in the Terror War, there is still much work to be done. The title of the article is "Syrious Threat". That title is a clever play on words likely inspired by the "Syrial Killers" banners observed last month at the protests in Beirut.

What really caught my attention, however, was the subtitle of Ledeen's article: "This can still go bad." As any English teacher will tell you, the word "bad" is an adjective, not an adverb. As such, it should be used to modify a noun, not a verb. The grammatically correct rendering of the title would have been "This can still go badly." If it had read this way, however, I probably wouldn't have noticed it. As such, I probably wouldn't have given due consideration to the points that the author most wanted to emphasize- that our work is not done, that we are not out of danger.

And that's the thing about figures of speech, about rhetorical flourishes: they are designed to catch our attention, to make us sit up and take especial notice of what was said. This line - this can still go bad - works so well both as a subtitle and as the closing line of the essay because it does just that. The name for this device is Anthimeria, the substitution of one part of speech for another, e.g. a noun used as a verb. I rarely come across this figure of speech. Ledeen's use of it is as good as any I have seen.

Nasrallah's Mind Numbing Repetition

2005-03-09T12:40:00.000-08:00

In a previous post, I remarked on the propensity of Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah to literally and figuratively to talk people to death. His over-reliance on a figure of speech known as Anaphora, (beginning successive clauses, phrases, and sentences with the same word or words) earned him pretty low marks in my book. Still, since it was my first time analyzing his remarks, I was prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt, i.e. I was prepared to believe that he might be a more skilful orator than his remarks suggested. After having read the transcript of his latest screed, I can say that my opinion of his oratory has changed- for the worse. This is in large part due to his over-reliance on an extremely narrow range of "repetitive" figures of speech, chief among them the figure "Anaphora". Here are some examples:

You have been present in battlefields for the defense of Lebanon's unity, Lebanon's dignity, Lebanon's Arabism, Lebanon's pride, Lebanon's land, Lebanon's freedom, Lebanon's independence and Lebanon's sovereignty.

You, who have met the calls from areas across the country, from all confessions and from all categories, today you determine the future of your country.

I urge you all to transcend every language, every term and every expression beholding an insult to men in this country.

To Syria we repeat what Syrian President Bashar Assad said: You do not have a materialistic military presence in Lebanon, you are present in the souls, in the hearts, in the minds, in the past, in the present and future, and no one can drive out Syria from Lebanon or Lebanon's mind, or Lebanon's heart or Lebanon's future.

I address U.S. President George W. Bush, Ms. Condoleezza Rice and the American - Lebanese field leader [David] Satterfield: Your plans aiming at dividing the country are wrong. Lebanon cannot be divided nor defeated. Lebanon will not change its name, or its history, or its identity. Lebanon will not throw its heart to your soldiers' dogs to eat it.

Lebanon will remain the country of Arabism, the country of nationalism, the country of resistance. Lebanon is the nation itself.

I thank you, the loyal, the devoted and the good. Long live the people, long live Lebanon, long live the resistance and long live Syria.

The examples above are only half the story. Nasrallah also used this device in several other places to emphasize two of his other favorite words, "we" and "you." Here's an example from four successive sentences in his remarks:

You have been present in battlefields... You, who have met the calls... You, in this mass demonstration...You reply to the world today...

This last phrase is the one that many media outlets incorporated in the titles for their articles on the speech and rally where these remarks were made.

And there are also eight consecutive paragraphs with "we" among the first words:

...we repeat what Syrian President Bashar Assad said...We here support ...We have come here...We agree with opposition ...We stress that the Taif Accord...We, the gathered here...We, who stand today ...We all consider that the family...

My conclusion: Nasrallah's over-reliance on one rhetorical device, Anaphora, suggests a real lack of imagination, a certain dullness of mind, a kind of cognitive rigidity that is frankly scary. The only thing scarier is the people who are moved by this kind of rhetoric. Flourish not!

Durkin Channels Hillary

2005-03-09T04:43:00.000-08:00

Tish Durkin over at the New York Observer, channels Hillary's ruminations about her as-yet-undeclared Presidential bid and finds, among other things, Tricolon and Parallelism:

Sure, there will be currently unimaginable gaffes and mortifications, screw-ups and scandals along the way—but nobody, nobody, has one-eightieth of the practice at turning those into white noise, sympathy magnets or live ammunition that I do.

The bulk of the article contains a thoughtful analysis of the cons (no pun intended) of a Hillary 2008 candidacy. It's well worth the read.

Hitchens on the Death of a Cliché

2005-03-02T02:56:00.000-08:00

In Slate, Christopher Hitchens comments on the death of one cliché , "the Arab Street" and warns us to watch out for the rise of another, "Islamophobia".

The return of politics to Iraq has had many blissful secondary consequences, one of them apparently minor but nonetheless, I think, important. When was the last time you heard some glib pundit employing the phrase "The Arab Street"? I haven't actually done a Nexis search on this, but my strong impression is that the term has been, without any formal interment, laid to rest. And not a minute too soon, either.

Although I know neither its origin nor its trajectory, I agree that this phrase is much less used now. What I do know is that at one time it had some currency, at least in some circles. That "The Arab Street" is now a cliché is less important to me than what made it work in the first place. To my mind, this phrase is an example of two figures, Antonomasia, the substitution of a proper name for common or appelative noun. In this case the proper name, "The Arab Street" is substituted for the relatively flat and much less glamorous "Arabic public opinion".

And why has this phrase gone from caché to cliché? Why has it fallen into disrepute and disuse? Hitchens suggests that the events of Jan 30 and the failure of "The Arab Street" to rise up in anger, like so many predicted so many times, have played a large role. His last sentence explains why this matters:

The battle for clarity of language is a part of this larger contest, and it is time for the opponents of terror and bigotry to become very much less apologetic and defensive on this score.

Steyn's Incisive Simile

2005-03-01T16:09:00.000-08:00

Mark Steyn came up with a very incisive Simile in his most recent Telegraph piece. Its well worth reading in its entirety.

Left to their own devices, the House of Saud - which demanded all US female air-traffic controllers be stood down for Crown Prince Abdullah's flight to the Bush ranch in Crawford - would stick to their traditional line that Wahhabi women have no place in a voting booth; instead, they have to dress like a voting booth - a big black impenetrable curtain with a little slot to drop your ballot through.

Ledeen's Money Paragraph

2005-03-01T08:09:00.000-08:00

Here's the last paragraph of Michael Ledeen's most recent column in the National Review Online It's a gem.

Our most lethal weapon against the tyrants is freedom, and it is now spreading on the wings of democratic revolution. It would be tragic if we backed off now, when revolution is gathering momentum for a glorious victory. We must be unyielding in our demand that the peoples of the Middle East design their own polities, and elect their own leaders. The first step, as it has been in both Afghanistan and Iraq, is a national referendum to choose the form of government. In Iran, the people should be asked if they want an Islamic republic. In Syria, if they want a Baathist state. In Egypt and Saudi Arabia and Libya, if they want more of the same. We should not be deterred by the cynics who warn that freedom will make things worse, because the ignorant masses will opt for the fantasmagorical caliphate of the increasingly irrelevant Osama bin Laden. Mubarak and Qadaffi and Assad and Khamenei are arresting democrats, not Islamists, and the women of Saudi Arabia are not likely to demand to remain shrouded for the rest of their lives.

Two things make this the money paragraph. One is the sheer number of figures. In the space of nine sentences you'll find these six figures of speech - Metaphor, Alliteration, Polysyndeton, Parallelism, Ellipsis, and Anthithesis. The second is how skillfully they are used.

Metaphor: "Our most lethal weapon against the tyrants is freedom, and it is now spreading on the wings of democratic revolution."

Alliteration: "...because the ignorant masses will opt for the fantasmagorical caliphate of the increasingly irrelevant Osama bin Laden." "...revolution is gathering momentum for a glorious victory."

Polysyndeton: "In Egypt and Saudi Arabia and Libya, if they want more of the same." "Mubarak and Qadaffi and Assad and Khamenei are arresting democrats..."

Ellipsis: In Iran, the people should be asked if they want an Islamic republic. In Syria, if they want a Baathist state. In Egypt and Saudi Arabia and Libya, if they want more of the same.

Anthithesis: "Mubarak and Qadaffi and Assad and Khamenei are arresting democrats, not Islamists..."

Parallelism: "We must be unyielding in our demand that the peoples of the Middle East design their own polities, and elect their own leaders.

Very nicely done!

Nasrallah Talks People to Death

2005-02-22T15:23:00.000-08:00

The following excerpts were recently posted on the Middle East Media Research Institute website. They are remarks made by Hizbullah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah in speeches delivered on February 18 and 19, 2005.

We consider it (America) to be an enemy because it wants to humiliate our governments, our regimes, and our peoples. Because it is the greatest plunderer of our treasures, our oil, and our resources, while millions in our nation suffer unemployment, poverty, hunger, unmarriagability, ignorance, darkness, and so on. America… This American administration is an enemy. Our motto, which we are not afraid to repeat year after year, is: 'Death to America.'

And this

Some people may wonder and say: 'Is there no end to this hostility?' Yes, there is an an end. If the Zionists leave our lands and holy places and give them back to their owners, this conflict will come to an end. If America stops interfering in our ountries' and nation's affairs, stops its aggression, stops its occupation, stops it's plundering of our resources and treasures, we will have no problem with it. We don't want to go to Washington to fight America. We are defending our countries and our existence.

A few things really lept out at me when I read the these remarks. Foremost was the overuse of the figure of speech known as Anaphora, the "repetition of the same word or group of words at the beginning of successive clauses, sentences, or lines." Skilled orators use this rhetorical device quite frequently and to great effect. Perhaps because when it is used in just the right amount, Anaphora lends a sense of melody and rhythm to piece of writing that few other figures of speech can. Martin Luther King Jr was expert at this. On the down side, the sense of rhythm that is imparted can cause listeners to overlook of the underlying logic, to give it more credence than it deserves.

And like all good things, Anaphora can also be overdone. Too much Anaphora makes a speech sound monotonous and uninspired. And to my ear, Nasrallah overuses this figure of speech in both of the above excerpts. In the first case, it is the word our that is overused : our governments, our regimes, our peoples, our treasure, our oil, our resources, our nation, our motto... eight times! He might have been better served by ordering the nouns in each group of phrases in either ascending or descending order, i.e. by using the figures Anabasis or Catabasis

In the second excerpt, Nasrallah resorts to Anaphora again, but this time using three different words: stops, we, and our. Not quite as repetitive but no more imaginative. And this is the other thing that is so striking about Nasrallah's remarks: the apparent overuse of the word we (used 7 times) and its possessive, our (used 24 times). That's 31 times in a total of 610 words. That's a rate of just over 5% or every 20th word. In terms of elapsed time, he used we and our 31 times in 5.5 minutes, an average of every 10-11 seconds. When a speaker tries, with words, to associate himself with those to whom he speaks or addresses, the figure of speech is known as Association or Inclusion. To see that Nasrallah is trying to do this is obvious. The question is why?

Why was he trying so hard to tap into or to create a sense of community or group identity among his listeners? If the sense of community were there, I don't think he'd need to harp on the point this much. Reading the transcript, and watching the video, I really got the impression that he's trying to gin the crowd up, that he is trying way too hard. Is he worried about something? Does he have a reason to feel isolated or marginalized? Is his personal or Hizbullah's support eroding? If so, why? And all this just days after the assassination of Hariri.

A closer examination of the word frequency of Nasrallah's remarks gives a clue. When you remove the commonly-used articles, conjunctions, prepositions (a, an, and, of, the, etc.) from consideration, the second most used word in his remarks is "death". It appears 18 times. It comes from a few phrases. There are the usual suspects, of course, the chants "Death to America" and "Death to Israel". And then there is this, from the last paragraph of the transcript of his speech:

How can death become joyous? How can death become happiness? When Al-Hussein asked his nephew Al-Qassem, when he had not yet reached puberty: "How do you like the taste of death, son?" He answered that it was sweeter than honey. How can he foul taste of death become sweeter than honey? Only through conviction, ideology, and faith, through belief, and devotion. We do not want to live merely in order to eat, drink, and enjoy life's pleasures, and leave our homeland to Israel so it will slaughter it upon the altar of its aspirations, desires, hate, and historic vendettas. Therefore, we are not interested in our own personal security. On the contrary, each of us lives his days and nights hoping more than anything to be killed for the sake of Allah. The most honorable death is to be killed, as the Leader Imam Al-Khamenei said when 'Abbas [Musawi] was martyred. He said: "Congratulations to 'Abbas, congratulations to 'Abbas." The most honorable death is death by killing, and the most honorable killing and the most glorious martyrdom is when a man is killed for the sake of Allah, by the enemies of Allah, the murderers of the prophets [i.e. the Jews].

Look what we have here: seven deaths, five kills, two martyrs, with a murder, a hate, a vendetta, and a slaughter thrown in for good measure. So its not just "death to Israel" and "death to America." It's also "death to us", to the speaker and his listeners. Nasrallah wants so badly to see the death of his enemies that he's willing to see the death of his associates, his fellow believers, and himself as part of the bargain. On second thought, I'm not so sure about that last part. I don't believe that he wants his own death. I don't believe he is quite so willing to die. His job, after all, is to talk other people to death, a job that requires that he stay alive whilst others do the dying. Still, I wouldn't doubt if he's sleeping with one eye open these days.