Joshua Michael Stern’s film, Swing Vote, in which Kevin Costner and Madeline Carroll play working-class father and daughter, has just opened nationwide. Presidential elections are around the corner. There is no better time to reflect on politics.

Is it possible that history repeats itself because we simply forget (or not care)?

President Clinton told the following to the Grand Jury (according to footnote 1,128 in Kenneth Starr’s report to the House of Representatives, as published Sept. 12, 1998): It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is. If the–if he–if ‘is’ means is and never has been, that is not–that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement….Now, if someone had asked me on that day, are you having any kind of sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky, that is, asked me a question in the present tense, I would have said no. And it would have been completely true.

In 1946, Orwell asserted in his In A collection of Essays: The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns… instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink. If Orwell does not do the idea justice, here is how Combs & Nimmo described the essence of palaver in The new propaganda : The dictatorship of palaver in contemporary politics: Circular reasoning and circumlocutions, jawboning, babbling, speaking in riddles, talking our way out of trouble, big talk, smooth talk, and spin. Essentially, palaver is bullshit (BS). Ken Smith proposed the following highlights in his book, Junk English:

1. hush of human frailties and cultural license,
2. pretentious,
3. appearance over substance,
4. broadness over precision, and
5. loudness above all.

Although, junk English can stand alone, it is the basic ingredient of BS. There is also doublethink, the term coined by Orwell (1949): Doublethink lies at the very heart of Ingsoc, since the essential act of the Party is to use conscious deception while retaining the firmness of purpose that goes with complete honesty. To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just as long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies - all this is indispensably necessary.

Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) were the initial reason to invade Iraq. After the WMD fiasco, the cause shifted to more noble ends such as promotion of freedom or to assist Iraqis make political progress.

Refresh your memory:

H.G.Frankfurt from Princeton University asserted: The essence of BS is not that it’s false but that is phony. BS is unavoidable whenever circumstances require someone to talk without knowing what he is talking about. Thus the production of BS is stimulated whenever a person’s obligations or opportunities to speak about some topic exceed his knowledge of the facts that are relevant to the topic.

The father of all propaganda, Adolf Hitler, once said: The effect of propaganda for the most part must be aimed at emotions and only to a very limited degree at the so-called intellect. We must avoid excessive intellectual demand on our public…Thus, all effective propaganda must be limited to a very few points …until the last member of the public understands what you want him to understand by his slogan.

Lauer: …how to go about winning the war on terror. That phrase strikes me a little bit. Do you really think we can win this war of …on terror for example in the next four years?

President: I have never said we can win it in four years.

Lauer: So I’m just saying can we win it? Do you see that?

President: I don’t think you can win it. But I think you can create conditions so that the … those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world- let’s put it that way.

So why do we keep believing? Pratkanis and Aranson said in The Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion, the more self-assured and confident a communicator appears, the more likely that we will accept what is said.

Concluding Question: What is the big deal? So what if everyone is a BSer? Who cares?

J.Zuckerman of Walden University said in a 2008 lecture: A society that speaks Junk English is a society of hucksters. If we are all huckstering each other, than we are persuading each other on effects, not facts or logic.

In politics BS does more damage than huckstering each other. During the lecture I attended, the presenter was dumbfounded by a question from an audience: What if we want to hear BS, what if politicians are just doing what we want them to do? Since then I was haunted by the possibility of being associated for the death of 4,000 [4] U.S. soldiers, and for somewhat less emphasized 95,000 [5] civilian deaths in Iraq.

References

• 1. http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/05/01/bush.transcript/index.html
• 2. Pres. G.W. Bush, as quoted in http://usembassy.state.gov/posts/rp1/wwwhr082.html
• 3. G.W.Bush, August 6, 2004
• 4. http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/iraq_casualties.htm
• 5. http://www.iraqbodycount.org/
• James E. Combs, Dan D. Nimmo, The New Propaganda: The Dictatorship of Palaver in Contemporary Politics, (p. 24). (New York: Longman, 1993).
• H.G. Frankfurt, On Bullshit, (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2005).
• Adolf Hitler . Mein kampf (pp.18-181), (1925).
• George Orwell, In a Collection of Essays, (pp.162-177), (Garden City, NY: Anchor Doubleday. 1946).
• George Orwell, 1984. (New York: Signet Classics 1949).
• Elliot Aronson and Anthony Pratkanis, The Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Us and Abuse of Persuasion. (New York: W.H. Freeman, 1992).
• Ken Smith, Junk English. (New York: Blast Books, 2004).
• Jeff Zuckerman, Power-point lecture, Residency Program, Walden University. (2008).