Category Archives: Words

Taking nasty pleasure in the King’s English

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Being at the source of our beloved language, I particularly enjoy this e-mail that Samuel Tenenbaum passed on. I’d read some of these offerings from some of the cleverer practitioners on both sides of the pond, but not all:

When Insults Had Class


These glorious insults are from an era before the English language got boiled down to 4-letter words.


The exchange between Churchill & Lady Astor:
She said, “If you were my husband I’d give you poison.”
He said, “If you were my wife, I’d drink it.”

A member of Parliament to Disraeli: “Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease.”

“That depends, Sir,” said Disraeli, “whether I embrace your policies or your mistress.”


“He had delusions of adequacy.” – Walter Kerr

“He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.” – Winston Churchill

“I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure.”  Clarence Darrow

“He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary.” – William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway).

“Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I’ll waste no time reading it.” – Moses Hadas

“I didn’t attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.” – Mark Twain

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends..” – Oscar Wilde

“I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend…. if you have one.” – George Bernard Shaw to Winston Churchill
“Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second…. if there is one.” –  Winston Churchill, in response..

“I feel so miserable without you; it’s almost like having you here.” – Stephen Bishop

“He is a self-made man and worships his creator.” – John Bright

“I’ve just learned about his illness. Let’s hope it’s nothing trivial.” – Irvin S. Cobb

“He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others.” – Samuel Johnson

“He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up.” – Paul Keating

“In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily.” – Charles, Count Talleyrand

“He loves nature in spite of what it did to him.” – Forrest Tucker

“Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address on it?” – Mark Twain

“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.” – Mae West

“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go..” – Oscar Wilde

“He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts.. . for support rather than illumination. ” – Andrew Lang (1844-1912)

“He has Van Gogh’s ear for music.” – Billy Wilder

“I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn’t it.” – Groucho Marx

I haven’t heard anyone say anything that clever since I’ve been here, but I am enjoying the accents.

Sorry, but commies don’t get to DO holy war

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Especially not extremely backward, stone-age commies led by a guy who looks and acts like an alien (a reference to my favorite Economist cover ever, below)

Did you see or hear the latest?

NKorea threatens ‘sacred’ nuclear war if attacked

By FOSTER KLUG and HYUNG-JIN KIM – Associated Press
POCHEON, South Korea — North and South Korea beat the drums of war Thursday, with each threatening the other with immediate retaliation if attacked.
Seoul has staged days of military drills in a show of force meant to deter North Korea, including live-fire exercises earlier this week on a front-line island shelled by the North last month. Angered by the exercises, North Korea threatened Thursday it would launch a “sacred” nuclear war if Seoul hit it and warned that even the smallest intrusion on its territory would bring a devastating response.
The two sides are still technically at war because their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce not a peace treaty, and a U.S. governor who recently made an unofficial diplomatic mission to the North has said the situation on the peninsula is a “tinderbox” and the worst he had ever seen it.
Still, the latest rhetoric seemed likely to be just that, words aimed at stirring pride at home and keeping the rival at bay.
Defense chief Kim Yong Chun said North Korea is “fully prepared to launch a sacred war” and would use its nuclear capabilities, calling Monday’s drills a “grave military provocation” that indicated South Korea and the U.S. are plotting to invade the North.
Kim told a national meeting in Pyongyang that the North’s military will deal “more devastating physical blows” to its enemies if they cross into the North’s territory even slightly. He also threatened to “wipe out” South Korea and the U.S. if they start a war, the official Korean Central News Agency said in a dispatch….

Here’s an interesting side topic for consideration by you lovers of language: Why is it that hyperbole seems to translate so badly from culture to culture? Or is it just a dictator thing? We’re all still having fun with Saddam Hussein’s “mother of all battles” — to which, after it was over, we could well have taunted “Maybe next time you ought to send the DADDY of all battles,” were George H.W. Bush given to trash talk. I certainly had a lot of fun with it back at the time — sending out memos to the newsroom, in connection with coordinating our war coverage, couched in Saddam style (I ran across one of those recently, and meant to post it — now I don’t know where I put it).

And now this — which frankly, I don’t think anybody’s going to be quoting 19 years from now. I mean, it just doesn’t work. Sorry, Kim, but you don’t get to have a “sacred war.” You’re a godless commie. Did you forget, or what? Stalin would have never slipped up like this. And another thing, Poindexter: If Stalin had threatened “devastating physical blows” — well, first of all, he would never have used a pantywaist construction like that, but if he said something LIKE it — you knew he’d have backed it up. You, not so much.

It’s just … embarrassing…

Lie of the year: “Gummint takeover of health care”

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A Tweet from the WashPost brings to my attention this item:

PolitiFact’s Lie of the Year: ‘A government takeover of health care’

By Bill Adair, Angie Drobnic Holan
Published on Thursday, December 16th, 2010 at 11:30 p.m.

In the spring of 2009, a Republican strategist settled on a brilliant and powerful attack line for President Barack Obama’s ambitious plan to overhaul America’s health insurance system. Frank Luntz, a consultant famous for his phraseology, urged GOP leaders to call it a “government takeover.”

“Takeovers are like coups,” Luntz wrote in a 28-page memo. “They both lead to dictators and a loss of freedom.”

The line stuck. By the time the health care bill was headed toward passage in early 2010, Obama and congressional Democrats had sanded down their program, dropping the “public option” concept that was derided as too much government intrusion. The law passed in March, with new regulations, but no government-run plan.

But as Republicans smelled serious opportunity in the midterm elections, they didn’t let facts get in the way of a great punchline. And few in the press challenged their frequent assertion that under Obama, the government was going to take over the health care industry.

PolitiFact editors and reporters have chosen “government takeover of health care” as the 2010 Lie of the Year. Uttered by dozens of politicians and pundits, it played an important role in shaping public opinion about the health care plan and was a significant factor in the Democrats’ shellacking in the November elections….

And indeed, it’s tough to think of a bigger lie recently propagated than the idea of the lame, tepid, timid health care bill that Dems crammed through over Repubs’ kicking and screaming was anything in the same universe as a government takeover of anything.

If only it were. That is, if only it were a takeover, not of “health care,” but of the mechanism for paying for it. A few minutes ago on the radio, I heard ol’ Henry McMaster rumbling in that distinctive old-Columbia drawl of his about that mean awful nasty mandate, and again found myself wondering how he or anyone can even begin to imagine that we could address health care expense in any meaningful way without a mandate of some kind. Not THIS mandate, but a real one — a mandate for all of us to be in the same system, the same risk pool. Nothing else would really work.

I experienced actual gummint-run health care when I was a kid, because my Dad was in the Navy. Navy doctors, Navy hospitals. And let me tell you something: It was great. My Dad devoted his career to his country, frequently (at sea, and in the Rung Sat Special Zone of Vietnam with the river patrol boats) putting his life on the line. And in return, my family’s health care was taken care of. Made all the sense in the world to me. Way I see it, we should all pay into the system one way or another — for most of us, through taxes or premiums or whatever you choose to call them — and then everybody’s in the pool and we achieve maximum economies of scale.

But essentially, even that wouldn’t be a gummint-run health-care system, but a government-run (actually, I don’t care who runs it, as long as we’re all in it and nobody’s adding cost by building profit into the transaction, and the way you usually accomplish that is with a public approach) medical insurance program.

But we never even considered THAT. No one dared, from the beginning of the debate, breathe the two words that should have been nonnegotiable — “single payer.” Which is idiotic. No, we started with a premise far short of that, and negotiated farther and farther away from it until we ended up with something that bore no resemblance to anything even within that universe.

And still, people like Joe Wilson went around saying “government takeover of health care” as if the words coming out of their mouths bore some relationship to reality.

Talk about a big lie. Yeah, you lie, Joe. Whether you understand that you’re doing that or not. Even if you believe it, which you most likely do.

But I find myself wondering — when he said it, did anyone actually believe it? I mean, besides Joe? I find that hard to fathom, if anyone did…

Oprah helps out another struggling writer

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Got an ad from Barnes & Noble via email saying, “Just Announced!… Oprah’s Latest Book Club Pick.”

Turns out it was something called A Tale of Two Cities by one Charles Dickens. I’m glad Oprah decided to help the guy out. He deserves a wider audience. I see he’s from London. Maybe I’ll look him up when I’m there at the end of the month, give him a little publicity on the blog.

This reminds me of two things:

  1. I still haven’t read that book. I’ve started a couple of times, but didn’t get into it, which my eldest daughter finds incredible, since it’s one of her faves. Maybe I should try again, after I get done reading Tony Blair’s book. I’m in a sweat to finish Tony’s, you know, in case I run into him over there. What if I I ran into him at Starbucks or something (hey, it’s a small country), and he asked what I thought of his book and I hadn’t read it? What a proper flat I should look. (And yes, I know my British slang needs updating. It’s not even up to Dickens’ era, being stuck in about 1810.)
  2. I read an interesting book review this morning, about a book titled The Other Dickens, a tale of Charles’ wife and how beastly he was to her. Which, of course, also reminded me of how I hadn’t read A Tale of Two Cities.

About that review, in the WSJ — I was struck by this bit of criticism:

There is a rather significant moment in 1849 when he insists on chloroform at the birth of Henry Dickens. A tender gesture aimed at sparing his wife pain? Ms. Nayder has other ideas: “a victory of male medical expertise over natural forces,” she decides, in which such “victory” is “compromised by the method through which it is achieved: the dissociation of mind from her body . . . and her consequent objectification.” This is sharply put, but you have a feeling that Dickens’s omitting to send out for anesthetics would have been equally culpable.

The bit about “objectification” gestures at another of Ms. Nayder’s contexts, which is her determination to give Catherine not so much a life of her own as one acceptable to the ukases of 21st-century academe. Nobody in “The Other Dickens”—remember that this is the age of Gladstone and Disraeli—does anything that is merely idiosyncratic: Having been “disempowered,” they perform “transgressive acts” that may or may not leave them in a state of “valorization.”

In other words, the author was somehow ideologically incapable of reaching the conclusion that maybe, just maybe, Dickens was, as an individual person, simply a jerk.

This got me to wondering about something else, after having watched “Frida” last night and being immersed in arguments among Mexican communists back in the 1930s: Which is more given to silly, pompous jargon — feminism or Marxism. Discuss.

Fiction tries to describe a strange new truth

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Sure, he wove a tangled web out there in the cold, but in a way things were more straightforward for le Carré's Alec Leamas.

I really value my Wall Street Journal. Every day, it reminds me what a well-run, thoughtful newspaper that still has some resources to work with can do. And in spite of its staid, conservative reputation, it manages to do some really interesting, creative things.

Graham Greene, creator of Our Man in Havana, would have had just the right touch.

Today, we see what happened when the editors got this idea: With WikiLeaks creating a reality that no novel ever imagined, what would three spy novelists have to say about this strange new world? What does spy fiction look like in a world without secrets?

I devoured it, as I am a fan of spy fiction. And while I am not a reader of any of the three writers they chose (Alex Carr, Joseph Finder and Alex Berenson), they rose well to the occasion of having to write on a newspaper deadline. Sure, they lacked the mastery of the language of John le Carré, and the dry wit of Len Deighton. And none of them have the touch of the late Graham Greene, whose sense of the absurd (think Our Man in Havana, to which le Carré paid tribute in The Tailor of Panama) would fit so well the perversity of Julian Assange et al.

But as I say, they did fine, each taking a different approach. Alex Carr did the best job of portraying the human cost of trashing security, with a U.S. intelligence officer anxiously racing to warn her Afghan source that he has been compromised by WikiLeaks’ callous disregard for his young life.

Those of you who still fail to get, on a gut level, what is wrong with what Wikileaks does should read that one if none of the others.

Joseph Finder had the most complete, in the literary sense, tale, managing to be fairly clever and tell a full story with a twist at the end, and do it all in just over 1,000 words — the length of one of my columns when I was with The State.

Alex Berenson sets a scene pretty well in his piece, but doesn’t resolve anything. It’s a mere snapshot smack in the middle of a story. I still enjoyed reading it.

Yes, it’s fiction, but fiction can communicate truths that journalism cannot. Most of what helps us understand our world, really get it, is in the mortar that lies between the solid fact-bricks that journalism provides. That mortar consists of subjective impressions, emotions, unspoken thoughts — things only an omniscient observer (something that only exists in fiction) can provide.

If you can read those three pieces — I’m never sure what people who don’t subscribe can and can’t read on that site — please do.

What would Len Deighton's Harry Palmer do?

“Swamp Fox, Swamp Fox, tail on his hat…”

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A reader this week reminded me of something that I may have known, but had forgotten — that long before he was the funniest deadpan comic actor in America, Leslie Nielsen was … “The Swamp Fox” on TV. She wrote:

I occasionally post on your blog as Abba.  Would you consider posting this clip from YouTube showing Leslie Nielsen, who died this week, as South Carolina’s Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox, in Disney’s series from the early 1960s – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vvQJ7ZDg1Y.  Here’s a longer version – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVGN1pDzYAY&feature=related.  Leslie Nielsen never looked so good!  This clip has the catchy theme song that I remember so well from my childhood.  We used to play the Swamp Fox on the playground at school, and many of the boys in my class had tri-cornered hats with fox tails attached.  Hear the song once, and you’ll be humming it all day long!  A fitting tribute to Leslie Nielsen from our corner of the world, I think.

I loved that show, which ran from October 23, 1959 (right after my 6th birthday) to January 15, 1961 — hardly more than a year.

Like the far, far more successful “Davy Crockett” series and generally forgotten “Gray Ghost,” these shows inspired me and other very young kids to run out and play at being actual figures from history. (Anyone remember that goofy, overly elaborate way Col. Mosby saluted? I thought it was cool, and used to go around imitating it. Wouldn’t you like to see video of that?)

Actually, to take that a bit farther… to this day, whenever I hear the words “Tory” and “Patriot,” I think of first hearing them used on “The Swamp Fox.” So while my understanding of the term was to grow and expand later, I actually had a minimal working knowledge of what a “Tory” was at the age of 6. If I ran into a 6-year-old who used a term like that today, I’d be shocked. But it was common currency among fans of “The Swamp Fox.”

I can also remember a conversation I had with my uncle about “The Gray Ghost.” I was confused about the whole blue-vs.-gray thing (especially since I was watching it in black-and-white), and I asked him during one show, “Are those the good guys or the bad guys?” My uncle, who was only a kid himself (six years older than I) could have given me a simplistic answer, but instead, he said, “Well, they’re both Americans…” and went on to suggest that a case could be made for both being good guys. That sort of rocked my world. There was no such ambiguity on the Westerns I watched. This was my introduction to the concept that in war, in politics, in life, things can be complicated, that there are many shades of gray. Perhaps the track that set mind on has something to do with why I don’t buy into the whole Democrat-vs.-Republican, left-vs.-right dichotomy that drives our politics. After all, they’re all Americans. And in the wider world, they’re all humans. Even the Nazis. (Of course, this doesn’t keep me from understanding that when humans’ actions go beyond the pale — as with Nazis, or terrorists — they must be opposed, with force if necessary.)

Also, while at first I didn’t think I remembered the “Swamp Fox” theme song, as I listened to it repeated over and over on that clip above, I had a dim memory of being struck by the odd syntax of that second line, “no one knows where the Swamp Fox at” — I didn’t know WHY it sounded odd (I was just learning to read, and hadn’t gotten to grammar yet), it just did.

In other words, these shows — which presented very simplistic, often inaccurate glimpses of history — not only helped feed a lifelong interest in history, but helped foster the ability to think.

So… TV doesn’t actually have to be junk, although it’s often hard to remember that these days.

Is English “The Last Lingua Franca?”

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Stan Dubinsky brings to my attention an article about a book, The Last Lingua Franca: English Until the Return of Babel, by Nicholas Ostler. The article he refers to was dense and unappealing, but I was intrigued by the title of the book. The thesis of the book, apparently, is not what the title implies. It implied, to me, that language will be the world’s common language for practical purposes forever and ever, amen — or until some apocalyptic collapse. The actual proposition is somewhat different:

English is the world’s lingua franca-the most widely spoken language in human history. And yet, as historian and linguist Nicholas Ostler persuasively argues, English will not only be displaced as the world’s language in the not-distant future, it will be the last lingua franca, not replaced by another.

The reasons why the author believes there will be no such common language in the future are less interesting to me — angels on the head of a pin, frankly — than wondering what folks will be speaking and writing several centuries hence.

And while it may be comparatively lowbrow, I think Joss Whedon’s prediction in the “Firefly” series was as credible as any other: He had all humans in the universe speaking a combination of English and Mandarin.


Far more useful than a phrase book…

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Next month I’ll be traveling to England, so this video, which Kathryn brought to my attention, might come in handy. If I can only master these, I should be able to pass as a local wherever.

Excuse the language. Or as the young man says, ignore the words. Just listen to the accents.

I used to be good at accents when I was his age (although not so much now; I think our speech patterns get less elastic as time goes on). But I was never this good.

What sort of person SAYS things like that?

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Gina reported a minute ago that Speaker Harrell was “overwhelmingly re-elected, 112 to 5, over Ralph Norman.”

As we expected.

But that’s not what interests me today. What interests me is the sort of rhetoric Norman was using going into this vote:

Norman

“In 2011, if (House members) give lip service to conservative values but don’t follow through, I’m going to be part of pointing it out and recruiting candidates to run against them,” said Norman,who defines conservative values as funding core services like law enforcement and education while making cuts elsewhere and dismissing “feel good” legislation.

“I’m planting the seeds and willing to put my name on the line with it,” he said.

What sort of person says things like that? Particularly when everyone knows he has no support. Has he no sense of irony? Has he no decency? Does he really think he sounds like anybody any sensible person would want to follow, talking about how he’s going to make the General Assembly — the same General Assembly that is rejecting him and his “leadership” — conform to his almighty Will?

This takes me back to that Nikki Haley/Sarah Palin rally that depressed me so. Nikki gets away with saying such obnoxious things because she has a pleasant voice and pleasing face and because, let’s face it, she’s a dame. Put enough sugar on it and it doesn’t sound so bad (unless you actually listen). But that doesn’t mean the things she says — such as the fact that established politicians are “scared” is “a beautiful thing,” or that she will “burn” lawmakers if they don’t obey her — are any less ugly. (As I said at the time, “What’s the difference between ugly good ol’ boy populism and Palin/Haley populism? Lipstick.”)

This mode of expression, this obnoxious, chip-on-the-shoulder attitude toward other human beings, is a distinguishing characteristic of this political trend with which Mrs. Haley, and Mr. Norman, identify.

And you know what? It is probably the one thing that bugs me the most about them.

Couldn’t they advocate the things they advocate without this hostile attitude? Is it really essential to who they are and what they stand for?

It’s too easy to get my conscience on my case

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FYI, folks, I got this from Randy Page over at SCRG, in response to this earlier post:

Appreciate your selective use of tweets from the SCRG account….

Ouch. I hate it that Randy feels put upon — I think he’s a nice guy and I want him to think I’m a nice guy, too, and all that — but it wasn’t all that selective. I mean, go look at the timeline. You be the judge.

I said the Onion thing reminded me of SOME of SCRG’s Tweets, and I showed you some of  the ones I was talking about. And I didn’t have to look hard. (And the ONE Tweet I found saying something positive about schools — “Schools’ Report Cards Improve” — hardly disproves my thesis, since in the same span of time I easily found seven negative ones. Since my post, SCRG has had two new Tweets. Neither was complimentary toward public schools, and one said “South Carolina’s Worst Elementary and Middle Schools.” I’m not holding my breath waiting for that companion Tweet about the BEST schools…)

I don’t see that I did a single wrong thing there. I definitely didn’t misrepresent the overwhelmingly predominate thrust of SCRG’s Tweets. But I still feel bad about it. As Mark Twain wrote (in the voice of Huck Finn):

But that’s always the way; it don’t make no difference whether you do right or wrong, a person’s conscience ain’t got no sense, and just goes for him anyway. If I had a yaller dog that didn’t know no more than a person’s conscience does I would pison him. It takes up more room than all the rest of a person’s insides, and yet ain’t no good, nohow. Tom Sawyer he says the same.

Uh-oh. Now I’m going to get in trouble with animal lovers. Hey, it was Huck Finn who said it, not me… There’s goes my danged conscience again…

SC Tweet of the week, from Adam Fogle

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Just to close out the week, I thought I’d share something that I enjoyed at the start of the week.

I was sort of in the dumps on Monday morning, and wondering how I’d ever deal with the stuff I had ahead of me the coming days — ADCO stuff, trying to sell some blog ads, some freelance stuff that sounds intriguing but that I don’t have time for, another four years of Mark Sanford — when I saw this Tweet from Adam Fogle that just summed it all up so well, and enabled me to laugh at it:

Adam Fogleadam_fogle Adam Fogle

I stopped believing for a little while this morning. Journey is gonna be so pissed when they find out.

That hit just the right tone to make my day, and help me face it with greater fortitude. (The second cup of coffee also helped, of course.)

Unfortunately, with the language that he used, I can’t steal it for the last-minute Health & Happiness I’ve been drafted to do at Rotary Monday. And I still have some of that same stuff I have to do, and we’re still gonna have four more years of… Quick, Adam, send me another one!

But anyway, that stands as my favorite Tweet of the week.

Later that day, Adam Tweeted:

Adam Fogleadam_fogle Adam Fogle

In the Land of Forgotten Tweets, I am King.

Not at all, my friend. Not at all.

“On Armistice Day, the philharmonic will play…”

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… but I won’t have a lot to say, even though I should.

I’ve always been terrible about these annual observances. I feel like I shouldn’t say anything unless I have something really new, really interesting, to say.

And I don’t have anything really impressive to say about Veterans Day, formerly Armistice Day, the 11th day of the 11th month, etc.

It’s not that I don’t think it’s important. Bud would accuse me (and frequently does) of making a sort of fetish of veteran worship. I am profoundly bowled over by the sacrifices of anyone who has served in combat for this country. Or served at all, even in rear areas. Interrupting one’s life to don the uniform and go where you are sent, perhaps for years on end, is a profound thing to do. Something we could use a lot more of. This is something that I think about, and read about, a LOT, and sometimes write about.

Unfortunately, except for the very few, too few, who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan — or Kuwait or Somalia or Bosnia or wherever — Veterans Day is about honoring previous generations. I mean, it’s great that we honor them, but it’s a shame that we associate “veteran” with old age as much as we do. The draft ended when I turned 19, the year I would have been called if I had been, and far too few people my age and younger have the experience of uniformed service. And that’s a loss — to our politics, to our civic life, to anything that depends upon a large portion of our society having the experience of having contributed to something larger than themselves. So our society, and our politics, have gotten meaner, pettier, more inward.

But this isn’t the day for that kind of talk. Earlier today, my son-in-law called to ask whether I was at the parade. I wasn’t. I was at work, where I’m trying to get my head above water on some ADCO projects now that the election is over. Which is why I haven’t posted much the last few days. And why I haven’t said anything, until now, about Veterans Day. Or the Marine Corps birthday yesterday.

Yo no sé que el quiere decir

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I read the 2nd reading at Mass yesterday, in Spanish, and doing so reminded me of something I read on another blog last week…

Just for those of you who still care — perhaps out of morbid fascination — what Will Folks has to say about Nikki Haley, I share this. It was Will’s entire statement with regard to her victory last week:

“Porque ¿qué aprovechará al hombre, si ganare todo el mundo, y pierde su alma.” – Marcos 8:36 (Sagradas Escrituras – 1569)

And no, I don’t know what he meant to say by that, or why he used a Spanish translation. It just struck me as mildly interesting that he chose to respond with a verse from Scripture, and that he chose that particular verse. I can think of a couple of ways to read that, and they are very different, so I’m not going to guess. Unusually cryptic, coming from such a tell-all guy.

The big, gigantic, huge ideological shift of 2010: About 4.76 percent of voters changed their minds

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Sometime over the last couple of days I was talking to a Republican friend who insisted that the American people decided to reject Obama and all his works on Tuesday, that the ideological message was clear and unequivocal.

His view was similar to the one express in this Tweet posted by @SCHotline today:

SC Politics 11/5: America to Democrats: Stop what you’re doi…http://conta.cc/cz79tE viahttp://SCHotline.us #scgop #sctweets#scdem

I, of course, disagreed. I believe that elections seldom express clear messages, for one thing. People have many reasons for voting as they do, and it’s almost impossible to classify or quantify them with any degree of certainty, even with exit polls — which necessarily boil motivations down to explanations that can be quantified. Voters could vote against a guy because, deep down, they don’t like the tie he wears — something a pollster is unlikely to capture.

What happened was that a small proportion of the electorate — a minority of us independents in the middle — voted Democratic in 2006 and 2008, but Republican in 2010. And they are just as likely to vote the other way in two or four years. Believe me; these are my people. I’m one of them. It’s a swing voter thing; someone who calls himself a Republican, or a Democrat — something who really believes all that junk they spout — couldn’t possibly understand.

My friend saw the election, for instance, as a clear, unambiguous rejection of Obamacare. Please. The word may poll well (for Republicans), but most voters couldn’t explain to you what the recent health care legislation actually DOES. Neither can I, unless you give me a couple of days to refresh my memory on it. I don’t even understand how it’s going to affect me, much less the country. If you don’t know what it is, how can you possibly know, clearly and unambiguously, that you are against it?

As a measure of how the country FEELS about the president, sure. But as a measure of a clearly defined ideology, no way. Which is good, since I don’t like ideologies.

Anyway, today my friend sent me this piece from The New Republic (hoping I would consider the source favorably, no doubt), headlined “It’s the Ideology, Stupid.” Well, I was offended at the original version of that phrase when the Clinton people used it; I am no more persuaded by this one.

What I DID like about the piece were the stats provided from exit polls. To begin with, they told me that in 2006, “those who voted were 38 percent Democratic, 36 percent Republican, and 28 percent Independent,” and this year the self-identification was 36/36/28. Well, right there I’m not seeing a big ideological shift. But my favorite stats were here:

We get more significant results when we examine the choices Independents made. Although their share of the electorate was virtually unchanged from 2006, their behavior was very different. In 2006, Democrats received 57 percent of the Independent vote, versus only 39 percent for Republicans. In 2010 this margin was reversed: 55 percent Republican, 39 percent Democratic. If Independents had split their vote between the parties this year the way they did in 2006, the Republicans share would have been 4.7 percent lower—a huge difference.

OK, let’s parse that. Independents are 28 percent of the electorate. In 2006, Dems got 57 percent of that segment, while the GOP got 39 percent. This year, they went 55 percent Republican and 39 percent Democratic. So that means roughly 17 percent of independents switched their preference from Democratic to Republican.

Seventeen percent of 28 percent (the percentage of the electorate that is independent) is 4.76 percent. I make no claims to be a statistician, so y’all check my math there. But I think I’m right.

So… instead of “America” sending a clear message to Democrats, or to anyone for that matter, what we have is 4.76 percent of the electorate voting differently from the way it voted in 2006 — for whatever reason.

“America” doesn’t change that much from election to election, folks. A few people in the middle slosh back and forth. And I think my explanation for why they do is as valid as the grand, oversimplified ideological one: People were dissatisfied in 2006 and 2008, so they elected Democrats to fix the things that were making them dissatisfied. Nothing has yet been fixed (even, for instance, if Obamacare will do the trick — which I doubt — it hasn’t accomplished anything yet), so they’re still dissatisfied, so they’re taking their custom to the other shop.

And that’s what happened.

Oh, by the way — the writer in TNR went on to explain his grand theory that it’s all about ideology in the subsequent paragraphs. I found them unpersuasive. At the very most, he quantifies an “ideological shift” of 11 percent — and I don’t think it’s ideological, I think it’s semantics. I think the word “conservative” feels more comfortable to more people this year. But even if he’s right, that’s an ideological shift of 11 percent. And 11 percent ain’t “America.”

Go read it and see what you think.

Sheheen wins endorsement tally, 7-2

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Back in 2008 when we endorsed John McCain, some of you pointed out how much of an outlier we were, since most papers across the country went with Obama. You were right to do so, because that was meaningful.

I realize that it’s axiomatic among the kinds of people who will turn out in enthusiastic droves tomorrow that newspapers, being “liberal,” always go with the Democrat. I know better. While newsrooms may be full of folks who usually vote Democratic, if they vote, editorial boards tend to be more centrist. And in South Carolina, they mostly lean right of center, to the extent that such a term in meaningful.

So it is that, even when I disagree with their conclusions, I give weight to the considered opinions of editorial boards, particularly when I see a consensus emerging.

We have such a consensus in South Carolina:

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) – Voters will decide Tuesday on South Carolina’s next governor, but the editors of the state’s larger daily newspapers have cast their ballots in their opinion pages.

The editorial boards of seven newspapers chose Democratic state Sen. Vincent Sheheen and the boards of two Lowcountry newspapers chose Republican state Rep. Nikki Haley.

The Post and Courier of Charleston applauded Haley’s views on government streamlining and reduced government spending.

“South Carolina could benefit from a governor who is committed to being an ‘ambassador, for business growth,” the editorial writers said.

The Greenville News, located in the center of the state’s most Republican and conservative region, said Sheheen is the best candidate to reverse the loss of authority and respect the office has experienced under Gov. Mark Sanford.

“Sheheen seems to best understand how to use the limited power given to the governor in South Carolina to put together teams and work for the common good,” The News’ editorial said…

Haley’s campaign also was endorsed by the joint editorial board of The Island Packet of Hilton Head and The Beaufort Gazette.

Sheheen’s campaign also received endorsements from the Aiken Standard, The State of Columbia, The Morning News of Florence, The Sun News of Myrtle Beach, The Herald of Rock Hill and the Herald-Journal of Spartanburg.

Note that the only paper of any size — generally, although not always, an indicator of greater professionalism — going for Nikki Haley is the Charleston paper, which has been head-over-heels for Mark Sanford since Day One. They love the guy, and are bound to love his designated successor.

Meanwhile, newspapers that would usually go for the Republican are unequivocally for Sheheen.

That’s because if serious people who have to stand behind and justify their opinions take a close, thoughtful look at these two candidates, the inevitable conclusion is obvious. At least, that tends to be the case 7 out of 9 times.

Burn, Baby, Burn

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The things you miss when you leave town a couple of days:

She also drew a comparison between working with lawmakers and raising children.

“That’s what it’s all about — letting them know what would happen,” she said, adding most lawmakers, like kids, will do the right thing if the consequences are clear. “If they mess up, I will burn them.” [Emphasis mine.]

Remember what I said about how Nikki, being female and petite and couching things as a “Mom,” gets away with saying things that coming from a man would sound incredibly presumptuous, megalomaniacal and bullying? This is another of those things…

She’s trying to sound fair and reasonable, but the rabble-rousing, storm-the-Bastille rhetoric that won the hearts of the Tea Party keeps coming out…

The Chinese water torture approach to campaigning

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Yesterday, driving back from Memphis where we had gone for a wedding, I came close to throwing the Blackberry out the window somewhere near Birmingham.

When I get an e-mail on the Blackberry, it buzzes twice. When I get a phone call, it also buzzes twice, before ringing. So whenever I get two vibrations, I tense up, waiting for the phone call. Which is no big deal most of the time, but pretty irritating. So imagine how I felt about the Rob Miller campaign after the follow messages buzzed me:

2:21 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson Says He Has Created Jobs”

2:38 PM — “FACT CHECK: Butch Wallace, Paid Nearly $100,000 for part-time work”

2:39 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson on the Wall Street Bailout”

2:40 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson Says Rob Miller is a Nancy Pelosi Liberal”

2:44 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson Says 16,500 IRS Agents Will Be Hired To Enforce The New Healthcare Law”

2:49 PM — “FACT CHECK: Congressman Wilson’s son received loans from a bailed-out bank”

3:04 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson is a Fiscal Conservative”

3:11 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson Touts Dangerous Defense Cuts”

3:12 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson Says He Supports Tax Cuts”

3:14 PM — “FACT CHECK: Wilson Says he Wants to Protect Social Security”

3:16 PM — “FACT CHECK: Wilson Spent Over $920 Per Month in Taxpayer Money to Rent a Car for His Personal Use, More Than All But 8 Other Congressman”

3:20 PM — “FACT CHECK: Joe Wilson Says He Supports Veterans”

3:30 PM — “FACT CHECK: Wilson & The Savannah River Site”

I am guessing this had something to do with the debate between Miller and Wilson yesterday. But you know what? I don’t care. I’m still pretty ticked about it. Who on Earth thought it would be a good idea to do this to people on a Sunday afternoon?

The Juan Williams debacle

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Folks, I’m a bit out of pocket — I’m in Memphis for a wedding, and my Internet access where I’m staying is limited (I may stop by a Starbucks later) — but to give y’all a little something to chew on, I share this email from a reader:

What did you think about Juan Williams being fired from NPR?

I thought that was about as low class as it gets.

1) His boss didn’t have the guts to fire him in person.  Got an underling to call him on the phone.

2)  Juan didn’t say anything that tens of millions of people in American don’t feel when they get on a plane- that if they see a group of Muslims on the plane, they feel uncomfortable- at least a little bit.

3) Juan didn’t say he liked that feeling. He wasn’t say other people should feel that way.  He didn’t say he was proud of it.  He was being honest about his feelings.

This country is becoming a place I don’t recognize.  You can’t even be honest with your own feelings- in a honest and forthright manner without getting screwed.

Unreal.

Thank you,
Barry

So what do y’all think about all that? Me, I think it’s a ridiculous overreaction by NPR. The explanation of how a rule has been applied here doesn’t seem to add up. The upshot is that NPR has handed FoxNews a propaganda coup in its ideological war with other media — one for which it was willing to pay $2 million.

Which makes me wonder — what do I have to say to get Fox to pay ME that kind of change?

Mrs. William Michael Haley, and all the ladies of the House

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Just noticed something on the S.C. legislative website. On the page with links to House members’ bios, there is an interesting difference in the way distaff members are listed:

Jeff D. Duncan
Tracy R. Edge
Shannon S. Erickson (Mrs. Kendall F.)
P. Michael “Mike” Forrester
Marion B. Frye
Laurie Slade Funderburk (Mrs. Harold Williams)
Michael W. “Mike” Gambrell
Wendell G. Gilliard
Jerry N. Govan, Jr.
Anton J. Gunn
Nikki Randhawa Haley (Mrs. William Michael)
Daniel P. “Dan” Hamilton
Nelson L. Hardwick

I never noticed that before, and I wonder why. Is it because they didn’t DO it that way before, or because I just never looked up any female members, or I just wasn’t being observant?

Anyway, it jumped out at me just now, when I went to try to answer the question raised by a reader back here (but I did not find the answer).

I wonder what y’all think of it.

Me, I like it. I think it’s genteel. But then, I would have been at home in the England that Patrick O’Brian and Jane Austen wrote about, when ladies were ladies and gentlemen were gentlemen. As long as I got to be a gentleman. (I think if I took an aptitude test that tested for all occupations throughout history, I would test as perfectly suited to being an English gentleman who did nothing but ride to the hounds and collect his rents — that is, let his man of business collect them for him, of course. I feel it in my bones. And you know what? In that whole year I was looking, I never saw a job like that.)

At lunch today, when I said something about how Vincent Sheheen has to be careful not to seem to be TOO aggressive with Nikki Haley, my ADCO colleague Lora Prill gently suggested that my sensibility with regard to matters of chivalry is a relic of a bygone era, which means of course that I’m way old. Which I’m not; I’m just quixotic.

At any rate, say what else you may say about it, it’s very South Carolina.

Beauty is Truth, and Truth Beauty

1 Reply

Wordle: Brad Warthen

Like a captain desperately busy clawing his ship away from th’ impervious horrors of a lee shore, I am busy today.

Later, I’ll try to post about last night’s debate.

In the meantime, I share this fun ditty that Doug Ross shared with me. It’s a graphic representation of this recent post, I think. Bet you didn’t know I was so artistic, huh?

And no, I can’t run it bigger here without it getting all blurry. You just have to click on it to see it full-size.