posted
I don't get how people are behind him...I really don't. I'm a concervitive...a libritarian actually...but still, it's not like I'm a big lefty...
Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
It's good propaganda. By which I mean, if they actually show that ad, it's going to be effective. Not really sure what it will do for them in the midterms, since in addition to showing that they have to include something that attaches Republicans at large to the President, otherwise it's just Bush Bashing when he isn't even running for anything.
They need to run that in addition to "Congressman/Senator So And So supports the Iraq War" ads, even better to get something on the person running following the President's new strategy. AND they should try and get footage of prominent Democrats from years ago who all along said we needed a change in policy to make them look prophetic and ignored by a stupid wreckless Republican leadership.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
His opponents successfully converted "stay the course" - as in commit to staying in Iraq until the job is done - to "stay the course" as in "don't change what we're doing at all."
Having successfully redefined the term, now they're mocking him for responding to the new definition.
It is brilliant propaganda.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Whether the definition has been changed or not (and that's been a Republican tactic even more than a Democratic one, so don't go crying to me), Bush was an idiot to come out and say "we've never been 'stay the course'." Even if he immediately explained what he meant by that commment, he should have known that that soundbite would hurt him, regardless if the Dems played it up or not.
Edit: By this, I mean, he basically set himself up for a fall. It was stupid politics on his part. He should have explained how what his administration is doing is different from what the Dems are claiming by using the "stay the course" line. (I don't know if this is actually true or not - I just think his administration is playing the politics game badly here).
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
"He should have explained how what his administration is doing is different from what the Dems are claiming by using the "stay the course" line."
He can't. I mean, he could, but the danger of emphasizing a phrase, over and over, to get it into the minds of the viewers, is that it might take on different meanings than the one you intended. "Stay the course" has been the adminstration's catch phrase and all-purpose response, often paired up with the description of any alternate suggestion of troop deployment at all as "cut and run." In one stroke he made himself looked resolved and firm and all of his detractors look cowardly and irresponsible. That is, until recently when the Dems started using "stay the course" in their own ads as a description of inflexibility in the Republican mindset.
Suddenly the phrase was a liability and had to be set aside, quickly.
Every time a new development occurs, it's always fun to watch the White House press conference to see which new phrase will be parroted 800 times by the guests on the next Sunday morning political talk shows and by Tony Snow for weeks until the next one is issued, probably by sealed envelope ("This week's phrase is 'the stakes are high,' pass it on").
Note that this is not a singularly Republican habit, but it does seem to be much more prevalent during this adminstration, possibly because Democrats have problems agreeing on anything.
Posts: 7790 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: His opponents successfully converted "stay the course" - as in commit to staying in Iraq until the job is done - to "stay the course" as in "don't change what we're doing at all."
Having successfully redefined the term, now they're mocking him for responding to the new definition.
It is brilliant propaganda.
Wasn't exactly a hard sell to make. This from the guy that turned Democrat's calling for phased out troop withdrawels combined with handing power over to the Iraqi government as "cut and run," as in "get out as fast as possible and screw whoever you have to, to do it."
When he's out there making everyone else's opinion on the war look like treachery, every time he says "stay the course" he's practically calling the play for Democratic propaganda. So now he comes out and says that all along it was his plan to change as the situation changed, even though he clearly hasn't in the past four years, all of a sudden it's the way we've been doing business all along, and all of a sudden phased hand overs to the Iraqi government, redeployments and benchmarks are all HIS plan, even though Democrats have been saying that for years. Incidentally, the Prime Minister of Iraq said that no one would give his government benchmarks, which paints something other than the rosy picture Bush is trying to foist off on us.
Bush made his own bed and hopped in, Democrats are just tucking him in.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
I'm not saying it's necessarily okay to do things simply because others are doing it, just that if one party is going to start making accusations regarding the unethical behavior of their opponents, then they need to consider whether they're being hypocritical. I happen to hold the position that acting badly and then behaving hypocritically is worse than simply acting badly.
Chris - I understand the now-liability of the phrase, and I agree that it should be set aside. I don't think Bush should have actually said the declarative phrase "We've never been 'stay the course'" That's just asking for trouble. Instead he should have simply kept reiterating his position and stating that the Dems were misrepresenting his plans without bringing the phrase into play.
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
I don't know that this is so much people doing a bad thing as it is people playing by the same set of rules. George Bush and his supporters have used simplistic, catch-phrase manipulation to confuse and dodge away from the more sophisticated, nuanced criticisms. Heck, they've used the "stay the course" mantra that way.
Yeah, they should have gotten nailed by the earlier stuff, but setting the game up the way they have has given them some breathing room. I don't really see slamming them on things they deserve to get slammed for using the tactics and rules that they've set out to be *bad*. Not optimal, for sure, but it's not like the issues underlying this "stay the course", "cut and run", and "we've never been stay the course" are not legitimate and the simplistic soundbite strategy has been a large part of the Bush administration's way of avoiding addressing them in any responsible manner. They are largely the ones who have set the game up according to these rules and now they are paying for it.
To me, this situation is more like one boxer repeatedly breaking the Marquess of Queensbury rules and the other boxer responding in kind.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Their calculated language framing turned against them because of a few reasons:
- It became associated with a group that was losing their credibility by trying to paint the war in rosy shades (Re: 'last throes') while reality continued to veer further from the assertions of the state department
- 'Stay the course' then became associated with a strategy which was ill-equipped to deal with the cascading failure of the occupation. The warmakers were being rigid and dogmatic and it has come to light oppressively over the years that they have had no idea what they were doing, but proceeded forward anyway (Re: Blind into Baghdad - Fallows, State of Denial - Woodward). "Stay the Course" was unwittingly an apt description of their hapless occupation strategy, or lack of thereof.
- They played it fast and loose with their own 'talking points' and tried to pull a 'we have never been stay the course.' It's so stark that you could poke fun at it by describing it as attempted doublethink.
They deserve everything they get with the fantastic failure of their own language framing.
It's their own fault, and anyone who mouthed off with "Cut and run" only to turn around and call this unfair can just stew in the hypocrisy.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:I'm not saying it's necessarily okay to do things simply because others are doing it, just that if one party is going to start making accusations regarding the unethical behavior of their opponents, then they need to consider whether they're being hypocritical.
I didn't see any party speaking out against anything here in this thread. I saw Dagonee speaking out against something.
Or does he become a hypocrite whenever he speaks out against anything that any Republican has ever done?
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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And the type of argument that Dagonee was making isn't the type of argument that the intelligent Republican pundits are making? I never made the claim that Dagonee was speaking for the Republican party. But I think it's rather silly to say that the Republican party, through its many members, isn't making the exact same argument that Dagonee made. Of course they are - it's a *good* attack on this Democratic tactic. People will be convinced by it. But that doesn't make it any less hypocritical.
I wasn't attacking Dagonee; I was attacking his argument if used by the Republicans, which seems quite possible. I'm sorry if you read something different into it. Perhaps before you make claims about what I'm saying, you could ask for clarification?
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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quote:I wasn't attacking Dagonee; I was attacking his argument if used by the Republicans, which seems quite possible.
Would I be correct in interpreting your post as meaning that while it's a valid argument when coming from Dagonee, it's an invalid argument when coming from the Republican party?
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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It's just we're putting new coversheets on all the TPS reports before they go out now. So if you could go ahead and try to remember to do that from now on, that'd be great. All right?
Posts: 4077 | Registered: Jun 2003
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quote:I wasn't attacking Dagonee; I was attacking his argument if used by the Republicans, which seems quite possible.
Would I be correct in interpreting your post as meaning that while it's a valid argument when coming from Dagonee, it's an invalid argument when coming from the Republican party?
You would be correct in interpretating the post as saying it would be a hypocritical argument if it came from the "Republicans" (strong supporting members speaking on behalf of their party), but it's not a hypocritical argument coming from Dagonee, as long as he has never redefined a term, then mocked a person for responding to the redefined term (I don't think I've ever seen him do that on this board, but who knows what he gets up to in lawyerly classes).
Posts: 2409 | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
As long time conservative Republican columnist GeorgeFWill points out: Anyway, what Cheney actually said 17 months ago was that the insurgency was in its "last throes." That was much stronger than saying we were "over the hump" regarding violence. Beware of people who misquote themselves while purporting to display candor.
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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quote:Originally posted by Dagonee: His opponents successfully converted "stay the course" - as in commit to staying in Iraq until the job is done - to "stay the course" as in "don't change what we're doing at all."
Having successfully redefined the term, now they're mocking him for responding to the new definition.
It is brilliant propaganda.
The significance of the phrase "stay the course" has changed somewhat to be sure, but was this change plotted out by Democrats? Or was it more of a spontaneous grass-roots reaction to the multiple meanings of the phrase as well as surging disappointment with the lack of progress in the war, involving not just Democrats but the entire population? edit:As well, the inflexibility and arrogance displayed at every turn by the Bush administration gives good cause for a definition of "stay the course" as steadfastness with blinders on.
It seems to me to be a grass-roots thing, which was later picked up by some Democrats. But this is subjective and hard to prove. In either case, it was boneheaded of the president to say "We've never been 'stay the course'", when he and his spokesmen have chanted it like a mantra dozens of times. It's an obvious lie.
Whereas reframing the debate on the estate tax into one on the death tax was calculated and focus-grouped to a fare-thee-well, and has been documented as such. It transformed a tax on the richest 1 or 2% into something visceral that everyone can relate to, even though so few would ever pay it. That's brilliant propaganda.
posted
Bush was the one who attempted to redifine what the Dems were saying.
A couple of months ago Bush was saying "cut and run" and catagorizing all Democrats as cowards and lumping all plans for an exit strategy into a message about leaving immediatly.
He attempted to contrast that with his "stay the course" strategy, but luckily we weren't fooled this time.
Posts: 2 | Registered: Sep 2006
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posted
Somehow, "Stay the course!" doesn't quite seem to belong in the same reality as the more complex situation described by a frontline soldier, now deceased.
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
The Bush administration is the worst administration at actually communicating their message since the days of Nixon (note--I was born after the Nixon presidency, but I remember reading about their collossal PR screw-ups, even before Watergate.) Bush himself is a horrible extemporaneous speaker, which constantly gives his opponents feul for attack (the "Bush is obviously stupid b/c he said so-and-so" line is getting waaay old IMHO) but his communications team screws it up even more when they come up with trite catchphrases that give the impression of un-nuanced policies. As someone who wants the Bush team to succeed, I was happy when the very witty and quick-on-his-feet Tony Snow became Press Secretary, but the whole communications team still has problems. As for the video, I thought it was an excellent pro-Democrat ad, typical of the Democrat's brilliant political strategy of calling for a "change in leadership" without indicating whatsoever what the new leadership wants to do differently. To misquote Shakespeare: the Dems strategy is "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
Posts: 786 | Registered: Jun 2003
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posted
I have to disagree, Brian. It seems to me that the Bush administration has been wildly effective at disseminating messages to the public. They use short phrases that are easy to get stuck in your head, then repeat them over and over to make sure the messages stick. They single-handedly added "flip-flopper", "cut-and-run", and the aforementioned "stay the course" to the national dialogue.
I also think Bush is discounted as a speaker. I think a lot of people listen to him speak and see/hear a down-to-earth kinda guy. He can butter up a crowd really, really well.
As an aside, I want the Bush team to succeed too. Just not at the same things they want to. Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote: The most recent United Nations report, published in September, showed that 3,590 people were killed in July and 3,009 in August in violence across the country. Compiled by statistics from Baghdad’s central morgue and from hospitals and morgues countrywide, the report posited an average death rate of 97 people per day.
posted
A linguistics professor's take on 'stay the course' and how it evolved:
quote: "Stay the course" was for years a trap for those who disagreed with the president's policies in Iraq. To disagree was weak and immoral. It meant abandoning the fight against evil. But now the president himself is caught in that trap. To keep staying the course, given obvious reality, is to get deeper into disaster in Iraq, while not staying the course is to abandon one's moral authority as a conservative. Either way, the president loses.
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