Dishonesty and Candidate Image

Those who know me well can attest to my disdain for political rhetoric, which I would argue is more of a form of sophistry in the absence of real knowledge of a subject than it is the useful tool for ‘informing’ the public that most politicians would claim it is. The easiest place to see this political chest-pounding is in political elections, where smooth words are supposed to make us ignore lack of experience, and war stories are supposed to help us ignore a lack of knowledge or innovation to inject into a national problem (either of these seem familiar?). But for lack of reliable and objective sources focusing on recent campaigns and elections, I have instead decided to focus this blog on the vague and deceptive language of candidate speechwriting and the harm that this kind of communication brings to the American people. I will explore several speeches, point out some very obvious problems with each speech’s wording, and speculate on the ramifications of this communication.

The first and most recent example that I could find of vagueness and deception in political speeches was President Obama’s address to the nation on health care. I will reference paragraphs of the speech (as they are divided in the text provided), the full text of which can be found here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/09/obama-health-care-speech_n_281265.html. Most specifically, in paragraphs 26 and 27 the president outlines his plan to require all individuals to have health insurance, pointing out that for anyone not to under his plan would be simply ‘irresponsible.’ What he fails to mention is that any person without insurance under this plan will be fined between $750 and $3800 depending on income levels (Individual Responsibility section of the framework), simply for not having insurance or buying into his public option (text of the framework of the bill available here: http://thehill.com/images/stories/news/2009/september/090809/baucus_health.pdf). This may not seem like a very big deal until you look at it from a situational aspect. Aside from the obvious dishonesty of this in the fact that Obama campaigned heavily on the stand that he would not make insurance mandatory, say for a second that a man loses his job, a job that gave him health benefits. If that man does not find a new job very quickly, he is either forced to pay an enormous fine for not having insurance, or buy into the public option, whether he wants to or not. Thus, this health care plan is designed to eventually kick more and more people into the public option, eventually giving it the majority that it needs to do away with private insurance altogether. Obama is careful to conceal this, as he knows that the American people would be opposed to the final goal of this plan, but he knows that very few people will catch his wording, and those that do and complain about it can easily be dismissed as ‘crazy pundits’ or ‘racists,’ if you ask Jimmy Carter. The result, in this case, could end up being a vote for a policy that if you didn’t take the time to read yourself (most people don’t have the time, heck most of Congress hasn’t read the whole thing), maybe you don’t believe in after all.

I don’t mean to just pick on President Obama either. If Republicans think that their political figures don’t participate in this type of political deception, they need to pay look more closely. I turn my attention now to a speech given by the previous president, George W. Bush, given September 24, 2008 addressing the nation’s economic crisis (Full Text: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/25/business/worldbusiness/25iht-24textbush.16463831.html). After his initial remarks, Bush is very quick to point out that these financial problems have been developing over a long period of time (paragraph 12). By paragraphs 15 through 18 he is now coming to what he feels is the crux of the problem in the housing market, lenders giving home loans to people who could not afford to pay them. The dishonesty here is very simple; the president of the United States is showing no responsibility for the problems of the country. He points out that these problems started a long time ago to make sure that people know that he was not responsible for how this crisis started. His comments in paragraphs 15-18 hint at where he places the blame, a bill passed by president Clinton during his administration, a bill that Bush feels led to lenders lending to people who they knew could not afford to pay them back (article outlining the bill found here: http://www.nytimes.com/1999/09/30/business/fannie-mae-eases-credit-to-aid-mortgage-lending.html?n=Top%2FReference%2FTimes%20Topics%2FSubjects%2FM%2FMinorities%20(US)). Whether or not these claims by Bush are true are irrelevant, the simple fact is that the man who had resided over the U.S. for most of eight years took no responsibility for the financial crisis that had the nation on the verge of economic depression. He instead blamed someone else, without naming them (so as not to sound to the American public that he was blaming someone else) and hid his lack of knowledge behind free-market rhetoric. On the second page of his speech (paragraph 6 on page 2), Bush states that his inactivity during this time of crisis can be attributed to his belief in “free enterprise.” Sounds to me like the reality of the situation was that Bush had no idea what to do to help the economy at that time. In this case, deception was more about candidate image than anything else, but the harm caused by this type of deception can lead to elections where the image of a candidate can be perceived unjustly as the image of the entire party, which is where public voice, “the ways citizens give expression to their views on public issues” (Zukin, 54).

Deception and careful wording can be found during the reign of the president before Mr. Bush as well, this time in a slightly different context. During President Clinton’s impeachment proceedings, his careful wording kept him from losing a perjury trial, and not even the lawyer who was interviewing him as a witness caught on to the deception. The first and most famous example of this was his notorious “I did not have sex with that woman!” line. The deception in this is obvious to anyone who has paid attention to the news; he never had intercourse with Monica Lewinsky, but they did engage in oral sex. Perhaps the lesser known of Clinton’s carefully-worded statements was his claim that he was never alone in the Oval Office Complex with Lewinsky, which was true. The problem was that the question that was asked of him was whether he had ever been alone in the Oval Office with her. The fact that he was never alone in the Oval Office Complex with her only means that the Secret Security Guards charged with guarding Clinton were doing their job and standing in the Oval Office Complex just outside the doors into the Oval Office. Once again, candidate image was the main reason for this deception, and the trust of the American people was influenced greatly by the truth that came out later in the Clinton scandal, and the trust that was lost may very well have cost Al Gore and the Democrats the election of 2000. This is an example of the phenomena of the ‘Post-Watergate Era,’ where media scrutiny on candidates’ character forces candidates to go along with certain social norms and values that appease the general public (Hollihan, Ch. 11).

The purpose I have in writing this blog goes back to the lyrics of the old The Who song “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” ‘meet the new boss, same as the old boss.’ There are countless more examples of political dishonesty in the U.S. from aldermen to senators to the president himself. Almost every politician in the U.S. today is inherently dishonest, and if you think some new guy coming in is any different, you are just fooling yourself. Honesty is identified by many researchers as an important characteristic that voters take into consideration when deciding which candidate to vote for (Hollihan, Ch. 4). The problem is that not enough people are identifying this dishonesty. By studying the words of candidates’ speeches and responses to questioning, you can often suspicious rhetoric, and it is then more than ever that you must do your research, study a candidate’s record, and decide for yourself whether, if elected, this person’s promises will hold up, or if past actions speak louder.


Readings from Class without Provided Links


Hollihan, Thomas A. Uncivil Wars: Political Campaigns in a Media Age. 2nd ed. Bedford/St. Martin's, 2008. Print.

Zukin, Cliff. A New Engagement: Political Participation, Civic Life, and the Changing American Citizen. New York: Oxford UP, 2006. Print.