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{"id":17920,"date":"2016-02-25T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-02-25T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leithart.level2d.com\/?p=2742"},"modified":"2016-02-25T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2016-02-25T00:00:00","slug":"on-the-inflation-of-political-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/leithart\/2016\/02\/on-the-inflation-of-political-speech\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Inflation of Political Speech"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Reflecting on the lessons of Donald Trump<\/a> in a piece at Public Discourse<\/em>, Matthew Wright points to The Speechwriter<\/a>, a recent book by Barton Swaim, former speechwriter to South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford.<\/p>\n

Wright summarizes, \u201cArmed with a Ph.D. in English from Edinburgh, Swaim took up speechwriting with romantic notions of wordsmithery: \u2018The speechwriter, I felt, was a person whose job it was to put words in the mouths of the powerful, who understood the import and varieties of political language and guided his master through its perils.\u2019\u201d It didn\u2019t turn out that way. as Swaim found himself caught in \u201cone great blizzard of verbiage.\u201d The governor was expected to have something to say about everything, and his speechwriters had to formulate opinions that \u201csaid something without saying anything. It would get the governor on record without committing him to any course of action.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/span>According to Wright, \u201cMost often Swaim achieved ambiguity through superfluity\u2014padded phrases that fill out a press release without adding real content. \u2018Law enforcement\u2019 becomes \u2018state and local law enforcement\u2019; citizens and political opponents are solemnly warned against \u2018rushing to judgment\u2019 and \u2018making accusations in the absence of evidence\u2019 \u2013 all words spoken with the intent to avoid substance. Other times, Swaim observes, the superfluity simply evoked desirable feelings in a constituent, rather than actively dissembling. By larding sentences with extraneous words and phrases\u2014an \u2018in large measure\u2019 here, a \u2018Given the fact that\u2019 there\u2014he said, \u2018you\u2019ve turned a perfunctory note into a heartfelt letter on which some time was spent.\u2019 It\u2019s the impression\u2014the feeling\u2014that matters, not the meaning.\u201d<\/p>\n

Swaim highlights what Wright describes as the \u201cunnaturalness of much of our political speech,\u201d driven by the need to speak to all and everything. Swaim writes, that many \u201cdon\u2019t appreciate the sheer number of things on which a politician is expected to have a position. Issues on which the governor had no strong opinions, events over which he had no control, situations on which it served no useful purpose for him to comment\u2014 all required some kind of remark from our office.\u201d Churning out words \u201cfosters a sense that you don\u2019t have to believe your own words. You get comfortable with insincerity.\u201d Wright glosses: \u201cwords become political tools separated from their meanings. The unnaturalness of our rhetoric hollows it out.\u201d Bad words deflate the good.<\/p>\n

And do we still wonder, Wright asks, at the popularity of \u201ca man who parades around saying things the only possible virtue of which is that \u2013 if even for a moment \u2013 it\u2019s what he actually thinks\u201d?<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"