Concept One- Perspectives by Incongruity: This concept, as discussed by Kenneth Burke in Attitudes Toward History, occurs when a rhetor engages in "Verbal Atom Cracking," and takes a word or concept from one category and applies to a new category (308).
This is an unofficial Obama ad that performs perspectives by incongruity on the McCain "Celeb" ad, increasing the ethos of Senator Obama through the ethos of Ronald Reagan and, in the process, diminishes the arguments of Senator McCain. As this ad reminds the listeners of the attacks on Obama by McCain, it situates them next to similar complaints employed against Ronald Reagan. The intent is to make you rethink the attacks on Obama since they were false against Reagan.
Concept Two- Stealing the Symbol: The ability to appropriate the meaning of a symbol and redefine it to one's advantage. By presenting the virtues of Reagan, the ad claims that Obama, and not McCain, possesses the virtues of Reagan, which is important to the "Reagan Democrats."
6 comments:
Wow, official or not, if this Ad breaks mainstream, it seems to Harrogate a case where Ovama is rolling demographic dice.
As you note, the hallowed "Reagan Democrats" will take the Ad seriously, be pleased that they are being courted, and perhaps even be persuaded to throw Obama their support based on it.
At the same time, it would be politically recklessness for Obama and his people, if they are not taking into account that this will most certainly be a "deal breaker" for many voters.
But of course they're assuming that the numbers will even out cumulatively in their favor. Perhaps they are right. The "screw them, where the hell else do they have to so anyway" argument has been Democratic orthodoxy for years now, so it is no surprise that Obama is adopting it as well.
Has Obama become a "deal breaker" for Harogate yet? Hard to say. Quite possibly.
But no matter what happens, as he has from the beginning, Harrogate wishes Obama well in his battle with McCain for the Conservative Quadrant of America's Soul, and leaving Progressive Politics for the basement dwelling bloggers to fantasize about. Hillary, of course, would have done the same thing Obama is doing. That's your contemporary Dem Party in a nutshell.
While this may help to make a play for the Reagan Democrats, the main focus is to take down the acts by McCain by revisiting what was said about Reagan, the symbols of all that is virtuous.
Think of what McCain is hitting Obama on: fan, Europe trip, negotiations (or speaking), optimism,
Then juxtapose those complaints:
Reagan's speech in Berlin (Tear down this wall") negotiations with Russia, optimism speak...
As each Republican sought to claim the symbol of Reagan as a measure of all things, who ever wrote that ad attacked the distinct silliness of those Republicans making those claims...
Notice the virtues being discussed: these are not the partisan virtues of Reagan but the diplomatic virtues that the Neo-Conservatives have attempted to destroy.
I would not worry that this ad is a deal-breaker
But it must be remembered that the whol premise behind the term "deal breaker" is that the deal was tenuous to begin with.
Surely, Obama and/or his people invoking Reagan for a second time, not on policy grounds but in terms of stylistic impact, will not be enough to dampen the enthusiasm of those solidly in his corner.
But for those who are A) committed to political and ecoomic justice and B)who are, say, less than ecstatic with how this whole election season has played out, the positive use of Reagan in any context whatever might make more of a difference.
No matter how we might like to interpret it, no matter what Obama's intention, there is no escaping that this makes Twice now, this upholding Reagan in a positive light.
A person might sanely ask, does Obama admire Reagan?
I think that baby is headed out with the bathwater on this.
Go back to the first invocation of Reagan and think of the context. Obama stated he wanted to be a transformational president in the way that Nixon and Clinton were not. The follow up remark was Reagan persuaded people to vote against their interest and vote for him.
During the South Carolina debate, when the Clinton's engaged in the intellectual dishonesty about what Obama said, saying that Obama favored the policies of Reagan, Obama clarified the record by stating the Clinton's twisted the logic of the argument and he rejected and denounced the policies of Reagan.
In this context, Obama stated his goal, to draw more people to the democratic party, and to run against the Clintons, as he needed to run against both in the primary since Hillary did not have a record but desired to use Bill's and the policies of the 1990s.
This means that unlike the Clinton's who characterized herself as a partisan fighter, Obama wanted to expand the Democratic coalition and needed to do so by diminishing the record of the Clintons.
The value judgment about Reagan's record is not in play here. The only element that matters is whether or not Reagan was a "transformational" president by increasing the voter base for Republicans.
The inclusion of Reagan's record is a guilt by association argument that should not matter. If you are happy that the Democrats do not increase their base, then you will be happy with McCain.
All that you say appears right. And if you remember, during the Clinton incident you bring up, Harrogate expressed his feelings that Hillary ought to have been embarassed to twist his meaning in the way that she did.
And with this Ad, too, one doesn;t have to look hard to see that the Idea is not about Reagan's actual politics, but about the grounds of attack that were levied against him. All of which is why for Harrogate, none of this rises to the level of "deal breaker."
(Actually, Harrogate doesn't imagine that Obama will say anything between now and November that will be the "deal breaker." For Harrogate, and perhaps for many others, we have gotten to the point that it just depends on his mood when he wakes up on election day).
But at the same time, if Obama decides to escalate things and make Reagan's political achievments a touchstone for his own purposes, this will dovetail in bizarre ways with the Awakening taking place among progressives in this country, with regard to Obama's actual politics.
A related point, one that is actually more important to Harrogate than anything stated above:
It may not possible, given the dynamics of the country, to be politically transformational in the way that Reagan was Unless you are lying your ass off to huge segments of the population.
Hmmmm. Either that, or some sort of "Independence Day" or "Deep Impact" type of scenario, where a true apocalypse is in sight, or had already taken place.
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