CT Blue

I understand that Obama gave a speech about inequality recently. Some say it marks a departure from his middle of the road course, while others…well, they have their doubts.

It certainly is frustrating that Obama is able to recognize and give voice to the problem, and yet also give the distinct impression of being a man with no intention of actually doing anything about it.

The best reaction I've seen is a column I read recently in the Boston Globe, though I know it appeared elsewhere. One Anat Shenker-Osorio, examines Obama's language and finds it wanting in a way that is all too common among those who manage our national discourse.

In summarizing highlights of America’s economic past, Obama used declarative sentences that made clear what various leaders accomplished. “It was Abraham Lincoln, a self-described ‘poor man’s son,’ who started a system of land grant colleges all over this country….A rich man’s son named Teddy Roosevelt fought for an eight-hour workday….FDR fought for Social Security….LBJ fought for Medicare and Medicaid.”

But as he turned to characterize the Great Recession, Obama’s speech pattern changed: He shifted to a sentence structure that excludes human actors from the subject position. “The deck is stacked” against the working class, Obama said. Why? Because “taxes were slashed,” he said, and “growth has flowed to a fortunate few.” His language gave no indication of who brought about these disparities.

Instead, his words suggested abstract ideas were capable of independent action. “Because of upward mobility,” Obama said, “the guy on the factory floor could picture his kid running the company.” And, he went on, “jobs automated or headed offshore.” In a nearly hourlong speech, only rarely did we get any glimpse of who-did-what-to-whom: “Businesses lobbied Washington to weaken unions and the value of the minimum wage.”

It’s no surprise that Obama’s not naming names—throughout the economic collapse and its aftermath, that kind of avoidance has been commonplace among politicians. What makes this speech stand out is that even as it attempts to put forth deliberate remedies to inequality, its language undermines the notion that we are confronting a problem humans made, not a hurricane or nasty flu, and suggests that the problem is out of human hands. It’s a perfect example of why English teachers admonish us to avoid passive constructions.

via The Boston Globe

It's an irony of amazing proportions. Obama's political opponents are quick to blame him for all manner of things, yet he is reluctant to assign blame to anyone. It's important because we cannot deal with a problem unless we recognize its causes. If we talk as if inequality is caused by impersonal forces that are simply working in accordance with some natural law, then we will seek out solutions that attempt to deal with those forces, or, more likely, ameliorate the effects of those forces (leading to rightwing claims that amelioration is welfare, and the ameliorated are “takers”). If we recognize, instead, that we are dealing with deliberate policy choices made by human beings with names, faces, agendas and party affiliations, then different, usually simpler and more effective, solutions present themselves. Those solutions may not be within our reach at present, but they will never be attempted if they are not properly articulated in a fashion every bit as aggressive as that currently employed by the right to stir up resentment against the powerless. Unfortunately, the obvious solutions are perceived as contrary to the interests of the people who control the purse strings of both parties. It does no good to argue that extreme inequality is not in the long term interest of the affluent. As Keynes said, in the long term we'll all be dead, and in the short term they are getting very rich.

Sooner or later, someone will come along who will see the political advantage of appealing to the frustrations of the lower 99 and who will, in fact, point fingers and name names. Unfortunately, it is far more likely that it will be a fascist than a leftist, and that fingers will be pointed at all the wrong people.

I do disagree with Shenker-Osorio about one thing, however. We now live in an age when we can no longer assume that even hurricanes are the result of forces over which we have no control. They too, are now, as often as not, the result of deliberate policy choices.