Prior to the first prez. debate, an interesting assessment of the speech styles of the two candidates that came my way on the heels of Kerry’s description of his vacillation on the war vote. I hope the senator realizes that he should have reserved the word “inarticulate” to describe his opponent, and not his own decision. Then again, the following article shows that it’s not the logical or well-read that win elections, but those who can lie in active speech. Active American-English speech, that is. The whole article is reprinted below because NYTimes.com articles go bye-bye after a while if you don’t cough up the dough.
My advice to Kerry: Just because you stuck one foot in your mouth doesn’t mean you have to shoot yourself in the other.
The Candidates, Seen From the Classroom by Stanley Fish
In Their Own Words: Bush and Kerry (September 8, 2004)
CHICAGO — In an unofficial but very formal poll taken in my freshman writing class the other day, George Bush beat John Kerry by a vote of 13 to 2 (14 to 2, if you count me). My students were not voting on the
candidates’ ideas. They were voting on the skill (or lack of skill) displayed in the presentation of those ideas.
The basis for their judgments was a NYTimes side-by-side display in this newspaper on Sept. 8 of excerpts from speeches each man gave the previous day. Put aside whatever preferences you might have for either candidate’s positions, I instructed; just tell me who does a better job of articulating his positions, and why.
The analysis was devastating. President Bush, the students pointed out, begins with a perfect topic sentence – “Our strategy is succeeding”- that nicely sets up a first paragraph describing how conditions in
Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia four years ago aided terrorists. This is followed by a paragraph explaining how the administration’s policies have produced a turnaround in each country
“because we acted.” The paragraph’s conclusion is concise, brisk and earned: “We have led, many have joined, and America and the world are safer.”
It doesn’t hurt that the names of the countries he lists all have the letter “a,” as do the words “America” and “safer.” He and his speechwriters deserve credit for using the accident of euphony to give the argument cohesiveness and force. There is of course no logical relationship between the repetition of a sound and the soundness of an argument, but if it is skillfully employed repetition can enhance a logical point or een give the illusion of one when none is present.
Senator Kerry, my students observed with a mix of solemnity and glee, has violated two cardinal rules of exposition: don’t presume your audience has information you haven’t provided, and always pay attention
to the expectations of your listeners. They also felt that when he concludes by declaring that “when I’m president of the United States, it’ll take me about a nanosecond to ask the Congress to close that stupid loophole,” he undercuts the dignity both of his message and of the office he aspires to by calling the loophole “stupid” (instead of “unconscionable” or “unprincipled” or even “criminal”). “Stupid,” one student said, is not a “presidential kind of word.”
So what? What does it matter if Mr. Kerry’s words stumble and halt, while Mr. Bush’s flow easily from sentence to sentence and paragraph to paragraph? Well, listen to the composite judgments my students made on the Democratic challenger: “confused,” “difficult to understand,” “can’t seem to make his point clearly,” “I’m not sure what he’s saying,” and my favorite, “he’s kind of ‘skippy,’ all over the place.”
Now of course it could be the case that every student who voted against Mr. Kerry’s speech in my little poll will vote for him in the general election. After all, what we’re talking about here is merely a matter of style, not substance, right? And – this is a common refrain among Kerry supporters – doesn’t Mr. Bush’s directness and simplicity of presentation reflect a simplicity of mind and an incapacity for nuance, while Mr. Kerry’s ideas are just too complicated for the rhythms of publicly accessible prose?
Sorry, but that’s dead wrong. If you can’t explain an idea or a policy plainly in one or two sentences, it’s not yours; and if it’s not yours, no one you speak to will be persuaded of it, or even know what it is, or (and this is the real point) know what you are. Words are not just the cosmetic clothing of some underlying integrity; they are the operational vehicles of that integrity, the visible manifestation of the character to which others respond. And if the words you use fall apart, ring hollow, trail off and sound as if they came from nowhere or
anywhere (these are the same thing), the suspicion will grow that what they lack is what you lack, and no one will follow you.
Nervous Democrats who see their candidate slipping in the plls console themselves by saying, “Just wait, the debates are coming.” As someone who will vote for John Kerry even though I voted against him in my
class, that’s just what I’m worried about.
Stanley Fish is dean emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
