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The Spectacle Blog
The State of the Union Address was unimpressive. President Obama’s delivery was uninspired. And the speech as written wasn’t anything special, either — it didn’t seem as though a lot of thought went into writing it.
For example, no mixed metaphors should have been left in the address after the first draft. Yet there were many, including:
- “But after investing in better research and education, we didn’t just surpass the Soviets; we unleashed a wave of innovation that created new industries and millions of new jobs.” Not sure how you unleash a wave.
- “It’s about connecting every part of America to the digital age.” Grid, network, or system would have made more sense than age.
- “I recognize that some in this Chamber have already proposed deeper cuts, and I’m willing to eliminate whatever we can honestly afford to do without. But let’s make sure that we’re not doing it on the backs of our most vulnerable citizens. And let’s make sure what we’re cutting is really excess weight.” Balancing the budget on the backs of our most vulnerable citizens works, because you could balance something on a back. But eliminating spending on the backs of the vulnerable is nonsensical. And then in the next sentence, the meaning of the metaphor is reversed, so that Obama is saying that we shouldn’t cut anything that’s not excess weight — but shouldn’t we take as much weight, excess or not, off of the backs of the most vulnerable?
Mixed metaphors were not the only oversights in the speech. For instance, from the next line: “Cutting the deficit by gutting our investments in innovation and education is like lightening an overloaded airplane by removing its engine. It may feel like you’re flying high at first, but it won’t take long before you’ll feel the impact.” Doesn’t the simile involving the airplane make the point? It’s a little lame to then spell out that the plane will fly at first before crashing.
Another one: “Look to Iraq, where nearly 100,000 of our brave men and women have left with their heads held high; where American combat patrols have ended; violence has come down; and a new government has been formed.” What does it mean for violence to “come down”? That clause would make sense if the subject were the level of violence.
Lastly, the address included some inadvertent rhetorical admissions. Obama was off message on this one: “We’ll invest in biomedical research, information technology, and especially clean energy technology - an investment that will strengthen our security, protect our planet, and create countless new jobs for our people.” So he’s saying that the number of jobs created by a given “investment” cannot be counted? He just spent two years arguing that he could count the number of jobs “created or saved” by the stimulus.
View all comments (13) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Joseph Lawler
http://spectator.org/blog/2011/01/25/sotu-full-of-mixed-metaphors
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Mike| 1.25.11 @ 11:34PM
Joseph,
I was going to contest your first paragraph. But, I will simply say that you are full of shit
David W| 1.26.11 @ 8:41AM
Ah yes, the typical liberal rebuttal. If you can't use facts to rebut a conservative you attack them (I'm surprised you didn't call him a racist nazi). Your comment basically destroyed any possible credibility you may have had). Perhaps you should try again.
Occam's Tool| 1.26.11 @ 12:09AM
Mike:
Troll much? Kind of rude, as well as pointy-headed, ain't ya?
Mike| 1.26.11 @ 12:12AM
Tool,
Still thinking with your tool, I see.
beebop| 1.26.11 @ 5:44AM
Have you ever googled "Occan?" Perhaps if you did -- and were a little less knee jerk -- you might understand the significance? Or am I confusing you with a rational, thinking member of the human species? Am I over reaching in this last bit?
bmatkin| 1.26.11 @ 3:33AM
Hey Mikey: It must hurt to find out the the uber intelligent chosen one who allegedly wrote a book about himself when he was a nobody actually isn't a word smith. His inaugural speech and now this one are indeed the products of someone who doesn't have the ability. He should fire his speech writer and hire Bill Ayers. At least Bill is a very good word smith.
Robert Pinkerton| 1.26.11 @ 6:24AM
Last night's SOTU speech was so full of pie-in-the-sky promises that it gave me a fleeting vision of a myriad of skices of pie in plastic-wrap attached to helium balloons. What appeared obvious to me was that the President was trying to be all things to all people, indifferent to the mare's-nest of contradictions that entrains.
solidground| 1.26.11 @ 8:48AM
I didn't watch the oral dump from the chief oral dump-ster. In fact, I took great pains to avoid it (which was difficult, given the number of news and non-news channels carrying it). From the news I'm reading, however, it seems that Obama's annual verbal fusillade perfectly conformed to his knotty headed notions about what makes the world go around, or at least how capitalism and free enterprise really work. No surprise there.
Zilla | 1.26.11 @ 9:14AM
I guess they didn't teach basic English composition skills at Barry's Indonesian madrassa and he somehow managed to avoid English 101 in college.
Ralph| 1.26.11 @ 9:55AM
As Scalia said the speech a juvenile exercise, and from the reviews, it appears he is correct.
I keep thinking that his speechwriters are just out of school young, and he isn't an editor.
Tim the Enchanter| 1.26.11 @ 10:50AM
I decided to watch a few episodes of All Creatures Great and Small instead. Why should I torture the poor, innocent pixels of my TV? They did nothing to deserve punishment.
Frisbee| 1.26.11 @ 3:08PM
Good insights Mr Lawler, thank you.
But the most prevalent metaphor abuse is the physical metaphor. Saying things like government spending is the "engine" of the "airplane". (And remember all that talk about the "car" being in the "ditch"?)
Chesterton discusses the weakness of the physical metaphor, particularly as abused by Nietzsche, in his "Orthodoxy":
"Nietzsche always escaped a question by a physical metaphor, like a cheery minor poet. He said, "beyond good and evil," because he had not the courage to say, "more good than good and evil," or, "more evil than good and evil."
Had he faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was nonsense. So, when he describes his hero, he does not dare to say,
"the purer man," or "the happier man," or "the sadder man," for all these are ideas; and ideas are alarming. He says "the upper man, or "over man," a physical metaphor from acrobats or alpine climbers. Nietzsche is truly a very timid thinker."
It's also true of Obama, "Had he faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was nonsense."
Frisbee| 1.26.11 @ 6:20PM
Hope you don't mind, I can't resist quoting Chesterton some more:
"Some fall back simply on the clock: they talk as if mere passage through time brought some superiority; so that even a man of the first mental calibre carelessly uses the phrase that human
morality is never up to date. How can anything be up to date?-- a date has no character. How can one say that Christmas celebrations are not suitable to the twenty-fifth of a month?
What the writer meant, of course, was that the majority is behind his favourite minority--or in front of it. Other vague modern people take refuge in material metaphors; in fact, this is the chief mark of vague modern people. Not daring to define their doctrine of what is good, they use physical figures of speech without stint or shame, and, what is worst of all, seem to think these cheap analogies are exquisitely spiritual and superior to the old morality. Thus they think it intellectual to talk about things being "high."
It is at least the reverse of intellectual; it is a mere phrase from a steeple or a weathercock. "Tommy was a good boy" is a pure philosophical statement, worthy of Plato or Aquinas. "Tommy lived the higher life" is a gross metaphor from a ten-foot rule."