"He has weaponized the English language."
Lord Halifax regarding Winston Churchill, last line of movie The Darkest Hour
The summary line in the movie echos Edward R. Murrow, regarding Churchill, in 1940:
"Now the hour has come for him to mobilize the English language and send it into battle, a spearhead of hope for Britain and the world."
"Now the hour has come for him to mobilize the English language and send it into battle, a spearhead of hope for Britain and the world."
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| Fight on the beaches and landing fields |
Readers of this blog may find my likening of Donald Trump and Winston Churchill to be absurd. They are opposite. After all, wasn't Churchill a hero? Isn't Trump is a narcissistic con man?
Churchill's speeches are elegant, oratorical, uplifting. They seem Shakespearian. Trump speaks near gibberish, and in the plainest possible language. Transcripts of his speeches are laughable. They read like tabloid headlines. Sad.
They have something powerful in common. Both have weaponized the English language. Both have worked to turn the policies of their countries to a point of view, one which mobilizes fear and action against an outside threat. Britain might have sued for some kind of peace arrangement with Germany in June, 1940. Churchill said no. We will fight on the Channel, the beaches, the farms, the streets.
Trump made an extraordinary achievement in changing the minds of a good many Americans--enough to win an electoral vote and now enough to keep a constituency of some 40%--a governing plurality--solidly behind him. He reversed Republican orthodox views on: trade, on immigration, on NATO, on Russia, on the role of the US in multinational organizations, and on democratic governments vs. autocratic ones.
Readers appalled by Trump find it hard to credit his skill. He--like Churchill--did not convince everyone, but Trump moved the Republican Party from a party of Reagan-Bush-Bush into its opposite. He did it by speeches with unapologetic positions presented pugnaciously.
America's Darkest Hour. His election, and now the current government shutdown, is possible because he convinced Republicans that we have a crisis on our border, people pouring over it, bringing drugs and crime and vicious murder. We have something new and terrible, a grave threat to America. An enemy is at the gate.
He is believed by enough of the right people. GOP officeholders stand by him.
In fact there is a multi-decade chronic problem, in decline. Not a crisis.
A foreign enemy at the gate is a deep rooted human fear. Trump and Churchill called the threats one which would change culture and traditions forever--a loss of our lives and civilization. Our way of life is at stake.
Trump was successful because our fellow countrymen were in fact motivated by that call to arms. We are at a time of historically high immigration, with some 13% of the population being foreign born--a number that approaches the level of the early 20th Century--and we know what has happened before: nativism, suspicion, ethnic tensions, the rise of groups like the Ku Klux Klan, labor unrest.
Democrats have a non-racist, non-xenophobic solution. It is to assure the public that they stand for careful, regulated, lawful immigration with mechanisms for assimilation in a rule based environment. The facts are on their side. Immigrants are less criminal than the native born. Immigrants here illegally are less a vector of terrorist activity than native born Americans.
Trump's overt xenophobic message has scared Democrats off from asserting clearly and forcefully a rules based immigration system. Rules enable immigration, they don't prohibit it, but Trump has created a clear--but false--frame. Immigrants are dangerous.
Trump weaponized the English language to create a persuasive message of fear of the outsider. Democrats need a spokesman to tell an alternative persuasive message of lawful immigration.
Churchill was passionate and forceful and unapologetic. That is the nature of words as weapons. The successful Democrat in 2020 must do the same.
He is believed by enough of the right people. GOP officeholders stand by him.
In fact there is a multi-decade chronic problem, in decline. Not a crisis.
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| Click: NY Times |
A foreign enemy at the gate is a deep rooted human fear. Trump and Churchill called the threats one which would change culture and traditions forever--a loss of our lives and civilization. Our way of life is at stake.
Trump was successful because our fellow countrymen were in fact motivated by that call to arms. We are at a time of historically high immigration, with some 13% of the population being foreign born--a number that approaches the level of the early 20th Century--and we know what has happened before: nativism, suspicion, ethnic tensions, the rise of groups like the Ku Klux Klan, labor unrest.
Democrats have a non-racist, non-xenophobic solution. It is to assure the public that they stand for careful, regulated, lawful immigration with mechanisms for assimilation in a rule based environment. The facts are on their side. Immigrants are less criminal than the native born. Immigrants here illegally are less a vector of terrorist activity than native born Americans.
Trump's overt xenophobic message has scared Democrats off from asserting clearly and forcefully a rules based immigration system. Rules enable immigration, they don't prohibit it, but Trump has created a clear--but false--frame. Immigrants are dangerous.
Trump weaponized the English language to create a persuasive message of fear of the outsider. Democrats need a spokesman to tell an alternative persuasive message of lawful immigration.
Churchill was passionate and forceful and unapologetic. That is the nature of words as weapons. The successful Democrat in 2020 must do the same.
3 comments:
Churchill and Trump? I believe the more prevalent comparison is with another leader from that time.
Let's see...Briton was facing an imminent threat of invasion, while Trump's "crisis" is made up, and designed to pander to the prejudices of what's left of the Republican party. The "crises" did not become an "emergency" until Republicans lost the House.
It is compelling to ponder what exactly the Democrats are facing as we approach 2020, and much is uncertain. For me the biggest question mark is whether Republicans will abandon Trumpism when it becomes evident that they will lose the Senate, which looks very likely. It's hard to imagine them supporting him for re-election even if the ongoing scandals and investigations don't reveal his evident criminality beyond a reasonable doubt. But they might, and it's a sad testimony to their decline.
The first time someone will be running for President to avoid prosecution.
I do think Democrats will be making a mistake if they approach 2020 as a popularity contest. They do need someone who will tirelessly refute and fact check while championing the Progressive agenda.
Spot on,Peter, with your assessment (both now and earlier) with the importance of language and labels. George Lakoff knew what he was talking about in Moral Politics. I agree with Rick's question about the Republicans potential abandonment of Trump; cracks are already beginning to appear, for example, today's rejection of Steve King's racist statements. The Democrats, of course, have their own fissure. Both parties, it seems to me, are experiencing an identity crisis. Both parties, ironically wedded to an "identity politics" that no longer serves them.
Andy Seles
During World War 2 the British liked Roosevelt more than Churchill. Americans liked Churchill more than Roosevelt. Churchill hated Stalin. Roosevelt kind of liked him.
Churchill wanted to preserve his colonial empire. Roosevelt wanted to break it up. Stalin wanted to include Eastern Europe into the Soviet Union. Churchill lost.
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