It’s midnight (again) in America

by David Benjamin

“A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.”
— Matthew 5:14 (King James)

MADISON, Wis. — America’s foremost gasbag once magnanimously declared that “I love the poorly educated.” In this belch, he more or less consigned the “highly educated” or just plain “educated” to his camp of enemies — composed of “little statesmen and philosophers and divines,” like me.

But as he categorically pooh-poohed liberals, progressives, Bachelors, Masters, PhDs, teachers and honor students, he (perhaps inadvertently) picked at a scab that has bloodied Democrats since the Sixties. For some reason, the defining trademark of liberal politics for at least fifty years has been dumbass semantics.

Semantic dominance by right-wing wordsmiths took virtually permanent hold on the imagination of the poorly educated in the ’84 campaign when Ronald Reagan’s ads declared that “It’s morning again in America.” You might ask “What the hell does that mean?” I might respond, “What the hell’s the difference?”

“Morning in America” worked so well that the “mainstream media” generously edited out its only partisan word — “again” — which was a gratuitous dig at former president Jimmy Carter.

Nothing else in that sixty-second spot was memorable. It begins with a white kid delivering newspapers, followed by a white family moving into their new house. A white granny hugs a white-gowned bride, followed by a white man running Old Glory up a pole. It ends with a grinning image of the Gipper. But forget all that. The slogan was the point and it stabbed Fritz Mondale in the heart.

Four years earlier, Reagan had preemptively claimed the semantic high ground by calling America a “shining city on a hill.” He was misquoting a passage in the Sermon on the Mount previously re-purposed by Gov. John Winthrop of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. The Gipper’s “city on a hill” gag left Democrats groping. Is there a politician in his right mind who would dare nitpick a metaphor that sets America atop the world and swells every voter’s heart with xenophobic pride?

Liberals have been playing rhetorical catch-up ever since Reagan — which is ironic because educated Democrats were not always prosaic in the poetry of politics. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in 1932, crushed Herbert Hoover and launched a near half-century of welfare-state dominion with two unassailable syllables that everyone understood implicitly: “New Deal.” He followed up with soundbites, in the era of radio, that left opponents groping for rebuttal.

“The only thing we have to fear is… fear itself.” “Tell that to the Marines!” “Above all, try something.” “Yesterday, December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy…” “I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made.”

The civil rights movement, led by perhaps the most lyrical orator of the 20th century, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., used catchphrases and articulated thoughts so clear, positive and emphatic that they stuck in the mind, stirred emotions and left little room for disagreement, or even discussion.

“We shall overcome.” “I have a dream.” “I am a man.” “Only in the darkness can you see the stars.” “We cannot walk alone.”

The Gipper’s citadel and Dr. King’s dream get to us because, first of all, they sound terrific. They were delivered with eloquence and conviction. But they also worked because they’re self-contained, like eggs. Swing at them if you will, but you’ll only end up with yolk on your face.

An epigram that needs an explanation, begs the question, or tosses a gantlet is a forensic failure. An effective motto stifles disputation with affirmation and goodwill. It leaves little room for challenge, argument or even curiosity.
For example, Consider “again” again. Unlike Reagan’s edited motto, that word was the thumb-in-your-eye essence of Donald Trump’s triumph. MAGA became a four-word taunt that irritated or inflamed, but did not inspire. As it exacerbated the nation’s polarization, it begged a whole bunch of questions.

“Oh yeah?” I often muttered, “when did America stop being great?” or “Isn’t America always great?” or “What’s so great about you, Chuckles?”

Worst, Trump’s jingle had to be explained. It forced every listener into the unwelcome intellectual quandary of American decline. It hit home only among Trump’s faithful. No one else was converted and most of us were just annoyed.

Trump, however, is not the greatest semantic offender. His enemies are a veritable wellspring of prickly slogans. I understand, for example, the message of “Black Lives Matter” and share its sense of outrage and urgency. But my inner linguist cringes, because it poses questions that racists can’t wait to ask: “Do black lives matter more than other lives?” “Why don’t all lives matter?” “Should white lives, Asian lives, Latino lives and blue lives be sacrificed to save Black lives?”

These are questions neither thoughtful, incisive, nor even serious. But they represent a device that can be termed strategic quibbling. Once asked, these bad-faith thrusts have the power to drown out the original message — that Black lives have been, throughout history, vulnerable to police brutality and systemic racism.

On the other hand, remember “Black Is Beautiful”? It resonated because it was positive, unambiguous and bulletproof. I mean, where was there a public figure — even in 1968 — who was prepared to argue that, no, wait, Black Is Ugly.

“Defund the Police” is an even worse example of harebrained sloganizing. Barely had it surfaced than it was weaponized by the right wing. It killed the election campaigns of Democrats who never said it. Every time it’s uttered, the speaker must be ready to respond with a thousand words of stultifying exegesis. “No, no, no, I don’t mean abolish the police. I mean re-direct police budgets to more socially constructive, more humane, less violent…” Yada yada yada.

If you wanna be a persuasive activist, you shouldn’t be waving a sign or shouting a blurb that bogs you down in a mire of explanation that muddies your message, wearies your believers, recruits no one to your cause, and bores everyone else to the point of wanting to drown both you and your antagonist.

As shown by the “defund the police” backlash, the right wing is also adept at 1) tying a verbal bombshell to its enemies and then 2) suddenly clamming up. This trick leaves liberals the daunting task of defining the term, defusing the confusion, denying the term and debunking its misuse. Myriad examples of this incriminating device include “fake news,” “deep state,” “reparations,” “socialist,” etc.

Consider “woke,” a formulation that both puzzled and offended me from its very coinage. The right wing smelled blood and swiftly turned “woke” into a mocking meme of furry-headed progressivism. This happened before most left-leaning folks figured out what the hell “woke” was supposed to mean.

Lately, one of conservatives’ most hard-ridden semantic hobby-horses is “critical race theory” (CRT). This arcane term is an artifact of grad-school historiography now being wielded as a truncheon against black activists, progressives, Democrats, educators and universities. All liberals are now obliged to argue both in favor of CRT and against its mischaracterization by the right. The rub, of course, is that the right never attempted to characterize CRT in the first place. It simply broadcast the raw term and left its unwilling apologists holding the bag — trying to explain a concept they had to look up on Wikipedia so they’d know what on earth they were defending.

Meanwhile, the right wing ascends the Gipper’s city on a hill and roars — warming the cockles of the poorly educated — a devastating, airtight four-word retort to all things CRT: “America Is Not Racist.”

This is — recalling a strip we all used to read every Sunday in the funny pages — the perfect squelch.