In recent years, many progressives have been learning that facts alone — without framing that conveys their context — are not enough. This lesson is forcefully demonstrated in cases in which conservatives tenaciously resist the use of language that reveals truth and lays bare their failed policies.
The latest examples of this include a proposed non-binding Senate resolution opposing the deployment of greater numbers of troops to Iraq and an international report on the future of the world's climate.
As the New York Times reports today in an article entitled "Senate Critique of Bush’s Iraq Plan Wins New Support," the Warner-Levin resolution, which expresses disapproval of the Bush administration's plans to increase the number of American troops in Iraq, gained support in the Senate. The Warner-Levin resolution (PDF) refers to Bush's plans to increase troop levels as an "augmentation," not an escalation.
Previously, senators were divided in their support for competing bills, in part over the use of the term "escalating" as opposed to "augmentation." Prior to the acceptance of the Warner-Levin resolution reported today, the McClatchy news service reported on January 22:
"Both resolutions oppose Bush's plan to increase the number of American troops in Iraq. Both stress that the job of quelling the fighting in Baghdad should belong to the Iraqi government, while U.S. troops should help protect Iraq's territory from outside assault, fight terrorists and train Iraqi troops.
But Warner's resolution avoids one politically loaded term: escalation. It uses the word 'augment' to describe the president's increase in forces; the Biden resolution calls it "escalating" the U.S. military presence."
The authors of the article were incorrect to suggest that "escalation" is politically loaded, while "augmentation" is not. On that point, they appear to have accepted conservative framing at face value. In fact, as others have pointed out, the Department of Defense defines escalation in its Dictionary of Military Terms. To avoid the use of this accurate and familiar military term and insist on the word augmentation instead is to conceal what the Bush administration's policy really means.
The competing language in the bills can be traced to an earlier exchange between Senator Hagel and Secretary of State Rice. The progressive blog Think Progress reported on Rice's appearance at a Senate hearing on January 11 as follows:
"Today, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice tried her best to make this escalation plan more palatable to the American public. 'I think that I don't see it, and the president doesn't see it, as an escalation,' Rice told an incredulous Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE). Hagel responded, 'Putting 22,000 new troops, more troops in, is not an escalation?' 'I would call it, senator, an augmentation,' Rice said."
Clearly, whether the Senate passes a non-binding resolution that disapproves of the "augmentation" or the "escalation" of troop levels is not the only point of contention. Senator Feingold, for instance, opposes the Warner-Levin resolution on other grounds, which he describes in his diary on Daily Kos today.
Still, the senators who objected to the word "escalation" appear to have succeeded in their insistence that the troop build-up be termed an "augmentation." Most politicians recognize that the official language that a bill uses and the words that the bill's sponsors use in interviews and speeches are often reflected in media coverage of that issue. By avoiding the word "escalation" in the bill, they may prevent the media from defining the policy as escalation.
Resistance to language that reveals the dangers we face also characterizes conservatives' responses to the climate crisis. This week, the words used to define the threat of global warming have been the focus of painstaking negotiations of an international climate report, which is expected to be released tomorrow in Paris. An article in the International Herald Tribune discusses the word choices that have been a key point of disagreement among negotiators:
"Scientists and government officials are falling far behind in their attempts to come up with an authoritative report on global warming — but not because of major disagreements among more than 100 nations and dozens of scientists.
The problem is wrangling over the wording and nuances of general language, three delegates told The Associated Press on Wednesday, the third day of their meeting in Paris. All governments involved must agree on the language of the 12-15 page summary."
An Associated Press story today entitled "Global warming science panel wording doesn't signal change in Bush greenhouse gas policy," hints at some of the way that negotiators focused on the language that described changes to our climate and their causes:
"Delegates who have seen the new science report coming out Friday say it
will declare that global warming is 'very likely' man-made. The wording was largely the result of the leadership of U.S. government scientist Susan Solomon, who heads the panel's working group, several delegates said Thursday.
But [John] Reilly [associate director of research at the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change] notes that 'saying that climate change is almost
certainly occurring and it's almost certainly due to human activity is different than saying the impact of climate change is so bad that we need to do something right away.'"
This is hardly the first time that conservatives have insisted on language that obscures the extent of changes to the earth's climate or equivocates on the need for decisive action. Conflicts over the choice of words have also affected previous international negotiations on this issue. In addition, new details have emerged about how Bush administration officials have restricted the language that climate scientists were permitted to use, with the effect of minimizing concerns about an impending climate crisis .
As the Boston Globe reported, a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee learned in testimony at a hearing yesterday that nearly half of 300 government scientists surveyed stated that they had experienced pressure to remove words from their work. Congressman Peter Welch described one such case to the Committee:
"'There was a story about a scientist who got authorized to speak at a conference. He was prohibited from using the phrase "global warming." He was allowed to say "global," and he could say "warming," but he couldn't put them next to each other. It became a charade,' (U.S. Rep. Peter) Welch said."
As the cases of the Senate resolution on Iraq and the international report on the world's climate demonstrate, those who resist progressive change recognize that words can either reveal or conceal the need for action. After devising language that serves their ends, conservatives are insistent that their words be used to define the terms of debate. This does not mean that progressives should never compromise, but we must always be cognizant of the power of words when a compromise is offered. Above all, it should remind us that we cannot advance and achieve a progressive vision for our nation as long as we allow conservatives to choose the terms of the public discourse.
Written by Evan Frisch, an employee of the Rockridge Institute, who blogs as evan_at_rockridge at the Rockridge Nation blog, where this is cross-posted.