If I see one more sign that says "Vote Democrat!" I'm just going to rupture.
You'd think we'd all have learned the lesson, right? Rove et al. popularized the alleged adjective "Democrat" (as in "He's active in that Democrat club.), after deciding it was a far, far better word to use than "Democratic."
We learned that during the infamous "rats" commercial of 2000.
Rats! Bureauc-RATS! Plutoc-RATS! Autoc-RATS! Aristoc-RATS! Democ-RATS!
Don't think there's much of a difference between "Democrat" and "Democratic"? Then I guess Karl doesn't have to worry about you, now does he?
Try this Google: "vote Democrat".
Make the jump and see if you agree that this is a difference we have to be vigilant about -- at least as much as we are about having union bugs on our lapel buttons.
This is getting way common, folks. Rove's brainwashing work of the last six years has been so effective that now we're doing the wet work ourselves! Here in California, the Democratic Party of the San Fernando Valley is printing stacks and stacks of signs that say "Vote Democrat" instead of "Vote Democratic." And the CDP has let everyone in the state know where to buy them.
Simple, silly mistake.
Did you notice something about the Google search for "vote Democrat"? After that number one hit for Cafe Press, almost all the hits show that the people using this phrase are on the far right. So why are we on the Democratic side playing along?
Here's an old blog entry by a newspaper copy editor that has a couple of significant clues:
This reminded me of a commentary of Geoff Nunberg's I read recently (from "Fresh Air" last week). He discusses the changes the word "Democrat" has undergone since we borrowed it from the French during the French Revolution, "when democrat was opposed to aristocrat, and the idea of "rule of the people" could evoke the alarming echoes of tumbrils in the streets."
But now that most Americans are so entrenched in democracy, there is little need for us to refer to ourselves as little-D democrats. Nunberg writes:
The big-D sense of Democrat persisted, of course, but only as the name of a political affiliation that had no more independent meaning than old party names like Whig and Tory. That's what allowed the Republicans of Hoover's era to start referring to their opponents as the Democrat Party. The point of the maneuver was to suggest that there was nothing particularly democratic about a party whose support was based in urban political machines. But Republicans couldn't have gotten away with it if the earlier meaning of democrat hadn't already faded from the public mind.
Walker mentions the Democrat-ribbing aspect of "Democrat Party," as well. But she notes that the story can't end there: Even some local chapters of the Democratic Party are referring to themselves as the Democrat Party. Hence, her note on inflections.
Interesting, huh? This has been going on a long time... since well before Rove. He's just started hammering the nail again.
Here's an interesting comment on the post:
I have heard Rush Limbaugh explain his use of "Democrat" over "Democratic" as stemming from his belief that the party has nothing to do with democracy. The justification sounds typically sophomoric of him, but still I suspected the idea was not orginal with him.
We need to wake up, folks. Rove has revived this slur because it works -- and before you know it, "Democrat" will be as dirty a word as "liberal."
The key cognitive associations of the word "Democratic" are strongly positive. But the most strikingly similar words to the alternative term "Democrat" don't have the benefit of a double-meaning. Phonetically similar words are strongly negative: bureaucrat, aristocrat, etc.
The right wingers sometimes call us 'crats... for good reason.
We must insist that we are The Democratic Party. It's good grammar, and good sense: Democrats really are Democratic.
Just ask the copy editor who weighed in on the post above.
[Title updated, per suggestion in comments.]