Skimming the political spam in my email this morning, I prepared to delete the latest from Stephanie Cutter (subject line “The last four years”), but part of it caught my eye:
“When he accepted the Democratic Party’s nomination for president four years ago, then-Senator Obama promised change — on issues ranging from health care, to strengthening the middle class, to fighting for greater equality for all Americans — and he has delivered on that promise.”
You may be saying to yourself, that there is a sentence chock-full of newspeaky goodness, but what exactly is so eye-catching about it?
Greater equality. Now, clearly this phrase refers to those Democrat dog and pony shows which pander to women, minorities, homosexuals, and any other various and sundry groups and classes I’m missing.
Nevermind what was meant by that phrase, though, and think about what those words actually mean. “Greater” is more, bigger, or better, right? “Equality” is the state of being the same in quantity or value.
It’s a great oxymoron. As I chewed on the mathematical impossibility of this phrase, my thoughts went something like this:
If demonstrably large swathes of Americans were treated unequally today, then she would just say “Obama is fighting for equality.” But she put the “greater” in there. Now how does that work? If something is already equal in status, then one can’t possibly make it even more equal, or an even better equal because there’s no such thing as more or better equal, lady!
And then I realized why the phrase caught my eye. It’s from Animal Farm. You probably noticed quicker than me. Anyway, I had great laugh when I thought about Stephanie Cutter managing to quote the pig in Animal Farm whilst trying to sell us on four more years of Obama.
Ha!
On second thought, maybe it’s not so funny. Suddenly, I’m remembering all the people who won’t get the joke.
Tagged: Obama spam emails, Stephanie Cutter
You are right. Too many people willl not get the joke.
Faction and cronyism allows/demands some of us be more equal than others. Now you just hush up about it and let us do the hard work of governing you people! :)
Great post! I honestly never read “Animal Farm” nor “1984″. But, sure looks like neither did Ms. Cutter. Must’ve been too busy reading Mao.
It’s a sick joke. Equality is a utopian fantasy.
Yep, “some animals are more equal than others”. “Animal Farm” should be required reading. Look at the GM bailout. The union pensions and benefits weren’t touched, while non-union labor and shareholders were screwed.
The last thing the Dems want is equality. With equality there wouldn’t be people for them to look down on.
I wish I had invented this word, but I heard someone the radio this morning define Obama’s 2008′s Hope & Change zombies as now sufferring from “anticappointment”. Perfect one word encapsulation.
I like that.
Did you just call a woman in politics a pig? Oh, geez. They’re going to be all over you. Well, but only because it was a Democrat…