Bushists Try to Sneak in Language Shift in WoT to Distract from Failures.

[BurtWorm]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/26/politics/26strategy.html?ei=5094&en=84d917f2326e4105&hp=&ex=1122436800&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print


July 26, 2005
U.S. Officials Retool Slogan for Terror War

By ERIC SCHMITT and THOM SHANKER

WASHINGTON, July 25 - ...

In recent speeches and news conferences, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the nation's senior military officer have spoken of "a global struggle against violent extremism" rather than "the global war on terror," which had been the catchphrase of choice. Administration officials say that phrase may have outlived its usefulness, because it focused attention solely, and incorrectly, on the military campaign.

Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the National Press Club on Monday that he had "objected to the use of the term 'war on terrorism' before, because if you call it a war, then you think of people in uniform as being the solution." He said the threat instead should be defined as violent extremists, with the recognition that "terror is the method they use."

Although the military is heavily engaged in the mission now, he said, future efforts require "all instruments of our national power, all instruments of the international communities' national power." The solution is "more diplomatic, more economic, more political than it is military," he concluded.

Administration and Pentagon officials say the revamped campaign has grown out of meetings of President Bush's senior national security advisers that began in January, and it reflects the evolution in Mr. Bush's own thinking nearly four years after the Sept. 11 attacks.

...

[ewagner]

1. Meyers got a clue?

like duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....

four years too late?

[KarenInMA]

2. "a global struggle against violent extremism"

Domestic violence is violent extremism. Let's spend as much money combatting that as we have in Iraq so far.

[PurityOfEssence]

5. It's got the perfect clunky, unpoetic rattle for these tone-deaf jackasses

Let's just call Republicanism violent extremism and get it over with.

[nguoihue]

3. "... evolution in Mr. Bush's own thinking ..."

Give me a break. Bush's own thinking ... ha ha ha The new catchphrase had to come from his neocon puppeteers.

Wonder if making up lies to invade a sovereign country and killing tens of thousands of their citizens so he and his cronies can take control of their oil qualifies as violent extremism.

[BurtWorm]

4. More like unintelligent design in Bush's "thinking."

:eyes:

[Wilber_Stool]

6. I wonder if that means

that we should treat it as a law enforcement problem? Where have I heard that before? I wonder, I wonder.

[BurtWorm]

8. I think they'd rather eat their own tongues than use that phrase.

Might I suggest to them taking lots of mustard into the mouth beforehand?

[Stephanie]

7. "Slogan"

that just disgusts me

[BurtWorm]

9. What they need is an anti-terror mascot!

:eyes:

[Kalish]

10. they're objecting to the use of the word war now?

give me a break.

[Otm Shank]

11. "The War on Terror" will henceforth be known as

"Freedom Lies"

[wli]

12. trying to reword it for use against left-leaning US citizens

Pretty transparent.

[BurtWorm]

13. Fred Kaplan notices the acronym changes from G-WOT to G-SAVE

http://slate.msn.com/id/2123412/

It took four years for the president of the United States to realize that fighting terrorism has a political component? It took six months for his senior advisers to retool a slogan? We are witnessing that rare occasion when the phrase "I don't know whether to laugh or cry" can be uttered without lapsing into cliché.

But the shallowness gets deeper still. The Times story doesn't notice what appears to be the driving force behind the new slogan—a desire for a happier acronym.

Look at the first letters of Global War on Terrorism. GWOT. What does that mean; how is it pronounced? Gwot? Too frivolously rowdy, like a fight scene in a Marvel comic book (Bam! Pfooff! Gwot!). Gee-wot? Sounds like a garbled question (Gee what?).

Then look at Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism. Its acronym is GSAVE—i.e., gee-save. We're out to save the world, see, not wage war on it. Or, as national security adviser Stephen Hadley puts it in the Times piece, "We need to dispute both the gloomy vision and offer a positive alternative."