Winning the War of Words (Page 1 of 2)

Speaking at the Georgia Public Policy Foundation on September 8, 2006, our President, George W. Bush, declared “America is safer, and America is winning the war on terror.”

This was three days before the anniversary of the terrorist attacks on September 11, and the speech in Georgia was one of a series delivered by the President in recent weeks to reassure a doubting public in time for the November elections that Republican leadership—his leadership—is what we need. The proof? We are winning the war on terror.

Insiders all agree that George W. Bush follows the political strategies mapped out for him by Karl Rove, widely hailed as a political genius, mastermind of Republican electoral strategy, and Man Behind the Throne. But unbeknownst to most of the Beltway crowd is that Karl Rove actually gets his power from a secret, mystical source, none other than the tragic Mother Goose character Humpty Dumpty.

Here’s Humpty, in a cameo appearance in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass: “‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.’”

This is a handy rule for all politicians, though not all are so brazen as Bush about using it. Take, for instance, the word “winning” in his declaration that we are winning the war on terror. He’s been making this claim since at least August 31, 2004 when he said “Make no mistake about it, we are winning and we will win.”

Only now, at the end of September 2006, we learn that the National Intelligence Estimate, the combined wisdom of all 16 intelligence agencies of the U.S. government, advised the President in April of this year—five months ago—that we were not winning the war on terror, at least not the way people usually think of winning, whether winning means achieving your goals or defeating your opponent. In Iraq, the intelligence community advised the President in April, the war is increasing the terror threat to the U.S., not decreasing it.

No doubt the President discussed this unpleasant news with his chief adviser, Karl Rove, who immediately began channeling Humpty Dumpty. “Mr. President,” Humpty/Karl says, “this is a win.”

“I like it, Dumpmeister. I don’t understand it, but I like it. How do we spin this as a win?” Bush says.

“We don’t spin,” says Humpty/Karl, “we declare. You are the Declarer, Mr. President. You declare we are winning.”

“I thought I was the Decider,” Bush says.

“You are. The Decider and the Declarer. So you decide we’re winning, no matter what those I-Heads say. And you declare it. We are winning. Declare it.”

“We are winning,” says Bush, but you can hear the doubt in his voice. “But the Intelligence Estimate—”

“Who needs intelligence!” Humpty/Karl roars, getting impatient. “We have words. And words mean what we say they mean.” He pulls out his shiny pocket watch.

“They do?” asks the President, “Hey, that’s pretty neat.”

“Stay the course,” says Humpty/Karl, now waving his timepiece slowly back and forth in front of the President’s face. “We are winning. Stay the course. We are winning. Stay the course.”

“We are winning,” Bush says, with growing conviction. “Stay the course.”

And so we are. Those who don’t agree, our President declared after the Intelligence Chief’s memo was leaked, are either naive or stupid.

The one slight problem with this approach is that words are not as flexible as the President wishes, and when they are treated as though their meanings can be changed on a whim, they lose their meaning altogether. And eventually their power.

Not yet, though.

Take the discussion over using torture on terror suspects to extract information. Senator John McCain, himself once subjected to inhuman treatment at the hands of enemy combatants in Vietnam, took a hard line in the Senate. The U.S. would not countenance torture, would not back away from the Geneva Conventions, would continue to uphold basic human rights.