I’m honestly confused. You don’t see why calling Obama a “Food Stamp President” is different from criticizing his economic policy?
I guess I would not predict that particular phrase being leveled against Hillary or Bill Clinton—even from people who disagreed with their economic policies for the same reasons they disagree with Obama’s economic policies.
I guess I would not predict that particular phrase being leveled against Hillary or Bill Clinton—even from people who disagreed with their economic policies for the same reasons they disagree with Obama’s economic policies.
Well, Bill Clinton had saner economic policies, but otherwise I would predict that phrase, or something similar, being used against a white politician.
Given the way that public welfare codes for both “lazy” and “black” in the United States, do you think that “Food Stamp President” has the same implications as some other critique of Obama’s economic policies (in terms of whether the speaker intended to invoke Obama’s race and whether the speaker judges Obama differently than some other politician with substantially identical positions)?
“public welfare codes for both “lazy” and “black” in the United States”
Taking your word on that, what “other critique of Obama’s economic policies” are you imagining that would not have the same implications, unless you mean one that ignores public welfare entirely in favor of focusing on some other economic issue instead?
Basic economics says that what you pay for, you get more of. Therefore, when you extend long-term unemployment benefits, you get more long-term unemployment.
or
The current tax rate is too far to the right on the Laffer curve
or
The health insurance purchase mandate is unprecedented, UnAmerican, and unConstitutional
edit: or
People who pay no net income tax (because of low income and earned income tax credits) are drains on American society
(end edit)
without me thinking that the political opponent was intending to invoke Obama’s race in some way. None of these are actual quotes, but I think they are coherent assertions that disagree with Obama’s economic or legal philosophy. Edit: I feel confident I could find actual quote of equivalent content.
Of course, none of the ones you suggested are actually about public welfare, in the sense of the government providing supplemental income for people who are unable to get jobs to provide themselves adequate income. So what we have is not a code word, but rather a code issue.
Except the first one, but with how you framed it as “public welfare codes for...” I don’t see how that one wouldn’t have the same connotations.
Tl;dr: You have a good point, but we seem to be stuck with the historical context.
Unemployment benefits might qualify as public welfare. More tenuously, the various health insurance subsidies and expansions of Medicaid (government health insurance for the very poor) contained in “Obamacare.”
But your point is well taken. The well has been poisoned by political talking points from the 1980s (e.g. welfare queen and the response from the left). I’ll agree that there’s no good reason for us to be trapped in the context from the past, but politicians have not tried very hard to escape that trap.
The term “welfare president” has the advantage of not having a huge inferential distance (how many people know what a Laffer curve is?) and working as a soundbite.
I’m really curious now, though. What’s your opinion about the intended connotations of the phrase “food stamp President”? Do you think it’s intended primarily as a way of describing Obama’s economic policies? His commitment to preventing hunger? His fondness for individual welfare programs? Something else?
Or, if you think the intention varies depending on the user, what connotations do you think Gingrich intended to evoke with it?
Or, if you’re unwilling to speculate as to Gingrich’s motives, what connotations do you think it evokes in a typical resident of, say, Utah or North Dakota?
The direct meaning is reference to the fact that food stamp use has soured during his presidency. For generally, a reference to his governing style which includes anti-business policies and expanding entitlements.
I’m going to be charitable and assume that by “direct meaning” you mean to refer to the intended connotations that I asked about. Thanks for the answer.
That seems improbable. To pick the first example I Googled off of the Atlantic webside: Chart of the Day: Obama’s Epic Failure on Judicial Nominees contains some substantive criticism of Obama—can you show me where it contains “code words” of this kind?
It’s not an improbable claim so much as a nigh-unfalsifiable claim.
I mean, imagine the following conversation between two hypothetical people, arbitrarily labelled RZ and EN here: EN: By finding enough “code words” you can make any criticism of Obama racist. RZ: What about this criticism? EN: By declaring “epic”, “confirmation mess”, and “death blow” to be racist “code words”, you can make that criticism racist. RZ: But “epic”, “confirmation mess”, and “death blow” aren’t racist code words! EN: Right. Neither is “food stamps”.
Of course, one way forward from this point is to taboo “code word”—for example, to predict that an IAT would find stronger associations between “food stamps” and black people than between “epic” and black people, but would not find stronger associations between “food stamps” and white people than between “epic” and white people.
I think “nigh-unfalsifiable” is unfair in general when it comes to the use of code words, but I’m not familiar with the facts of the particular case under discussion.
In fact, I fully expect that (for example) an IAT would find stronger associations between “food stamps” and black people than between “epic” and black people, but would not find stronger associations between “food stamps” and white people than between “epic” and white people, and if I did not find that result I would have to seriously rethink my belief that “food stamps” is a dog-whistle in the particular case under discussion; it’s not unfalsifiable at all.
But I can’t figure out any way to falsify the claim that “by finding enough ‘code words’ you can make any criticism of Obama racist,” nor even the implied related claim that it’s equally easy to do so for all texts. Especially in the context of this discussion, where the experimental test isn’t actually available. All Eugene_Nier has to do is claim that arbitrarily selected words in the article you cite are equally racially charged, and claim—perhaps even sincerely—to detect no difference between the connotations of different words.
I wouldn’t actually use IAT to find these kind of connections—I would look at the use of phrases in other contexts by other people, and I would look at the reactions to the phrases in those contexts.
To take a historical example from Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era by James M. McPherson: in the 1862 riots against the draft, one of the banners that rioters carried read, “The Constitution As It Is, The Union As It Was”. That this allusion to the Constitution is an allusion to the legality of slavery under said Constitution is supported by one of the other banners carried by the same groups of rioters: “We won’t fight to free the nigger”. If, in 1862, a candidate for state office out in the Midwest were to repeat (or even, depending on the exact words, paraphrase) that phrase about the Constitution, I think the charge of “code word” would be well-placed.
I agree that looking at deployment of phrases is a useful way of finding code words, but it is always vulnerable to “cherry-picking.” The second banner you mentioned might or might not have been representative of the movement.
Consider the hypothetical protest filled with “Defend the Constitution, Strike Down Obamacare” posters, which should not be tainted by other posters saying “Keep government out of Medicare”(1) but it is hard to describe an ex ante principle explaining how distinctions should be made.
(1) For non-Americans: Medicare is widely popular government health insurance program for the elderly.
I’m honestly confused. You don’t see why calling Obama a “Food Stamp President” is different from criticizing his economic policy?
I guess I would not predict that particular phrase being leveled against Hillary or Bill Clinton—even from people who disagreed with their economic policies for the same reasons they disagree with Obama’s economic policies.
Well, Bill Clinton had saner economic policies, but otherwise I would predict that phrase, or something similar, being used against a white politician.
You haven’t answered my question:
Given the way that public welfare codes for both “lazy” and “black” in the United States, do you think that “Food Stamp President” has the same implications as some other critique of Obama’s economic policies (in terms of whether the speaker intended to invoke Obama’s race and whether the speaker judges Obama differently than some other politician with substantially identical positions)?
“public welfare codes for both “lazy” and “black” in the United States”
Taking your word on that, what “other critique of Obama’s economic policies” are you imagining that would not have the same implications, unless you mean one that ignores public welfare entirely in favor of focusing on some other economic issue instead?
A political opponent of Obama might say:
or
or
edit: or
(end edit)
without me thinking that the political opponent was intending to invoke Obama’s race in some way. None of these are actual quotes, but I think they are coherent assertions that disagree with Obama’s economic or legal philosophy. Edit: I feel confident I could find actual quote of equivalent content.
Of course, none of the ones you suggested are actually about public welfare, in the sense of the government providing supplemental income for people who are unable to get jobs to provide themselves adequate income. So what we have is not a code word, but rather a code issue.
Except the first one, but with how you framed it as “public welfare codes for...” I don’t see how that one wouldn’t have the same connotations.
Tl;dr: You have a good point, but we seem to be stuck with the historical context.
Unemployment benefits might qualify as public welfare. More tenuously, the various health insurance subsidies and expansions of Medicaid (government health insurance for the very poor) contained in “Obamacare.”
But your point is well taken. The well has been poisoned by political talking points from the 1980s (e.g. welfare queen and the response from the left). I’ll agree that there’s no good reason for us to be trapped in the context from the past, but politicians have not tried very hard to escape that trap.
The term “welfare president” has the advantage of not having a huge inferential distance (how many people know what a Laffer curve is?) and working as a soundbite.
Here is another example of my point that one can claim any criticism of Obama is racist if one is sufficiently motivated.
Well, yes by finding enough “code words” you can make any criticism of Obama racist.
Yes, that’s certainly true.
I’m really curious now, though. What’s your opinion about the intended connotations of the phrase “food stamp President”? Do you think it’s intended primarily as a way of describing Obama’s economic policies? His commitment to preventing hunger? His fondness for individual welfare programs? Something else?
Or, if you think the intention varies depending on the user, what connotations do you think Gingrich intended to evoke with it?
Or, if you’re unwilling to speculate as to Gingrich’s motives, what connotations do you think it evokes in a typical resident of, say, Utah or North Dakota?
The direct meaning is reference to the fact that food stamp use has soured during his presidency. For generally, a reference to his governing style which includes anti-business policies and expanding entitlements.
I’m going to be charitable and assume that by “direct meaning” you mean to refer to the intended connotations that I asked about. Thanks for the answer.
That seems improbable. To pick the first example I Googled off of the Atlantic webside: Chart of the Day: Obama’s Epic Failure on Judicial Nominees contains some substantive criticism of Obama—can you show me where it contains “code words” of this kind?
It’s not an improbable claim so much as a nigh-unfalsifiable claim.
I mean, imagine the following conversation between two hypothetical people, arbitrarily labelled RZ and EN here:
EN: By finding enough “code words” you can make any criticism of Obama racist.
RZ: What about this criticism?
EN: By declaring “epic”, “confirmation mess”, and “death blow” to be racist “code words”, you can make that criticism racist.
RZ: But “epic”, “confirmation mess”, and “death blow” aren’t racist code words!
EN: Right. Neither is “food stamps”.
Of course, one way forward from this point is to taboo “code word”—for example, to predict that an IAT would find stronger associations between “food stamps” and black people than between “epic” and black people, but would not find stronger associations between “food stamps” and white people than between “epic” and white people.
I think “nigh-unfalsifiable” is unfair in general when it comes to the use of code words, but I’m not familiar with the facts of the particular case under discussion.
I agree in the general case.
In fact, I fully expect that (for example) an IAT would find stronger associations between “food stamps” and black people than between “epic” and black people, but would not find stronger associations between “food stamps” and white people than between “epic” and white people, and if I did not find that result I would have to seriously rethink my belief that “food stamps” is a dog-whistle in the particular case under discussion; it’s not unfalsifiable at all.
But I can’t figure out any way to falsify the claim that “by finding enough ‘code words’ you can make any criticism of Obama racist,” nor even the implied related claim that it’s equally easy to do so for all texts. Especially in the context of this discussion, where the experimental test isn’t actually available. All Eugene_Nier has to do is claim that arbitrarily selected words in the article you cite are equally racially charged, and claim—perhaps even sincerely—to detect no difference between the connotations of different words.
I wouldn’t actually use IAT to find these kind of connections—I would look at the use of phrases in other contexts by other people, and I would look at the reactions to the phrases in those contexts.
To take a historical example from Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era by James M. McPherson: in the 1862 riots against the draft, one of the banners that rioters carried read, “The Constitution As It Is, The Union As It Was”. That this allusion to the Constitution is an allusion to the legality of slavery under said Constitution is supported by one of the other banners carried by the same groups of rioters: “We won’t fight to free the nigger”. If, in 1862, a candidate for state office out in the Midwest were to repeat (or even, depending on the exact words, paraphrase) that phrase about the Constitution, I think the charge of “code word” would be well-placed.
I agree that looking at deployment of phrases is a useful way of finding code words, but it is always vulnerable to “cherry-picking.” The second banner you mentioned might or might not have been representative of the movement.
Consider the hypothetical protest filled with “Defend the Constitution, Strike Down Obamacare” posters, which should not be tainted by other posters saying “Keep government out of Medicare”(1) but it is hard to describe an ex ante principle explaining how distinctions should be made.
(1) For non-Americans: Medicare is widely popular government health insurance program for the elderly.
Agreed—it’s not a mechanical judgment.
Yup, looking at venues in which a phrase gets used is another way to establish likely connections between phrases and ideologies.