The State of the Union, by the numbers
The Washington Post's coverage of the President's State of the Union address included a table of the number of times the president used selected key words in his address, and compared it with the number of times he used those words in past addresses. The table is reproduced below (comparing 2006 with '05 and '04). Note the shift in emphasis away from Iraq, Tax (Reform) and Social Security -- places where Bush is either mired in controversy or has seen to have failed -- and toward "The World," "The Economy,", and a wide array of issues that garnered between 2 and 7 mentions (below). This seems to reflect Bush's move away from Big Ideas to smaller-scale, (supposedly) more manageable policies. Terrorism remains a strong suit for Bush, so that word count remains high, while "glittering generalities" such as "Freedom" will never get old for an American president (guaranteed to force even reluctant Democrats to give a Standing O). Anyway, who said the State of the Union isn't a laundry list?
World..................... 26 ('06).. 15 ('05)... 14 ('04)
Economy/
economic................ 23........... 14.......... 17
Terrorism/-ist/
terror...................... 20.......... 27.......... 20
Freedom................. 17............ 21............ 8
Iraq........................ 16........... 27.......... 24
Government............ 11............ 14............ 7
Tax......................... 8........... 10.......... 20
Spending/spend....... 7............. 4............ 2
AIDS....................... 6............. 1............ 0
Iran........................ 6............. 3............. 1
Liberty.................... 4............. 7............. 1
Social Security......... 3............17............. 2
Surveillance............ 2............. 0............. 0
Medicare................. 2............ 0............. 8
Medicaid................. 2............ 0............. 0
Source: Washington Post
(Note: Where appropriate, singular, plural and possessive variations are also counted.)
posted by hdougie at 2/02/2006 08:22:00 AM
8 Comments:
First of all I might be bias while I respond due to being a liberal democrat. This media blog is a perfect example how the government can trick citizens into following and believing in the ideas they plan to carry out. For example, Bush focused on the key words “World Economy, Terrorist” to convince us to look away from the troubling debt in the United States, the social security conflict, debate of Iraq and more. Again, as in all his addresses, he incorporates words of liberty, freedom, which I believe his is planning to make us agree Iraq was a justifiable choice. Then why half the Middle East including other parts of the world dislike Americans at this moment. I wonder? Though, as his approval rate declines, the citizens will not be persuaded until something good comes out of this war. Maybe laundry list, I agree.
Ashley Coon
I think the words that the preisdent uses are a direct reflection of what is big news at the time. Of course the subject of world economy is one that everyone is concerned about and so he is going to talk about it more than something like Medicare, that has been on the back burner sort of. Also, i think the president is going to try and divert some attention from "hot button" issues because he probably doesnt want them to be the focus of his speech. He knows lots of people are unhappy about the war in Iraq so he is not gonna waste a bunch of time talking about it. These are just a couple of my opinions on what i read in the article.
~Tyson Terry
What these numbers do is tell a story about the state of the country and world that we live in today. I think everyone can agree that this is in fact the very purpose of the state of the union. Where are we now, and where are we heading? I give Bush credit for highlighting two important topics more this year than he has in the past; namely, the world economy and the difficulties facing us in Iran. Bush mentioned "World" and "Economy" more this year than in the past because of the every increasing movement toward globalization and global competition. China is the single greatest threat to our domestic economy (as is evidenced my rising gas prices), and globalization is a real issue effecting American jobs and purchasing habits. Bush is looking forward to this issue because depending on how we handle it now, it can either be a huge problem or a great opportunity. I beleive Iran is the second most important future issue (nuclear development, and the advancement of fundamentalist islam), and i applaud Bush for increasing its visability in this year's state of the union.
-Nicholas A. Cintineo
It's not too hard to tell what President Bush is trying to accomplish by selecting and repeating specific key words - his goal is to address burning issues without delving too deeply into subjects that reflect negatively on him. The lone exception seems to be "Iraq", which even with a big drop-off was still mentioned 16 times. Because of the importance of this issue, Bush focused on it nearly as much as other issues, but did not come close to matching his output from 2005. Instead, he chose to focus the majority of his attention on topics related more towards the future, rather than Iraq and how that reflects a negative light on him. Pretty transparent, but pretty smart as well. This was a good speech.
Brian Galliford
I'm not a huge fan of analyzing the state of the union address, because they generally say what people are already expecting them to say. They're more like a summary of the past year and the plan for the future, of which most was already made public but the majority of people chose not to keep up with politics. However, the "axis of evil" is an exception to this little theory, as that was a surprise to Americans. A lot of good it's done though, as we identified the 3 most dangerous nations in the world, and have done absolutely nothing about it since then. (Enter crack about American presence in Iraq here). I would love to see a president come out and say "The state of our union is NOT strong." Just the acknowledgement that millions of kids dont have enough food and countless millions aren't receving proper health care would be nice to hear. Maybe the president could even throw in that the top 1% control 70% of American wealth, and the top 5% control 90% of the wealth. We aren't curing cancer here, just acknowledging the state of the union cant possibly be strong if companies are going out of business and wages haven't increased since the 1970's. Democrats and republicans, conservatives and liberals alike are at fault here, we are all at fault. We have to accept there is a problem on a wide scale, and then work towards fixing it. That got kind of deep for a state of the union response...David SaNogueira
I agree and disagree with some comments posted thus far, but I think that what everyone needs to understand is that the president does not write this speech. He is merely the messenger that carries out the message. This is not just the presidents reaction to the past year, rather it is the Bush administration. Our country has undoubtedly been different since the atrocities of 9/11. It is only natural to assume that less than a decade since our homeland was attacked the words terrorism would be used in such a large quantity. In addition he uses the term world and economy greatly because the general public is not educated enough on national issues. This is the cabinets way of making Americans feel invovled in gorvernmental concerns. Rachel Ippolito
Obvious from this list is the President's disregard for what is happening within the boundaries of our own nation. Particularly health insurance and social security issues, which should in my opinion be somewhat at the forefront of a Presidents efforts and concerns. Bush continues to try to insight anger, resentment, and fear through the use of words like terror, terrorism, and Iraq. What he fails to mention is that if we eventually "win" the war on terror,the lack of affordable healthcare, prescription medicines and the inability of the elderly and sick to live on their incomes will kill many of us slowly anyway. Perhaps President Bush should be more concerned with highlighting the disparities between individuals in this nation - socially and economically than drawing attention to the differences between our nation and others. Bush is so concerned with highlighting the problems we need to address in other nations perhaps he's forgetting about the problems we are facing right here and now. - Antonia Conklin-Heininger
While terrorism is definitely a controversial issue in American society it seems unfair of Bush to have such a narrowminded focus. Mentioning words like the economy doesn't seem as sufficient as directly addressing topics like Social Security. Although this tactic might be personally expedient for Bush and his presidency, it is avoiding key issues that Americans might need answered.
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