Bush on the Couch Revised Edition by Justin A. Frank M.D

Author:Justin A. Frank, M.D. [Justin A. Frank]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780061739781
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2007-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Who can argue with that? But how can one defeat a word?

By highlighting Bush’s indifference to meaning and communication—which our bemused disbelief often lulls us into overlooking—Miller and Brooks, among others, are helping draw the nation’s attention to the most disturbing aspect of Bush’s use of language. Like the travesties of misrepresentation he uses to disguise his attitudes toward the skies, the forest, or the children his budget cuts so cruelly leave behind, the patterns Miller and Brooks identify underscore how Bush perverts language not just to evade, but also to control. His tendency to hamper discourse, in other words, it has the effect of steering it—and it’s no coincidence that the result is often to his advantage.

Such attempts to control the dialogue can take many forms. As we’ve seen, Bush uses language to attack (“a face for radio”), dismiss (“I better call my lawyer”), distract (“Kenny who?”), intimidate (“Bring ’em on”)—asserting his power and authority along the way. Of course, whenever he is touting his power to others, his message is also directed ultimately toward himself, constantly reassuring himself that he’s in control. This is clearer when he positions himself as having divine authority—as in March 2004, when he told an audience in Los Angeles, “God loves you, and I love you. And you can count on both of us as a powerful message that people who wonder about their future can hear,” when he asserts his god-like power by speaking of “my” army or “my” country, or makes references to God, Jesus, and his divinely ordained mission. The fractured syntax of comfort sends a strong hidden message of power: Don’t worry about your future. God and I are taking care of it for you.

It may be hard to imagine a person with the self-confidence to equate himself with God; yet such hands off—I’m handling it messages are generally the product of being frightened. What does George W. Bush fear? He probably couldn’t answer, though any analyst could identify a number of possibilities worth investigating, most involving the prospect that his lies, his limitations, or the less healthy aspects of his personality might be exposed.

Ultimately, though, both the process of spreading fear and the effects of the fears themselves may be of more immediate relevance than the fears themselves. His perversion of language reflects his disregard for other peoples’ words—and what are laws, after all, but formations of words? In Bush’s troubled perception, law is as easily perverted as any other language. Furthermore, when he detaches language from meaning, he deprives the electorate of its voice—of the very words with which the nation can shape and register its dissent. Though the apparent humor of Bush’s verbal blunders may lull us into taking our own words no more seriously than he appears to take his, our complacency distracts us from a legitimate danger. If we adopt a similar attitude to our own language, our words will be as profoundly robbed of their meaning as his have been. The result: Our dissent is quieted, if not entirely silenced, out of fear that it lacks authority or relevance.

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