Politicians lie, they dissemble, they distort the truth. They change the meaning of words, put two mutually incompatible ideas into one paragraph. They simplify concepts to the point of absurdity. It is what they do. Which is why I waste very little time going through the economic and logical absurdities in a politician's speech. Why pretend to be surprised by the idiocies you know are going to appear?
What we observers of politics forget is that Politicians are not speaking to us political wonks. Nor are they talking to people who are actually sitting there listening him bump his gums. They are at best talking to journalists, trying to get a quote or soundbite into the press or, even better, on the 9 o'clock news. In reality they're talking in code to their supporters, and in soundbites to the outside world. Thus the philosophical incoherence in a politician's speech is irrelevant. What most people call 'Straight talking' I call Sophism. What most people call 'fairness' I call 'being on the wrong side of the Laffer curve', and so on, but to call a politician on these things is to forget that these events have their own language. It may look like English, but it isn't. It is always possible to look at a politicians speech, and fisk it. There will always be inferences made on spurious grounds, because a political speech cannot fully make an argument because there isn't time. Instead it is the intellectual equivalent of impressionism - seeking to give the truth without being specific on details.
Of course, I could be too generous to politicians here. In avoiding details, they are seeking to maintain wiggle room, should events conspire against them but I think most politicians who make it to the top are motivated by a desire to make the world a better place, and seek to do so honestly. The language of the political-media construct however prevents comprehension. The language is written by one's opponents. Let's take a famous example.
There is no such thing as society.
Now if you're on the left, you think that Margaret Thatcher in 1987 was talking about deliberately atomising society. You think this was the intellectual justification for the '80s 'ME!' society, when of course she was talking about the exact opposite - blaming excess state interference for the very atomisation of society which her political opponents sought to pin on her. "Society" became code for "the state", a political construct in the media-political hive mind which existed during a period - late 80's to the present which saw the almost complete centralisation of power in the hands of the British state, and the neutering of all levels of democracy below parliament.
There is such a thing as society, it's just not the same thing as the state.
David Cameron, 21 years later is forced to detoxify the word "society" in the eyes of his supporters, and counter the charge that Tories are vicious individualists, seeking to use the poor as fertiliser on multi-national GM uber farms. The Tory view of society has always been the
Burkean "little platoons" which mediate between the state and the individual. This might be church, company, charity, clubs, societies and associations. It's taken 21 years for a Tory to find a soundbite which might actually express accurately what Margaret Thatcher wanted to say to Woman's Own in 1987. Which is why Politicians choose their words so very carefully. One slip up, and you've moved the vocabulary of the Politcal-media complex against you. Can we really expect them to tell the truth, in english, under those circumstances?
In truth, and especially at inflection points in political discourse, 1979, 1997, 2010 the opponent's caricatures are likely to be more accurate than the image parties want to present themselves. Margaret Thatcher was derided as "Attila the hen" by the labour party - and as a hard, uncaring woman, who wanted to take
milk from children. This hinted at the radical agenda better than the
St Fancis of Assisi quote with which she entered office. In 1997, "Labour's tax bombshell" and "New Labour, New Danger" accurately present the message that Labour will Tax and Spend, bankrupting the country even though that nice Mr Blair is in charge. Which turned out to be, more or less, the truth.
At present, Labour are schizophrenically trying to portray David Cameron as a vicious Thatcherite, intent on making 'Savage Cuts' in public services whilst mixing the blood of the workers with champagne in a bizarre Bullingdon club ritual, whilst also asserting that he's a slick salesman with no substance. He can't be both, and I suspect the Labour caricature of the Tories' radical agenda is more accurate than the equivocating and centrist rhetoric with which Cameron so infuriates the political right. Which is why I am optimistic that, whatever bollocks appears in political speeches talking about harmony, The Tories in office will be more resolute and radical than they would want you to think.
I certainly hope so.