Warning: Today’s post has political content. I won’t do this often, but key events bring it out of me.
Last night was the first US presidential debate. I was not one of the millions watching. I later got the highlights, such as they were. But I find modern presidential politics both crushingly depressing and mind-numbingly boring, and I need to maintain a certain distance for my sanity’s sake.
Important? Sure. Janice and I discussed the implications this morning, too. But one reason I get depressed is that too many people don’t seem to think they’re important enough…not important enough to approach them like we live in 2024 instead of 2004.
Best example? I saw a report a few days earlier that said, “A gaffe in this week’s debate could shape the election.”
That struck me as the funniest political humor I’ve seen in some time, but I don’t think the reporter was joking.
Gaffe is a recent word, only showing up after 1909 or so, a little after the shift in relations between politics and media that President Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) pioneered. He welcomed reporters’ scrutiny and gave them a steady stream of quotes and copy. Teddy would have loved the 24-hour news cycle—on the whole.
But even he probably had a few verbal misfires that today’s less forgiving media would pick up on. And most politicians in the last 120 years haven’t had his appealing persona and knack for thrilling yet intelligent sentences.
Some politicians were defined by their gaffes. The press roasted Warren G. Harding for campaigning on a “return to normalcy”—the standard word in 1920, when he ran, was “normality.” The gaffe didn’t keep him out of the White House, yet it tends to be one of the only things mentioned about him in historical roundups—along with incompetence and the Teapot Dome scandal, both of which reinforce the “He said ‘normalcy,’ what an idiot” narrative.
In a presidential debate, Gerald Ford claimed, “There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe.” The moderator gave him a chance to back away from this total falsehood, but he doubled down, insisting Poland, Romania and Yugoslavia were free from Soviet interference. That answer stuck with him for the rest of the campaign and may have cost him the presidency.
Back then, the news media were different. Conservative media could insist that when Ford said “were free,” he meant “should be free,” and that anyone who said otherwise was a traitor. But conservative media didn’t then monopolize a billion-dollar broadcast channel, most of talk radio, and countless unregulated internet venues.
Vice-President Dan Quayle lurched from gaffe to gaffe:
“I was recently on a tour of Latin America, and the only regret I have was that I didn't study Latin harder in school so I could converse with those people.”
“It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it.”
“The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make.”
Republican, Democrat, and independent alike, we all shared a hearty laugh at lines like this. They ensured Quayle had no real political career after 1992….again, because we had a shared political reality then.
The idea a politician can lose power by saying the wrong thing is charming. It appeals to our notions of equality and justice. And, for decades, it was true.
But we live in a post-gaffe world now. Donald Trump has said numerous things that would have ended an earlier politician’s career (Google “Pussygate” if you must). Joe Biden’s made his share of incompetent misstatements, but his supporters grumble, “Better incompetence than malice,” and keep their noses to the grindstone. (There’s talk of replacing Biden on the Democratic ticket, but I’ll believe that when I see it.) As for Trump, his base is all about “loyalty.”
Presidential politics is no longer determined by a shared reality but by a loyalist cult and the coalition opposing it. There’s no longer room to abandon “our guy” just because he said something stupid-sounding or even vile. You want to support the cause, don’t you?
So political gaffes no longer exist in America, because a mistake isn’t a real mistake if there’s no consequences for it. And if an untruth gives a politician more benefit than loss, then it’s not a misstep, it’s a platform plank.
Of course, there are other wordplay concepts more relevant to America’s current political reality. For one thing, I’d pay more attention to doublespeak.