In Chapter two we discussed different types of myths and rituals. In this article I read from huffing post, Senator Tom Cotton clearly used the myth of Us and Them. He is a first term (freshman as they are called) senator from Texas who has been very outspoken in many areas like Obamacare and even wrote a controversial letter to Iran about how many of the GOP leaders have misgivings about the nuclear negations with Iran. This letter even contained 46 signatures of his GOP colleagues, all in favor of his beliefs. On Monday in front of the Senate he gave his first speech and within a minute he started off using Adolf Hitler as an example.
He went on to state that back in WWII Winston Churchill tried to warn everyone about Hitler and that he was a huge threat but no one really took this to seriously until it was too late. He made the statement quoted by Churchill “Tragically, Great Britain and the West didn’t heed this warning, when they might have strangled that monster in his crib. Rather they let the locust continue to eat away at the common defense.” He continued with the fact that today’s world is continually in dangerous situations and defense spending is being cut when every other nation is making theirs stronger our defense is getting weaker.
He clearly is stating that if we do not heed this warning the US could find itself in another war like WWII and we will not be prepared and our military will not be able to defend herself. He is clearly trying to make congress and the public feel that we need to get touch, beef up our military and find a way to cut spending someplace else like Obamacare and increase spending on defense and he was doing this at the onset of the Republican Blueprint budget. Using someone like Hitler is defiantly a way to use a specific group like Nazi’s to enlist support from others who feel that the safety of the nation is in jeopardy.
Interpretation of reality is an important role of communication. This insightful blog post highlights the validation of how political communication constructs our reality. This is a great example of political settings. The Senator’s speech harkens thoughts and images of war, concentration camps, bombings, death etc. By linking our violent history to the possible future, people will legitimize what he is saying in his speech. This use of symbols and rituals creates a common bond among citizens. He wants to be in control and have his listeners be influenced by his speech. If he can share his vision and outlook with others, he can also control their actions. Myths combine the old and the new. On page 29 of our text book, the author’s state, “…they are composed of images from the past that help us cope with and understand the present. Myths function to reduce the complexity of the world, identifying causes that are simple and remedies that are apparent.” With the recent “War on Terrorism” we still target voting groups with myths and rituals. ~ Debbie
The video you mentioned from c-Span in Senator Tom’s speech he does quote Winston Churchill in reference to WWII, he does this to discuss the United State’s “lack of defense” in an article about the United States military spending, it makes us question whether the United States actually has such an inadequate and lacking defense. I would like to bring attention to the use of Priming in Senator Tom’s speech, since he brings attention to a topic that is already getting a large amount of funds, when there are other issues that would probably benefit more from the attention.
The article about US military spending http://pgpf.org/Chart-Archive/0053_defense-comparison