TopicsOn The Media is produced by:
If you believe the conventional wisdom of both the White House and the punditry, America’s middle class is under attack, in decline and threatened with total extinction. But who exactly are the middle class and where is the evidence of their impending doom? Economist Stephen J. Rose says the rumors of the middle class demise are greatly exaggerated.
The Bush Administration leaves office in a month, but will its linguistic oeuvre remain? From the "Clean Skies Inititive" to "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques," Bushies paid close attention to the power of words. Republican wordsmith Frank Luntz, however, doesn't expect the terms to stick.
Last week’s Proposition 8 in California and this week’s same-sex vows in Connecticut have been about one thing: whose loving unions can legally be described as ‘marriage.’ Bob speaks with EJ Graff, author of What Is Marriage For? The Strange Social History of Our Most Intimate Institution, about the semantics of the ‘M’ word and whether changing the term changes the struggle.
Barack Obama's success in this week's primary contests took place despite an all-out effort by the Clinton campaign to paint him as "elite." Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg describes how the meaning of elite has changed over the years and psychologist Drew Westen explains why being labeled an elitist can be so damaging.
Earmarks were brought to the center of the political spotlight this week in President Bush's State of the Union speech. Once an insider term pertaining to the process of allocating funds, it is now a dirty word synonymous with pork. The Washington Post's Jonathan Weisman explains how this evolution is mostly political and ultimately inaccurate.
With a tricky definition and a lag-time to compile statistics, it may take up to a year to know if we are indeed in a recession right now. In the meantime, the media speculate. Critics from the left and right weigh in on whether the media jump the gun by invoking the R-word and David Wessel, economics editor for the Wall Street Journal, explains the word's place in the newsroom.
Robert Mukasey was confirmed this week as attorney general. The process moved the definition of waterboarding into the spotlight. As media struggle to find out what the interrogation technique entails, the working definition has been "simulated drowning." But those who've experienced and performed it say it is drowning. Two newspaper editors weigh in.
We all use filler words like um or uh but it’s rare that we hear them in movies, news broadcasts or … uh … this show. Author Michael Erard explains that verbal blunders and hesitations reveal more than we think.
