Obama's Pronoun Switcheroo
Everyone wants change. Anyone who voted for Clinton, Obama or McCain voted for a candidate running on a "change" slogan. We voted for economic change, government change, education change, health care change, political change (not to mention science policy change). Obama ran and won the election on two change slogans.
First, the reassuring "Change You Can Believe In" that both Hillary Clinton and John McCain copied. Acronym Required wrote about "Obama's Change Challenge" last May. In September, Obama changed his slogan to "Change We Need".
At the time, Obama's Chief Strategist for the campaign, David Axelrod, bullshitted to reporters about the alteration: "It's not that we're moving away from it, but we're incorporating it...there's a real distinction between more of the same and the change we need and so that's a part."
Now Obama's PR group is slinging a new slogan change. As commentators clamor doubtfully about Obama's various choices and decisions, his change slogan changes again. As of tomorrow you can buy an inaugural poster of Obama which says "Be The Change".
Is that our best hope? Gandhi said "Be the Change You Want in The World". That may have been helpful half a century ago, coming from a sage man swaddled in muslin and leaning on a stick** -- but Obama! We believed!
The Obama camp pulled a not-so-subtle pronoun change, from the implicit "I" will change things (and you can believe in me), to a "we" will change things (together, all of us), to the "you" are the only one who can change (anything). Ouch. But Obama! We believed!
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**Not that I'm not a Gandhi fan. I even own the movie Gandhi.
