In five words by Langston Hughes, Kerry aides hear slogan

[Cocoa]

Nice discussion of Kerry's excellent slogan, despite the inane digs at Kerry at the beginning.

And Jamieson's caveats seem a little off the wall to me. What normal person is going to think of the West Wing when they hear this slogan?

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/01/politics/campaign/01motto.html

<snip>

Kathleen Hall Jamieson, an expert on political messages, said the line had the potential to resonate powerfully with Democrats and others who believe the nation is being driven in the wrong direction. "It suggests someone's hijacked the country, without being a frontal attack," she said.

But, she cautioned: "It only works if people don't hear it as a mindless sentence. It works because you think that America isn't being America, and that something's getting in the way of that, and that John Kerry could be the vehicle of getting the America that you want."

Ms. Jamieson also warned that the line echoed a cliché of political consulting, "let Reagan be Reagan," and could remind some voters of the "standard indictment against Kerry: that underneath this candidate is the soldier who came back and protested the war, which many people think was his finest hour."

For that matter, it also echoes an episode of "The West Wing," entitled "Let Bartlet Be Bartlet," in which the fictional president's aides realize he has become too cautious, a criticism that Mr. Kerry has faced lately.

[RoBear]

1. So WHAT

is the slogan????? I don't have a NYT account.....:shrug:

[displacedtexan]

2. Let America be America again!

Freepers never likes L. Hughes anyway. Ignore them.

[Peachhead22]

4. I don't like the slogan

I agree with the underlying sentiment, but from an aesthetic standpoint the phrase just sounds a little awkward, stilted and vague. In a screwed up way maybe even reinforcing some undesirable things the Bushies are trying to portray in Kerry.

I prefer the slogan:

"George W. Bush is a total f*ck up, and he's a danger to America." :)

Strong, unequivocal, to the point.

[OneBlueSky]

3. I'd like to see something a little more populist . . .

yeah, I know . . . "Fat chance!" . . . but if I had my druthers, we'd be looking at things like . . .

"Power to the people!"

"The people, united, can never be defeated!"

"Corporations are NOT more important than people!"

"Corporations are NOT people; PEOPLE are people!"

"John Kerry, leveling the playing field."

"Patriotism is NOT taking jobs offshore!"

you get the idea . . . :)

[Cocoa]

5. really?

you really prefer those you listed to "Let America be America again?"

And regarding how populist it is, here's the poem it is taken from:

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain--
All, all the stretch of these great green states--
And make America again!

[Feanorcurufinwe]

6. Thanks for posting that