
A leaked document from Fox News managing editor Bill Sammon also has the Internet buzzing. I have no idea why. Are there people out there that are still surprised by the fact that Fox News manipulates language in order to sway people to think a certain way?
Here is the memo.
1) Please use the term "government-run health insurance" or, when brevity is a concern, "government option," whenever possible.
2) When it is necessary to use the term "public option" (which is, after all, firmly ensconced in the nation's lexicon), use the qualifier "so-called," as in "the so-called public option."
3) Here's another way to phrase it: "The public option, which is the government-run plan."
4) When newsmakers and sources use the term "public option" in our stories, there's not a lot we can do about it, since quotes are of course sacrosanct.
Yeah, and? Why is this a shocking revelation? I suppose it is very interesting to see how Fox uses the word "government" and how insistent they are that is mentioned a great deal. Since we have been discussing this recently, I thought at least worthy of a note. This is yet another fine example of how marketing manipulates people into acting against their self interest. The word "government" is a code word specifically used to control thought.
In many ways, it's a trigger word (see: The Manchurian Candidate) used to activate somewhere between 30-40 million Americans. Clearly, it's very successful.
Hell, they don't need to kill anyone anymore. When you have that many people so nicely controlled, who needs assassins?