No, that's not about the economy, jobs, the deficit, gay marriage, dealing with Congressional Republicans, or really anything else for that matter. It's about sloganeering, specifically the apparent frame for his upcoming State of the Union address: "an America built to last." This is, to my mind, another pathetic failure to use "A New Foundation" as the President's catch-phrase. As regular readers know, assuming there are any, I've been advocating for this as the President's catch-phrase for two years come tomorrow. Obama's "Win the Future" line was similarly trying to get at the same idea as "A New Foundation," but did so by sounding incredibly silly and being extremely easy to mock on Twitter. "Built to last" is a car commercial-level slogan. "A New Foundation" is the exact same slogan, except that it doesn't suck! It's the same image of a new, robust version of our country, except instead of sounding like a sleazy auto salesman it's cut from the very same cloth as such progressive agendas as the New Deal, Fair Deal, Square Deal, New Frontier, and Great Society. It's not even really a slogan: while it is a catch-phrase, it's more of a title than a description.
And yet, he continues not to see it. This is a sad day for American rhetorical framing devices.
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