I have been seeing some news pieces about President Obama's Tuesday speech to the nation, analyzing the "grade level" of his words. They are concluding that he spoke "over the heads" of many Americans.
President Barack Obama's speech on the Gulf oil disaster may have gone over the heads of many in his audience, according to an analysis of the 18-minute talk released Wednesday.
. . . Though the president used slightly less than four sentences per paragraph, his 19.8 words per sentence "added some difficulty for his target audience," Payack said.
[. . .] Obama's nearly 10th-grade-level rating was the highest of any of his major speeches and well above the Grade 7.4 of his 2008 "Yes, we can" victory speech, which many consider his best effort, Payack said.
The media and pundits are largely talking about how Obama is perceived and not about what Obama says, and certainly not explaining the underlying policies. Is Obama too smart for Americans? Or at least for American media, which is supposed to transmit and translate information that helps citizens participate in our democracy. But our "market driven" media (thanks, Ronnie) by and large no longer plays this role, and politicians are supposed to play a part on a stage. Obama did not intentionally mispronounce the word nuclear, as the previous president did. Was this a political mistake?
During the recent media frenzy with pundits complaining that Obama doesn't exhibit enough anger, comedian Bill Maher had a line that Obama would say, "I've been briefed on your pain." Is this the "grade level" of America now? How much is each of us to blame, insofar as we allow ourselves to be consumers instead of citizens?
