sociolinguistic mid-term extra-credit

This is a copy of my mid-term extra-credit for my sociolinguistics class. I wrote comments on an article, in this case, William Safire's latest "on language" column in the NYT. Read on, and hope with me that I get an 'A'...

There are four different interpretations of more or less the same words, constructed in different orders. One is, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” which, using apparent Southern wisdom, advises people to leave well enough alone things that appear to be working just fine. The second is, “You break it, you own it.” a phrase apparently lifted from china shop rule, informing people that whatever they break in the shop, however they break it, they have to pay for it, even if they own it, because in this view, something broken is something purchased. The third, quoted from Pottery Barn policy, leaves slightly more leeway in the interpretation of breaking things; “If you break it accidentally, then you don’t have to pay for it.” (italics mine) which leaves open the argument of how something was broken to define the issue of payment. Finally, Jim Lehrer is quoted as saying (apparently confusing his words, but interestingly so just the same…), “If you broke it, you fix it.” (italics NYT’s), which states in no uncertain language that, regardless of how the item came about to be broken, you, the breaker of that item are held responsible for its repair. Senator John Kerry was asked to give his opinion of this interpretation of the misquote from Lehrer during his first debate with President George W Bush, “Now if you break it, you made a mistake. It’s the wrong thing to do. But you own it. And then you've got to fix it and do something with it.” Claiming that breaking anything is a mistake, which therefore absolves the breaker of the item of any pre-meditated or malicious motives, Kerry then states in the next sentence that the act of breaking something is the “wrong thing to do”, suggesting that perhaps the breaking of the item was not in fact a mistake, but a conscience decision, and in this case, a decision that carries with it the weight of culpability. He then seems to align himself with the china shop rule by stating that no matter how the item was broken, you the breaker now own it. However, Kerry goes one step further by adding onto the act of owning the broken thing a moral responsibility of not only fixing it (this of course does not take into account that having broken the item, then paying for it, you may no longer have the monetary ability to repair it, or the item may in fact be now irreparable…) but then doing something with it.

This is all of course, related to the invasion of Iraq. The first thing to note is the application of words of mercantilism to an act of war, lending more credence to the argument of those against the war that it was in fact an imperialistic strong-arming to gain unfettered access to a large part of the world’s oil supply. Secondly is Powell’s apparent backsliding on his original warning to Bush, by giving him an out in suggesting that it was possible that the breakage, or the invasion was a mistake. Powell, in the interim, is able to absolve himself completely by using as his advice, quoted policy of a retail outlet; these were not his words. Finally, as only a lawyer could, Kerry then takes all of this and twists it into a great big political pretzel by saying that the breaking of anything, or the invasion of any country is inherently a mistaken action, but never the less a wrong one, thus requiring the breaker to fix their mistake and then make good on that mistake by turning it into something worthwhile and useful.

I think that the Bush administration should have followed the original adage.