Dumbed Down, Going Down

So the language of Obama’s State of the Union registers at an 8th grade reading level. Are we surprised?

Not after reading the piece by Walter Williams posted on LRC this morning. The people Obama is trying to reach are simply uneducated — not dumb, but deliberately deprived by the educrats of the capacity to reason and reach rational conclusions, to paraphrase Hannah Arendt. (Be sure to read the article Williams refers too, as well. Brace yourself.)

Obama has deliberately dumbed down all three of his SOTU addresses. His “average grade-level score of 8.4 is more than two grades lower than the 10.7 grade average for the other 67 addresses written by his 12 predecessors,” according to a careful analysis of the texts. Wonder why?

Obamanologists at Politico gild the lily: “Obama’s use of simple language  is in part a reflection of his audience: the American voter in an election year.”

Translated through the LRC Truthacator, we add the missing adjective: the Holy O’s audience is the :uneducated” voter (thanks to his allies in the government school unions), and his goal is making them resentful and envious while leaving them uneducated. Think Orwell’s proles, and Huxley’s Deltas.

Get in line for your Soma.

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10:50 am on January 25, 2012