Where Bush is following the advice of Luntz and Thau is in avoiding certain poisonous words. Chief among these is "privatization." Supporters of reform toss that word around to describe the process of creating investment accounts controlled by individual workers. To the public, however, it indicates corporate control of Social Security, which they oppose. Bush never utters the word. Instead of calling investment accounts funded by payroll taxes "private," he calls them "personal."

Mark Shields: In an Orwellian abuse of the language, conservatives, including even the respected Cato Institute, insist that they're now for Social Security choice, not for dreaded 'privatization'. Yes, and war is peace.

NOVAK: I'm still for privatization.

Bob Novak after the word came down from party headquarters (Crossfire, Oct. 28th, 2002) ...

[Democratic consultant] Steve McMahon: I thought they were accusing the Republicans of wanting to privatize Social Security which, after all, is what Republicans wanted.

NOVAK: That's a Democratic term.

By Associated Press | January 25, 2005

WASHINGTON - In a sign of the intensifying political battle over Social Security, the AARP released a nationwide poll yesterday indicating deep public skepticism about President Bush's plan for personal accounts. The Republican Party immediately criticized the study as flawed.

''Approximately four in 10 respondents initially favored private accounts," the seniors' organization said in a summary of its findings.

''However, those who initially favored private accounts dropped off substantially once they were exposed to any of the consequences associated with implementation of private accounts."

In a two-page rebuttal, the Republican Party said the AARP's survey relied on slanted wording.

Why did you start using that term when you used to say "private accounts" (cite source). When did you get the memo from Frank Luntz?

Exposing this in the media will be difficult, but I promise you it would kill any last shred of hope Bush had in promoting his destruction of Social Security. Revealing the Republican language games to the public would do significant damage to their national image and destroy any immediate legislative proposal they are working on.

This is also the sort of thing I want to shove in the face of the small minority of "truth will set you free" Dems who did not like the presentation I gave with a friend at the January Philly DFA Meetup about how to talk Social Security like a liberal. Republicans develop these words in extensive focus group and poll testing, they all start using them, and now the media has adopted the Republican terms. They have effin' scientific evidence that doing this will help them win on Social Security, but some liberals trapped in the late Enlightenment do not want to realize this. This is a big part of why we lose people. Whenever anyone uses the term "personal accounts," ask them when they started using that term, and what Frank Luntz memo they read.