Message: "We Car."

From Ask Figaro:

Dear Figaro,
Fiat recently introduced a retro Fiat-500, a tiny automobile.  The slogan is:  “You are, we car.: Please, Figaro, analyse and evaluate this slogan for me. Figarist forever, I wait for your expert opinion.
Arie Vrolijk

Dear Arie,

“You are, we car” employs an anthimeria, the verbing figure, which turns nouns into verbs, adjectives into nouns, and the like. Fiat is into carring, apparently. It’s also into identity strategies, using a campaign that emphasizes the “500,000 car combinations” the model offers, allowing you to find the car that’s just for you. The car company hopes your unconscious will do this fallacious little syllogism:

You are the essence of you.
Fiat is the essence of car. Ergo,
Fiat is the essence of you.

Figaro would not want to meet the focus groups who approved this message.

Snappy Answer: “We don’t car for you.”

The Figurative Love Potion

From Ask Figaro: 

 Dear Figaro,
This Christmas I plan to ask a woman to marry me. We’ve been dating for two years, and I’m 99% sure of success, but want to do this thing right, rhetorically speaking. Any advice?
Nuptializing

Dear Nup,

As the great orator Gorgias (we call him “Gorgeous”) would say, it’s best to drug her. Not through drugs per se, but through figures of speech. That’s how Paris talked Helen into the affair that launched those thousand ships.

A  great figure for the occasion is the anadiplosis, the build-on figure, which begins each new clause or sentence with the words that end the previous one, e.g.:

“The more I’ve come to know you, the more you’ve become a true friend. And the more you’ve become a friend, the more my love grows. And the more it grows, the more I want it to continue to grow forever. Will you marry me?”

Trust Figaro. Say it with an absolutely straight face, with utter sincerity, and your beloved—along with romantic immortality—will be yours.

Fig.

Latter-Day Mitt

Quote:  “Americans tire of those who would jettison their beliefs, even to gain the world.”  Mitt Romney

Figure of Speech:  adynata (a-dyn-AH-ta), the last-people-on-earth figure. From the Greek, meaning “without power.”

Romney at last gave a pretty good speech defending his faith as part of an American “symphony” of religions. Sure, he turned up the rhetorical music a little loud, but it’s reassuring to see a presidential candidate defend separation of church and state.

One of his best lines appears in the form of an adynata, a figure of thought that refuses a proposition by positing an absurdly desperate or favorable hypothetical example, as in, “Even if we were the last people on earth, I wouldn’t go out with you.”

The beauty of the figure in Romney’s case is that it lets the most craven-seeming, issue-of-convenience candidate appear selfless and steadfast. “Some believe that such a confession of my faith will sink my candidacy,” Romney said in his speech. “If they are right, so be it. But I think they underestimate the American people. Americans do not respect believers of convenience.”

Nice! While the Dems thump each other with the Republican tactic of attacking opponents’ strengths, they should learn a trick from Romney: trumpet your own political weaknesses as if they were strengths.

Snappy Answer:  “So about gun control and abortion…”

Iran a War, I’m Running a War…

Quote:  “Iran was dangerous, Iran is dangerous and Iran will be dangerous if they have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.”  President Bush

Figure of Speech: antistrophe (an-TIS-tro-phe), the last-word repeater. From the Greek, meaning “turning around.”

All ten American spy agencies report that Teheran abandoned its weapons program four years ago. In response, President Bush toes a tricky rhetorical line in the form of an antistrophe, a figure that repeats the same words in successive phrases or clauses.

The antistrophe lets Bush do what he loves best: repeat a key word over and over, in order, as he puts it, “to kind of catapult the propaganda.” The figure also disguises a shift in Bush’s argument. Up till now, the White House had been rattling its sabers over Iran’s alleged development of weapons. Now the issue isn’t development but know-how.

By repeating the same word over and over and over, Bush seeks to make knowledge a dangerous thing.

Snappy Answer:  “There’s only one thing to do in this crisis: imagine some weapons.”

Good Thing God's a Republican

Quote:  “I do not speak for my church on public matters — and the church does not speak for me.”  John F. Kennedy, speaking to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, September 12, 1960.

Figure of Speech:  chiasmus (key-ASS-mus), the criss-cross figure. From the Greek letter chi, or “X.”

This week Mitt Romney plans to do a Kennedy, delivering  a speech about his religious beliefs.  Kennedy, a Catholic, faced opposition from groups who feared he would take orders from the Vatican.  Today’s religious fundamentalists oppose Romney because belongs to the Mormon Church — a cult, say Christianists.

Kennedy deployed a chiasmus (Figaro’s favorite figure!) which states a clause and then repeats its mirror image.  Kennedy’s speech may have made the difference in a close election against a Quaker named Richard Nixon.

Can Romney pull off the same feat? Unlike Kennedy, he can’t advocate separation between church and state; the Republican base isn’t too keen on that part of the Constitution.  Instead, Mitt should emphasize values over doctrine, saying he stands for marriage and family far better than horn dogs like Giuliani and Thompson.  That strategy won’t win him Iowa, where voters seem to enjoy a direct line to God.  But it will help him in the more profane states like New Hampshire.  Which happens to be the state of sin where Figaro lives.

Snappy Answer:  “Enough about church. Let’s talk about God.”

Throw Mr. Sand on the Fire

Quote:  “Would Ticket Inspector Sand report to the Control Room.” Announcement heard on the London subway system.

 

Figure of Speech:  schematismus (skee-ma-TIS-mus), the figure of code words. From the Greek, meaning “configuration.”

Mr. Sand gets around. Building managers traditionally invoke his name when there’s a fire, and he seems to serve the London Underground as well. This type of circumlocution, called schematismus in rhetoric, can help prevent a stampede of panicky patrons. Instead of yelling “Fire!” over the P.A. system, the manager calmly asks for Mr. Sand.

The schematismus makes for one of the more enjoyable figures. There’s an old legend about schematisms in Pidgin, a potpourri of dialects spoken in the English colonies. The pidgin for elevator was “room go up belly down.” For piano it was “big black box hit him in teeth he cries.” Or so Figaro heard.

We just pity anyone actually named Sand who wishes to become a ticket inspector.

Snappy Answer: “And would everyone else please run screaming from the building.”