Quote Abuse

My brother, always one to broaden my political horizons, brought this Michael Gerson column in the Washington Post to my notice because he thinks Gerson correctly identifies Obama's problem: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/18/AR2010101803778.html?nav=hcmodule

Gerson quotes Obama, and then unpacks the quote. Here is the quotation and context:

"Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now," he recently told a group of Democratic donors in Massachusetts, "and facts and science and argument [do] not seem to be winning the day all the time is because we're hard-wired not to always think clearly when we're scared. And the country is scared."

I took issue with Gerson (and my brother) because Gerson goes on to create an argument entirely based on "us" and "them": Obama is a "neocortical" snob out of touch with everyone else and dismissing the general population as "reptilian." Gerson takes two sentences from Obama's mouth and imbues them with horrendous meaning that Obama could not possibly have intended. This is a classic case of quote abuse.