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Dumbing Down Political Speech


May 22, 2012 by

Pretty much everyone notices that political speech has become more bitterly partisan in recent years. Now a study finds that speechifying by our leaders in D. C. has also been dumbing down, nearly a full grade level since just seven years ago.

Measured by the Flesch-Kincaid test, congressional oratory has dropped from an 11.5 grade level on average to a 10.6 grade level. This compares to the U. S. Constitution’s ranking of 17.8 and the Declaration of Independence’s ranking of 15.1.

Is there a partisan take on all this? Well, yes and no. All 10 of the lowest ranking orators are Republicans. But, 8 of the top 10 highest ranking orators are also Republicans.

Where does President Obama rank? Go read another article if you’re an Obama fan. The President, regaled by so many for his intelligence, gives State of the Union addresses that barely rise to an 8th grade level, among the lowest rankings in the 70 years of orally delivered State of the Union addresses.

Here are the results found by the Sunlight Foundation in its study.

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5 Comments

  1. RP
    May 22, 2012 | 11:53 am

    Is anyone surprised? Just listen to anyone of them. Intellegence is not required to be a political leader. Money is.

  2. RP
    May 22, 2012 | 11:53 am

    Is anyone surprised. Intellegence is not required to be a political leader. Money is.

  3. slamfu
    May 22, 2012 | 2:48 pm

    People respond better when its dumbed down. Like most things, people get what works. We WANT $.99 double cheeseburgers that clog our arteries and cause massive obesity. If we wanted bean sprouts and salads for $.99 THAT’S what would be on the value menu at a fast food restaurant. But it’s not. Who we vote for and why is the grand mirror held up to the electorate. Which is why I am so horrified all the time whenever I look at our leaders.

  4. davidpsummers
    May 22, 2012 | 5:45 pm

    I live in California and more often hear the Democratic side of the political “discourse”. Ironically, the way I compensate for this is not to assume this will lead me to bias my thinking toward the Democrats, but to make sure that being more exposed to the dumb things from their side doesn’t push me the other way.

    It is easy to assume that such a dumbing down is a deliberate marketing decisions. However, politics these days is heavily dominated by name calling and vilification as part of an endless partisan war between two “sides”, which is a fundamentally shallow exercise.

    For example, we don’t debate issue like whether is it better to let struggling business fail in the hope that the money will be invested in a new more vigorous business that will help the economy more. Instead we argue about whether Romney wants to let people destroy our jobs.

  5. zephyr
    May 22, 2012 | 7:38 pm

    Dumbed down speech is bad enough, but dumbed down policy is worse. I guess it’s all part and parcel of our current celebration of low standards.