Centuries ago, Aristotle laid out three forms of persuasive proof: ethos, pathos, and logos. These three, he reasoned, could contain any form of persuasive argument. Ethos, or proof via character, was only marginally referenced in Bush's speech. When speaking about the possibility of full war, Bush attempted to portray himself as one whose deep care for the American people would only let him put them in harm's way as a very last resort. He said, ``I hug the mothers and the widows of those who may have lost their life in the name of peace and freedom. I take my responsibilities incredibly seriously about the commitment of troops'' (Bush). Though this is also an appeal to emotions, primarily it serves to craft a public image of Bush's character as one who would never unreasonably bring risk to his troops.
Emotional appeals, or appeals to pathos, do figure heavily into Bush's speech. Its language is filled with rhetorical choices designed to bring an emotional response in the listener. He starts this appeal immediately in his introduction, referencing the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. For many Americans this event stirs up deep patriotism and anger at those who attacked our country, therefore its use at such an early point in the speech was intended to bring out those emotions and allow them to color the listener's response to the rest of what Bush has to say. Bush similarly ended his speech with an emotional appeal, selling the listener on their obligations to extend American ideals of liberty worldwide. He challenged, ``As I said in my State of the Union, liberty is not America's gift to the world. Liberty is God's gift to every human being in the world'' (Bush). This appeal plays on the emotional connection Americans feel to the ideograph of liberty, and also attempts to extend that connection to liberty worldwide.
This extension also carries with it a smaller appeal to logos, or to logic. In that particular statement Bush attempts to draw the listener to the logical connection that since liberty is a universal concept, not an American one, we as a nation are beholden to do our part to make sure it is available to everyone. Bush's speech also contained elements of logos in the way it clearly laid out his goals for a possible war. He set out a problem - Saddam Hussein and his treatment of the Iraqi people - and then laid out objectives for an American attack - disarming Hussein and bringing liberty and aid to his people.
The advancement of liberty is a fundamental aspect of Bush's appeal, and yet it's a much more nebulous concept than other objectives such as disarmament and aid. Other terms used in the speech, such as ``threat,'' have the same consistency. Michael Calvin McGee, in his article ``The 'Ideograph': A Link Between Rhetoric and Ideology,'' calls concepts like these ideographs. These, he says, are words that ``signify and 'contain' a unique ideological commitment'' (McGee 445). The concepts they contain are not physical, instead they acquire meaning from their usage. As McGee says, ``No one has ever seen an 'equality' strutting up the driveway, so, if 'equality' exists at all, it has meaning through its specific applications'' (448). The listener understands the usage of these ideographs because they have been trained to understand them, not because the terms have any special meaning of their own.
The concept of what is meant when one uses the term ``liberty,'' as Bush did in his speech, is something that has been under refinement for hundreds of years. For Americans, the usage of the term particularly dates back to the Revolutionary War, and the struggle for independence. When Bush says that ``Liberty is God's gift to every human being in the world,'' the listener is called upon to insert all of the ideas that make up liberty in their minds (Bush). The idea of liberty is not a singular concept, instead it is an agglomerate for a multitude of smaller, more physical, conceptions. McGee says that when an ideograph is used, it forces the listeners ``to make reference to its history by detailing the situations for which the word has been an appropriate description. Then, by comparisons over time, [they] establish an analog for the proposed present usage of the term'' (448). Through the use of the ideograph, the listener is encouraged to make the logical connection that Hussein's oppression is similar to English oppression of Americans at the time of the revolution. Given these analogous situations, therefore, the role of America in Iraq is to facilitate the Iraqi people's natural desire for the same freedoms Americans strove for at that time. The ideograph of liberty connects everything together and provides a justification for Bush's proposed action.
The other justification Bush proposes is the impending ``threat'' posed by Iraq. Since Hussein values none of the American ideals, he is a danger to attack America or countries that share its values. Bush emphasizes, ``Saddam Hussein is a threat. He's a threat to the United States of America. He's a threat to some of our closest friends and allies. We don't accept this threat'' (Bush). Though threat can have a physical meaning in certain situations, in this case threat is explained much better as an ideograph. Bush builds to the collective meaning of the word by situating the attacks of September 11 as a threat that was not forseen. His use of the term threat later when describing Hussein is then strengthened, because the pool of situations for which the word carries a description is enlarged, and the ideograph is thus made richer. This example illustrates McGee's contention that ideographs are never rigid, and that their meanings instead change with time. For instance, before September 11 talk of a ``threat to the United States'' might have conjured up an image of an attack on American interests abroad, perhaps on a ship or a foreign embassy. In the 1980's, the term might even have brought to mind images of Soviet missiles pointed at America, waiting to launch nuclear devastation. Now, however, a threat is perceived as something different, something smaller and closer to home. Protecting our nation from threat has taken on an entirely different appearance. Now instead of a military arms race to stop the advances of the Soviet Union, protection from threat entails reducing certain freedoms in the name of homeland security. The focus of American efforts has shifted to taking care of potential risks overseas before they can come to our shores and do their damage.
With each change in the composition of the ideographs used to shape our policy, the face of American ideology changes as well. Values and priorities change and realign. American ideographs do not function independently, instead they coalesce to form the whole of our political ideology. McGee explains that, ``An ideograph ... is always understood in its relation to another; it is defined tautologically by using other terms in its cluster'' (451). When Bush says that liberty is a gift to the world, he is in turn extending with it a multitude of other ideographs by which the ideas of liberty are defined. Threat itself is tied to liberty in its opposition. The idea of threat in the sense of the ideograph Bush called upon is not so much a physical danger to each individual. Instead a threat is a danger to the American ideology. Bush is portraying Hussein as a threat to freedom, to liberty, and to all the other ideas that America stands for.
The concepts of ideographs and Aristotle's forms of persuasive proof hail from very disparate eras. Yet, together they provide the framework for a very modern argument. Aristotle's forms provide a vehicle for the conveyance of argument. They provide a very sound perspective on how the human mind understands what it is receiving. The ideographs then in turn provide a term that can be used to communicate an entire body of shared meaning. Only together can they adequately convey the messages contained in a political speech such as the one Bush gave. The American political ideology is too rich and complicated a concept to be conveyed without the use of all the tools available.