They sometimes inform. And educate. And shape opinion.
Words do that.
I’ve never been so flummoxed — so perplexed — as by the words I’m hearing, now. Because words were everything when I was in the PR business. Publicity is built on the words in press releases, and the words spokespersons, with business firms and organizations, use when they’re talking to journalists.
Knowing this, people writing publicity carefully choose their words. For the most part, the words used in publicity — even with some occasional spin and hyperbole — communicate positive messages about products and services, a business firm’s commitment to philanthropy and other needs, and a company’s, or an organization’s, commitment to workers.
Reading Jared Kushner’s words in the media, the other day — he said that “controversy elevates message” — I was wondering if that’s really so, considering what the president, himself, and others around him, have been saying, lately, in the media.
Mr. Kushner is President Trump’s son-in-law and senior advisor.
In a Reuters story, for example, President Trump exclaimed “Stop ballot madness!”
Michael Caputo, “the top communications official at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), accused government scientists of plotting against President Trump and told Trump supporters to arm themselves ahead of the November presidential election,” according to an article in The Hill.
Attorney General William Barr said, in Politico, “Name one successful organization where the lowest level employees’ decisions are deemed sacrosanct,” apparently referring to career public servants in the Justice Department that Mr. Barr currently heads.
During a recent White House press briefing, “CNN’s Kaitlan Collins pointed out that three top healthcare officials in the Trump administration said during testimony before a Senate committee that they were unaware of Trump’s Obamacare replacement plan,” according to an article in Business Insider. “So who is it that is working on the healthcare plan that’s going to be introduced before the election,” Collins asked White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany.
And McEnany replied… “I’m not going to give you a readout of what our healthcare plan looks like and who’s working on it. If you want to know, come work here at the White House.”
If “controversy elevates message,” as Mr. Kushner suggests, what do recent comments like these — by the president, the top communications official at HHS, the attorney general, and the White House press secretary — what do they do?
Rather than elevating messages, do they have the opposite effect? The word — depress — is an antonym for the word — elevate.
Harvey Radin is former senior vice president in charge of corporate communications and media relations, Bank of America Western Region. He makes his home in Redwood City, CA.