Not too long after I started working at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, an editor sent a terse note about a column I’d written on voting reforms. “Don’t use the word ‘reform,’” he wrote.
That’s weird, I thought. What else would I call it? But read or listen closely, and you’re unlikely to see the word “reform” in much of the AJC’s politics coverage. Tort reform isn’t “tort reform.” Education reform isn’t “education reform.” And health care reform most definitely isn’t “health care reform.”
There’s a reason behind the “reform” phobia for journalists, though, and it isn’t about grammar or being politically correct. Instead, it’s through years of experience watching lawmakers and politicians propose changes to a current system and trying to tell you, even without telling you, that it will be better for you in the end.
“Reforming” something literally means improving it for the better or rebuilding it. And what could be bad about that? Absolutely nothing, and that’s why reform is probably not the right word for most policy proposals, since nearly all changes result in winners and losers. Before you know which one you are, calling a proposal a reform is just doing the work for the politician trying to convince you it’s a good thing.
The biggest reform going at the Georgia Capitol right now is Gov. Brian Kemp’s “tort reform” proposal. But you won’t read about “tort reform” in the AJC. Instead you’ll read about Kemp’s proposed “litigation overhaul,” or “proposed lawsuit limits.”
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
The people pushing for the package are the ones most likely to benefit in the long run, namely business owners, hospitals, retailers and insurance companies. The potential losers, depending on which version of the bill gets passed, could be plaintiffs attorneys and, in some cases, the people who hire them. Getting those “reforms” to balance out for regular Georgians will be the key to the debate this year. But is it a change for the better? You’ll be the judge.
Recent political history, especially the kind with speechwriters and consultants, is full of examples of “reforms” proposed in Washington that may or may not have turned out to be change for the better.
President George W. Bush was a big “reformer.” After sweeping into office promising to be a “compassionate conservative,” Bush laid out his plans for tax reform, Social Security reform, welfare reform, tort reform and education reform, all in a single speech.
Bush came after President Bill Clinton’s era of government reform, including campaign finance reform. Clinton also had his own version of welfare reform, which was entirely different from Bush’s welfare reform. Are you seeing the problem?
Fast forward to the 2008 presidential campaign, and you’ll see Democrats debating among themselves about what “health care reform” means. Then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton argued health care reform should require every American to have health insurance, while Sen. Barack Obama’s plan was meant to make health insurance available and affordable, but not required.
Credit: Joe Marquette
Credit: Joe Marquette
Obama won, of course, and it took two more years and multiple versions of the legislation, for the Democrats’ “health care reforms” to pass. Years later, when Republicans promised health care reforms of their own, they mostly meant they’d repeal the reforms the Democrats had just enacted.
Like Bush, President Joe Biden was big into the idea of reforming things, too. Earlier in his Senate career, Biden championed criminal justice reforms under the 1994 Crime Bill, which significantly toughened penalties for drug offenses. Later, as president, Biden’s revamped “criminal justice reforms” proposed to do just the opposite.
During his four years in office, Biden also proposed a new round of Social Security reform, ethics reforms for the Supreme Court, gun safety reforms, tax reform and comprehensive immigration reform. Biden also had a fondness for “commissions,” and proposed several to study possible reforms.
One politician who rarely uses the word “reform” is President Donald Trump, and it’s instructive to see not just why he doesn’t talk about reforms — but also how that’s worked out for him.
“Reforming” something would mean that Trump was planning to change the current government systems in America for the better. But as we’ve learned, especially in the last two weeks, Trump isn’t in office to change the system. He’s there, by his own description, to destroy it. And that’s exactly what his most devoted base of supporters sent him to do.
Trump never used the word “reform” in his convention speech over the summer, nor in his inaugural address last month. He spoke for an hour and a half at his September rally in Savannah, for example, and never promised to reform anything.
Instead of tax reform and energy reform, he told his rally, “We’re sitting on trillions and trillions of dollars under our feet. Let’s use that to make America rich again. Is that OK? We’ll pay off the debt. We’ll reduce your taxes. It’ll be a beautiful thing.”
And instead of talking about “immigration reform” this fall in Gwinnett County, he said this: “We will stop illegal immigration once and for all. It will be ended. We will not be invaded. We will not be occupied, we will not be conquered.”
Much of what Trump said during the campaign was exaggerated. Some of it was untrue. A lot even offended people, who voted for him anyway because they felt like they knew what they were getting with another four years of Trump.
If there’s any reform we could all get behind, it should probably be ditching the word “reform,” because it turns out that the one politician who never says “reform” is the same one in the process of changing almost everything.
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