Wordsmithing, part 4

Pa-tri-ot noun,
A person who loves, supports, and defends his country.

Vice President Cheney, in a recent interview in Japan, criticized the plans of Speaker of the House Pelosi and Rep. Murtha to place restrictions on the President's request for additional funds that would make it difficult or impossible to send 21,500 extra troops to Iraq--the now famous "surge." In response, Speaker Pelosi called the office of the President to complain. When she was only able to talk to White House chief of staff Josh Bolton, which apparently left her unsatisfied, she issued the following statement:

Vice President Cheney continues to question the patriotism of those of us in Congress who challenge the Bush Administration's misguided policies in Iraq, but his latest attack is beneath the office of the Vice President, especially at a time of war.

This is equivalent to a basketball player who, when charged, falls down and pretends injury. It's also an example of wordsmithing which the Democrats have used over the duration of the Iraqi war. I have long since lost count of the number of times and the number of people who have made the accusation against the President, the Vice President, and many others in the Republican leadership, of "questioning their patriotism" any time their calls for a pull-out from Iraq are in turn criticized. But despite this tedious litany of accusation, I have yet to see one solid example of the words "unpatriotic" or "un-American" attributed to a Democrat by anyone in the Bush administration, or even the Republican leadership.

Nothing is easier than defining someone else's motives for the sake of your argument. This is a wordsmithing tactic that has almost limitless possibilities for exploitation.