Do The Dems Project “An Aura Of Fiscal Responsibility”?

David M. Herszenhorn and Robert Pear, writing of course in the New York Times, seem to think so. My favorite sentence from their Thursday, Oct. 15, article, discussing the Dems recent proposal to spend an additional $240 billion to shield doctors from cuts in Medicare that, er, the same Dems are proposing elsewhere.You can relish this contradiction on your own time, since it’s not my concern here. The following peach of a sentence by Pear and Herszenhorn is. [Emphasis added]

The Medicare bill has support from doctors, who are potentially crucial allies in the Democrats’ effort to overhaul the health care system. But the bill could shatter the aura of fiscal responsibility that Senate Democrats have worked to create in writing their broader health care legislation.

I think that aura is delicious. Does it mean that the Democrats have tried actually to be fiscally responsible, or only to project an aura of responsibility? Turns out that, according to the Oxford American Dictionary built into my Macbook’s operating system, Pear and Herszenhorn may have chosen precisely the right word:

aura

noun. the distinctive atmosphere or quality that seems to surround and be generated by a person, thing, or place….

  • a supposed emanation surrounding the body of a living creature, viewed by mystics, spiritualists, and some practitioners of complementary medicine as the essence of the individual, and allegedly discernible by people with special sensibilities.
  • any invisible emanation, esp. a scent or odor….
  • Medicine ( pl. also aurae |ˈôrē|) a warning sensation experienced before an attack of epilepsy or migraine

Seems to surround (but maybe it doesn’t?). Not even necessarily an emanation, but a supposed or even invisible emanation, and one that apparently can only be seen, or understood, by mystics, spiritualists, and others with “special sensibilities.”

I’d say that sums up the fiscal responsibility of the Democrats, and those who claim to see it, pretty well.

Say What?