Dog Talk

A quick thought on the latest presidential gaffe.

When describing the powerful interest groups that allegedly controlled the White House, he said (off script): "They talk about me like a dog."

What does that expression even mean?

The people in the crowd seemed to get it, because they all laughed uproariously, but I don't seem to be following the expression. Maybe it's some kind of political slang of which I am ignorant.

I could understand it if he said, "They talk to me like a dog" or "They talk at me like a dog." In either of these cases, he would be suggesting that the powerful interest groups are issuing commands that they expect him to obey -- because of a modern cultural belief that dogs are symbols of obedience and submissive loyalty.

But "talk about me like a dog?"

How do people talk about dogs that makes this so negative?

"Hey, did you see that dog over there...it is sooooooo canine! What a joke!"

See, dogness as such just doesn't seem to register very high on my criticism meter.

Calling someone a dog can be pejorative ("She's such a dog" or "Hang cur! Hang whoreson, insolent noisemaker!"), but that doesn't seem to really apply here. They aren't labeling him a dog -- they are conducting conversations about him in the manner that one would conduct a conversation about a dog.

Most times I talk about my dogs, it is with fondness...although I suppose an anecdote or two might creep in about canine excretory functions. Is that what Obama is referring to? Does he have a problem with incontinence? Does that work metaphorically?

It also makes one wonder, how does the President talk about his dog?