Do you have the time?

When someone asks the author of Slate‘s Kerryisms “Do you have the time?,” does he just say “Yes” and walk on? If someone else says “Yes, it’s five thirty,” does the author condemn the “it’s five thirty” as a “caveat” or “embellishment”?

That’s what it looks like if you read the most recent Kerryism. Larry King asked John Kerry, “Is abortion a great moral issue to you?” Do you think that this was a question that called for a literal yes-or-no answer? Or do you think that the way normal people speak, such a question is usually an invitation for the candidate to explain his moral views about abortion? John Kerry apparently chose the latter interpretation:

Sure it is. Absolutely. And I think it’s far more complicated than public life allows the discussion for. I mean, being for choice does not mean you are for abortion. Neither Teresa nor I are for abortion. Abortion should be rare, but safe and legal, as President Clinton said so often, and I think appropriately.

I think that it’s really a question of who should make this decision, and how do arrive at it. But there is morality. Of course there’s morality involved. And we should be talking to people in America about responsibility, about adoption, about other choices. And I want to have a better conversation than I think we’ve had on it. But it doesn’t change my position on who chooses. And I will protect that right of choice.

This may have been more verbose than necessary, but it was a sensible thing for a politician to say.

On the other hand, this is what Kerryisms gave as Kerry’s answer without “caveats and embellishments”:

Sure it is. Absolutely.

If Kerry had said that, he would have been seen either as a fool (someone who thought the question called for a yes-or-no answer) or as evasive (someone who knew the question called for an explanation of his moral stand, but who chose to duck it by pretending that the interviewer was looking for a yes-or-no answer). And if Bush had given such an answer, it would doubtless appear in Slate‘s Bushisms.

Now I’m not at all sure that the rest of Kerry’s answer could correctly be called “caveats and embellishments.” But even if it is, then this example just shows that there’s nothing funny, worthy of derision, or even particularly noteworthy about “caveats and embellishments.” In this case, they turn a nonresponsive answer into a responsive one; an answer that’s worthless to the voters into one that’s useful; an answer that’s bad politics into one that may be good politics; an answer that would seem surreal into one that expresses a plausible moral position (whether or not one thinks it’s the right one). Why then is Slate condemning them? If it wants to fault Kerry, that’s great — but fault him for something that deserves faulting. If it wants to make jokes, that’s fine, too; but where’s the joke here?

I’ve criticized Kerryisms many times in the past; maybe I’ve reached the point of diminishing returns. But it just galls me to see this sort of stuff — not substantive, not funny, just empty snideness descending into self-parody — in a magazine of Slate‘s prominence and quality.