Watching this interview on Newsnight this week, you couldn’t help but feel that there was a bet on at Conservative HQ as to how many times David Cameron could shoehorn the words ‘fixing a broken society‘ into one sentence. Aside from the political content of what is being said and whether it really means anything, I thought it worth mentioning as it smacks of the mannered word manipulation of Frank Luntz, the famous US pollster and focus group facilitator, (he of the Death tax / Inheritance tax mindshift), who conducts sample tests to find out which phrase or combinations of words get the most voters the most excited. He then trains the politicians to use and incorporate these brand slogans into everything they do and say, till we achieve the aural equivalent of “Fixing a Broken Society TM” and they are deemed to ‘own’ the idea, irrespective of content or discernable action. Just something to think about when listening to any of them saying anything.