It's 'common sense' – or is it? The politics of Obama's new favorite phrase.

“Political figures say something is ‘just common sense’ when they want to imply that it's obvious to anyone whose thinking isn't fogged by ideology or strained by excessive cleverness,” says Geoffrey Nunberg, a linguist at the University of California, Berkeley's School of Information.

“Both right and left have appealed to ‘common sense’ over the years, but in politics the fact that you feel obliged to invoke ‘common sense’ usually means that the views aren't common to everyone,” Mr. Nunberg adds. “It's like saying that an issue is ‘not political,’ which more or less guarantees that it is."

On a practical level, by framing his ideas as “common sense,” Obama is trying to get the public to take action.

“It’s clearly an effort to capture the center, the independents, and moderate voters who did vote for him in the election, or at least a majority of them,” says Martin Medhurst, a professor of rhetoric and political science at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. “I’m sure [Obama] hopes they will put pressure on their elected representatives and somehow conjure a majority on his proposals.”

Indeed, as part of his argument for reform on both guns and immigration, Obama often mentions opinion polls that he says support his positions. Many polls show majority public support for the major elements of his gun legislation – a renewed ban on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, and background checks on all gun buyers.  

But anybody who has followed the debate over guns knows that the matter is far from settled. Obama’s other rhetorical turn – referring to “gun violence measures” and not “gun control” – shows how mindful he is being of his word choices on a delicate issue. To some gun-rights advocates, “gun control” can signal the beginning of a slippery slope to confiscation.

Still, Republicans aren’t too worried that the Second Amendment is about to bite the dust. Even Vice President Joe Biden, who chaired Obama’s task force on gun violence following the Dec. 14 school massacre in Newtown, Conn., played down the proposed ban on assault weapons, saying he thinks access to high-capacity magazines is of greater concern. After all, most gun deaths in the US are caused by hand guns, not assault weapons. 

Political analysts say the proposed ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines doesn’t have the votes in Congress and that the most Obama will get is expanded background checks.

But Obama’s use of open-ended rhetoric “could be a big problem for Republicans down the line,” when deficit reduction and defense spending come back to the fore, says Republican strategist Ford O’Connell. “Like the phrase ‘paying your fair share.’ I can see the expressions on people’s faces, they think he’s being reasonable. Same with ‘common sense.’ Everyone places their own meaning on it.”

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