Never Disliked Death Panel

Let me just state for the record that I never found anything offensive about the use of the phrase "death panel". The Left has embraced "framing" for years but has only recently given credence to the term through the work of a strident liberal professor from Berkeley by the name of George Lakoff. Lakoff has written for at least a decade about how Liberals must use language to win battles and that language can be used to manipulate public opinion. Well, what Sarah Palin did is no more than to use the same tactics against the Left and that's why they seethe.

Update: Steyn weighs in on a little controversy over at NRO with regard to the phrase and the concept:

And finally I don't think this is any time for NR to be joining the Frumsters and deploring the halfwit vulgarity of déclassé immoderates like Palin. This is a big-stakes battle: If we cross this bridge, there's no going back. Being "moderate" is not a good strategy. It risks delivering the nation to the usual reach-across-the-aisle compromise that will get Democrats far enough across the bridge that the Big Government ratchet effect will do the rest.