The Pledge to America and Contract With America as Word Clouds

(Sept. 23) -- The GOP unveiled a new "Contract with America," sorry, scratch that, "Pledge to America," today, attempting to articulate to voters what Republicans would do differently, specifically, if they were in charge of Congress.

Of course, the new document was designed to echo Newt Gingrich's seminal 1994 document, "The Contract with America," which is widely credited with helping usher in a 12-year Republican Congressional majority.

Although Republicans were already favored to make big gains when voters go to the polls for the midterm elections on November 2, it is unclear how much following the model of '94 will really boost them this time. Like many sequels, the "Pledge to America," doesn't seem to have been as well-received as its predecessor, despite attempts to appeal to this decade's hot new conservative constituency, the tea party.

In fact, in the first day of its release, some of the strongest critiques have actually come from conservative writers and pundits, who point out that there aren't any particularly groundbreaking, or even new ideas in the new "Pledge," which was drafted by several national Republican figures, most nominally Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).

Here at Surge Desk, we wanted to see just how closely the two documents lined up in terms of overall content and messaging. So what better way to do that than employ that eminently Web-friendly graphic, the word cloud, which presents the most-oft used terms in any passage of text sized according to their relative recurrence. Anyone can make for themselves at Wordle. Hat-tip: Firedoglake.

First up, the 1994 "Contract with America":