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Where's the Movement?
In forming his administration, President Obama abandoned the movement that had begun during his campaign for deal-making and a pragmatism that hasn't worked. That movement is still possible and needed now. Here is look at what is required, and how a version of it is forming in California.
We begin with this week's triple whammy.
Freedom vs. The Public Option
Which would you prefer, consumer choice or freedom? Extended coverage or freedom? Bending the cost curve or freedom?
John Boehner, House Minority Leader, speaking of health care, said recently, "This bill is the greatest threat to freedom that I have seen in the 19 years I have been here in Washington. . . It's going to lead to a government takeover of our health care system, with tens of thousands of new bureaucrats right down the street, making these decisions [choose your doctor, buy your own health insurance] for you."
This is exactly what Frank Luntz advised conservatives to say. They have repeated it and repeated it. Why has it worked to rally conservative populists against their interests? The most effective framing is more than mere language, more than spin or salesmanship. It has worked because conservatives really believe that the issue is freedom. It fits the conservative moral system. It fits how conservatives see the world.
The Democrats have helped the conservatives. Their pathetic attempt to make any deal to get 60 votes convinced even Massachusetts voters that government under the Democrats was corrupt and oppressive, not just inept, but immoral.
All politics is moral
All political leaders argue that they are doing the right thing, not the wrong thing, that their policies are moral, not evil.
Conservatives understand this, liberals tend not to. Conservatives know a morality tale when they see it: Greedy Wall Street bankers, who have cost people their homes, their jobs, and their savings get billion-dollar bailouts from the government, while those honest hard-working people get nothing. Corruption. Oppression. A threat to freedom.
The conservatives are winning the framing wars again - by sticking to moral principles as conservatives see them, and communicating their view of morality effectively. In the 2008 election, Barack Obama ran a campaign based on his moral principles and communicated those principles as effectively as any candidate ever has.
But the Obama administration made a 180-degree turn, trading Obama's 2008 moral principles for the deal-making of Rahm Emanuel and Tim Geithner, assuming it would be 'pragmatic' to court corporations and move to the right, in the false hope of bipartisan support. A clear unified moral vision was replaced by long laundry lists of policy options that the public could not understand, and that made ordinary folks feel they were being bamboozled. And in many cases, they were.
Even the language was a disaster. Liberals thought that conservatives would like consumer choice. That's why they used "public option." As Harry Reid said, "It's public and it's an option - a public option." But what did a conservative hear in the words "public option?" Say "public" and he hears "government." "Option" is a policy-wonk term, from the language of bureaucracy. Say "public option" and the conservative hears "government bureaucracy."
The results of deal-making in the name of pragmatism have been considerably immoral, as documented thoroughly by progressives like Drew Westen, Matt Taibbi, Robert Kuttner, and many others. Advice on what to do instead has not been lacking from other progressives. Advice is all over the blogs. Guy Saperstein is an excellent example.
We progressives are long on factual analysis, critique, suggestion - and ridicule. Rachel Maddow is one of the best, and her popularity is well-deserved. What's more fun than ridiculing Tea Party-ers, Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and the like, by showing the factual errors, the flaws in their logic, and the cruelty of their positions.
But we have been dealt a triple blow. A year of failed deal-making by our side, the Tea Party win in Massachusetts, and worst of all, the 5-4 Supreme Court decision to turn our democracy into a corporate plutocracy. This is serious.
Democrats still have the presidency and a majority in the House and Senate, but the momentum is on the conservative side. Their victories in the framing wars have inevitably led to a crucial electoral victory and to a Supreme Court death threat to democracy itself, framed as free speech.
Democrats have electoral power, but progressives have not created an effective movement to take advantage of that power.
"Where's the movement?"
In the emerging Obama mythology, this is the question attributed to President Obama whenever he is asked to take the lead on a progressive issue. It is not an idle question. Leaders can only lead if there is a pre-existing movement for them to get in front of.
Moreover, there are other conditions. The idea behind a movement, and the language expressing its goals, must also pre-exist in public discourse. In other words, the movement must already have:
- a popular base;
- organizing tools;
- a generally accepted morally-based conceptual framing;
- an overall narrative, with heroes, victims, and villains;
- a readily recognizable, well-understood language;
- funding sources;
- and a national communication system set up for both leaders and ordinary citizens to use.
The base is there, waiting for something worth getting behind. The organizing tools are there. The rest is not there.
That is the present reality. Expecting Obama to be FDR was politically unrealistic. And complaining that he isn't doesn't move anything forward.
Howard Dean was right when he said, "YOU have the power." What is needed is an organized activist public with a positive understanding of what our values are and how to links them to every issue. Barney Frank was only half-right when he said that the public gets active only when it is angry. That may be true for isolated issues - he was talking about regulating Wall Street. But anger is directed at isolated negatives. An effective movement must be positive, organized, and long-term, where an overall positive understanding defines the isolated negatives. And it must have all of the above.
The California Democracy Movement
We have the beginning of such a movement in California.
The central issue in California is basic democracy. California is the only state in America where the legislature is controlled by a relatively small conservative minority. Because it takes a 2/3 vote in both the Senate and Assembly to pass a budget or any tax, 1/3 plus one - 34% - in either house can control the vote by saying no to measures that would finance public needs.
Conservatives exercise that control for the simple reason that they don't believe that government should serve public needs, that instead government should be privatized and shrunk to fit in a bathtub, as if governing would disappear with government.
But governing doesn't disappear when government shrinks; instead corporations come to govern your life - like HMO's, oil companies, drug companies, agribusiness, and so on, with accountability only to maximizing profit, not to public needs.
An overwhelming majority of Californians - over 60% - disagree. They believe that government should serve public needs, and they have elected sensible legislators. But they don't quite make up 2/3. And so an extreme right-wing minority - about 37% - controls the state, its present and its future.
Luckily, there is a way out for the majority in California. The initiative process that created this situation can get us out. I have proposed The California Democracy Act as an initiative in the November 2010 election. It changes two words in the California Constitution - "two-thirds" becomes "a majority" in two places. It can be described in one simple sentence: All legislative actions on revenue and budget must be determined by a majority vote. That ballot initiative needs only a majority to pass. It would return majority rule to the legislature on everyday economic issues, bringing democracy back to California. Those interested can join the campaign by clicking on www.CaliforniansForDemocracy.com
Democracy is the central issue, and that is what our movement is about. We are setting up an infrastructure in California, with a statewide organization and a speakers' bureau, for those who want to continue democratizing the state after the election.
Democracy is The Issue
The majority vote campaign gives us a chance to talk not only about this particular issue, but about democracy as it affects all issues. The clearest articulator of what democracy is about has been Barack Obama - the campaigner we cheered for, campaigned hard for, and voted for.
Democracy, he has observed, is based on empathy - on citizens caring about one another. That's why we have principles like freedom and fairness, for everybody, not just for the rich and powerful. True empathy requires responsibility, not just for oneself, but also for others. And since we, as individuals and as a nation, are far from perfect, empathy demands an ethic of excellence, of making oneself better, one's family and community better, and one's nation better.
That view of citizenship in a democracy comes with a view of government. Government has two sacred moral missions: protection and empowerment.
Protection goes well beyond police and the military and the fire department to consumer protection, environmental protection, worker protection, health care, investor protection, social security, and other safety nets.
Empowerment is what the stimulus package was about: building and maintaining roads, bridges, public transportation, and public buildings; systems for communication, electricity, water; education, from pre-school through graduate and professional schools; scientific research and technological development; a banking system that works; a stock market that works; and a judicial system that works.
No one earns a living or lives well without protection and empowerment by the government. That is what taxes pay for. And the more you make from what the government gives you, the more you should contribute to keeping it going
Tax Shifts
When you cut taxes that pay for public needs, you are actually shifting taxes. You are taxing others. In California tax cuts for corporations last year led to cuts in the support for public universities, which led to 32% higher tuition and a drastic cut in the number of students educated. That 32% constituted a tax on those students and their parents, and when they had to borrow the money for college, interest payments on the loan effectively double the cost of the loan. That's a very high tax shift. But an even higher tax is shifted onto students who cannot afford the higher tuition: the tax of a lost education lasts all one's life and its cost is not only monetary, but a cost in human potential. It is also a cost to employers, who get less educated workers, and to society, which gets less educated citizens.
The Movement
We will be talking about all of this and more. Take economic democracy. California is the world's seventh richest economy. It is ludicrous to say that there is no money in California. If the money for public needs is there, where is it? In California, the richest one percent owns more assets than the bottom 95 per cent. The money is concentrated at the top.
Just about every issue comes down to the issue of democracy. That is why we are starting with the California Democracy Act, which would finally end the rule of the state by a small minority of ultra-conservative legislators. It would finally give the voters of the state a voice in their own future and the future of their children and grandchildren.
If you live in California (one out of eight Americans does), then join the California Democracy Movement. If you live elsewhere, form your own democracy movement and unite with us. The principles are simple, and they are Obama's:
Democracy is about empathy - caring about your fellow citizens, which leads to the principles of freedom and fairness for all. Empathy requires both personal and social responsibility. The ethic of excellence means making the world better by making yourself better, your family better, your community better, and your nation better. Government has two moral missions: protection and empowerment for all. To carry them out, government must be by, for, and of the people.
It's only a paragraph. The principles apply to all issues. That's the basis of a democracy movement. That's what separates a movement from a coalition. Coalitions are based on interests. Movements are based on principles. We need a movement that transcends interests and goes beyond coalitions.
Movements also transcend particular policies. The framing of moral principles comes first and the policies elaborate on the principles. The way to unite a movement is to form policies that carry out the principles in ways that everyone can understand.
The time is now
We have a triple disaster on our hands: the administration's failure at deal-making in the name of pragmatism and bipartisanship; the Tea Party victory in Massachusetts fueling and propelling ultra-conservatism; and the anti-democratic 5-4 ruling of the Roberts Court. We can no longer sit on our hands and just criticize the President, or give him advice and hope he can do it alone. We have to provide the answer to his question: Where's the movement?
- Posted in
100 Comments so far
Show AllWhere is the movement is indeed the crux of the article. George will lambasted as an Obama apologists, which he actually is not, except to use Obama's own words and still holds some faith the man might have meant them when he said them.
Maybe he did and then became a stooge of the corporate "plutocracy" by listening to all those Clinton-era advisors. Just maybe.
Or maybe he's as cynical a bastard as many here have STRONGLY suggested.
Then it would be extra sweet to take his own words and use them against the SOB.
Let's see, that list of requirements for a movement were:
1) a popular base;
2) organizing tools;
3) a generally accepted morally-based conceptual framing;
4) an overall narrative, with heroes, victims, and villains;
5) a readily recognizable, well-understood language;
6) funding sources;
7) and a national communication system set up for both leaders and ordinary citizens to use.
I think the mess in Washington is breeding number 1 for us. Several sites have been posted for organizing tools, please repeat them here for number 2. Number 3 and number 4 requires some work and s sense of place and history. Number 5 will be a problem for some posters whose language is either very dense and hard to follow and some of us take off into the atmosphere at times. And for number 6, I have no idea outside the Dean approach. Number 7 has the idea of low-power local FM radio stations to circumvent the Fawning Corporate Media as a start.
Come on, stop wasting time and energy (and bandwidth) on Obama-bashing fun and get serious here. Our country needs us, we need our country back.
Gary
"Information is the currency of democracy."
-- Thomas Jefferson
During the Great Depression millions of desperate Americans camped out in Washington DC until the electeds took meaningful action.
Obama, Congress and the Federal Reserve will keep printing money, food stamps, unemployment checks and whatever else it takes to keep Americans from getting in the politicians' faces.
The two million people who showed up in DC on that frigid 1/20/09 for the Obama inaguration need to return to DC and get in the faces of the electeds.
Yesterday I observed a new convergence of "Activists" that cover all the points except funding; though one of the Preachers did a hocus pocus during the Offertory that put the Congregation in a Giving Mood; including $200 from the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, so you decide if you want to or need to join up with them or do my usual and just sit back and watch.
Of course these are unusual times as the main writer states, so people are doing or suggesting unusual acts, as the Reverend Jesse Jackson did in his call to the other Pastors in the audience for planning some form of arrest provoking Civil Disobedience or the orchestration of some form of Boycott. What was also unusual to the activities of the Congregation was: this mixing of Baptist (the political root of the City of Detroit) with the main activist church (Inclusive Methodist), with connections to the US Social Forum Church and State (rep. Catholic), and intra-city aspects of Jackson's Rainbow Coalition.
One of the unusual shout outs was for the energy of the meeting to be in part focused on a "Church Voice" during the up coming US Social Forum in Detroit (6/21-23?). Though the main shout out which I seem to see as being less unusual, with Haiti and such, is there main shouts for Jobs, Moratorium on Foreclosures, and a Moratorium on Heat, Water, and Electrical Shut-offs (all year, but especially during the winter months); Conyers supposedly pledged or sponsored the action to go to the Governor and convince her she has the legal power to call an Economic Emergency where Moratoriums could be issued.
I've been thinking of the camp out for awhile too, and PBS has been showing video of them recently. Remembering that the Reverend Wendell Anthony reported that 50,000 people showed up for 3,000 or so grants; something also new to the convergence of Activists was the sponsorship of the event, if not auspicious appearance, by the NAACP. Point being: from now to the end of June is plenty of time to start co-coordinating a major shout out for a camp out at the US Social Forum, planning a DC Encampment for later that summer, which could include July 4.
Jackson was the only one to bring up Stopping The War, which was part of his introductory riff, but if the money being put up for Haiti and the returns that provides, gets put up against the impending $35 billion Supplemental War Spending Bill, with all the furor going on about the Bankers bailout and the returns and profits there...well, it only took, as well placed as it was, one arrow to bring down Smaug and turn the tide of battle, and one swing of a broken sword in the hand of a Human to cut loose the Ring of Power...and who knows where we are on the trail, but when the Ring was dissolved, so was it's hold of Evil throughout the land...(someone out there remembers the scene!)...surely one day the insanity of spending $600 billion plus $50-100 billion supplement per year on War, and the return it is providing, will held in a clear light of day, and measured against the spending that was/is done regarding Katrina and the spending that was/is done in regard to Haiti...as well as the long forgotten American Ghetto.
Surly one day this consideration must reach the Mass Consciousness of America...how can this day be sooner rather than later?
I'll second that, Gary.
This is being posted at Buzzflash now, too.
http://www.buzzflash.net/shakeit.php
I had one this morning.
I did really appreciate one point Lakoff made:
"But governing doesn't disappear when government shrinks; instead corporations come to govern your life - like HMO's, oil companies, drug companies, agribusiness, and so on, with accountability only to maximizing profit, not to public needs."
It has mystified me for years how conservative sophists have managed to convince so many of the little people that reduction in government power automatically leads to a proportional increase in their own power over their lives. That goes against all evidence and depends on magical thinking. As Lakoff states, the power vacuum is immediately filled by elite economic actors, and that was the whole point of gutting the government in the first place! The strategy works by repeatedly stressing that the government is THE limit on an individual's freedom and power, and neglecting to mention that every single private individual or entity can potentially limit every other individual or entity, and private interests can sometimes exert more power and control over an individual's life than the government does. Those who are bamboozled appear to never make the connection that when this country allowed actual enslavement of human beings, private actors captured and held the slaves.
Maybe the soft-minded little people who fall for this sophistry are mesmerized by myths about pioneers and they imagine themselves in a frontier dreamworld where they are masters of their own fates and the opportunities are boundless. And the dream is so sweet and alluring they offer little resistance when being led down the path to ruin.
Sioux Rose
KIVALS: I was struck by that quote, too. You provided a very eloquent explanation for how these two powers (both with authoritarian leanings) play off each other to bamboozle the general populace. Of course if government acted as Nader intended, to checkmate the potential trespasses of the for-profit corporations, then the power dance would be better balanced and a greater variety of human interests served.
The general populace's most egregious delusion is believing that government is the only thing standing in the way of each of them becoming millionaires (or billionaires for the extremely delusional). They don't care if tax cuts only benefit the top 1% because they sure as hell don't want to be overtaxed when they join the ranks of the uber wealthy.
I'm getting tired of hearing this. The majority of Americans want a health care system with a strong public option. Read the polls. This is consistent. It's the MSM and our elected politicians who are pretending it is otherwise. There are many more polls indicating that Americans are far more progressive than the MSM would have us believe. Divide and conquer us is their goal. They want us to be against our neighbors. Suits them just fine.
And Americans do too care about tax cuts for the rich. The overwhelming majority wants the richest to pay the highest taxes, they want tax increases on the wealthiest.
Please, read the polls, talk to people, and throw away your tv (it lies).
Sioux Rose
RAY: Cuidado! So much of our perception is based on covert forms of projection. Are you sure it isn't YOU that wants the big bucks? It's true advertising has spent many kings' fortunes on procuring in persons a desire for things that are expensive, the "good" life ideal; but it's also been shown in studies that more people prefer loving relationships to wealth, and that at a certain point of ownership, happiness begins to break down (or comes to mean little, from a statistical reference point). Not all Americans suffer from "Excessive Greed Disorder," although it certainly exists in high numbers among our "elected caste."
I tend to agree with RVRWalker on this one.
"Maybe the soft-minded little people who fall for this sophistry are mesmerized by myths about pioneers and they imagine themselves in a frontier dreamworld where they are masters of their own fates and the opportunities are boundless. And the dream is so sweet and alluring they offer little resistance when being led down the path to ruin."
Very nicely stated, kivals.
That neatly sums up why the country is in the mess it's in. That frontier dreamworld, with it's anti-intellectual bias, has been promoted by all media ever since that frontier actually existed right up to this very day.
From John Wayne to Rambo to Arnold Schwarzenegger, promotion without respite of the physical, the frivolous, the bully, the crook, the rude, the crude and the stupid.
In Time Magazine's 1999 list of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century, Lucille Ball, of the 'I Love Lucy' show made the list, but Fidel Castro did not.
Is it any wonder then that G W Bush was elected not once but twice, that McCain got 40 million votes, and Obama's campaign sweet talk enchanted the millions? Considering their conditioning since birth, it'd be a wonder if millions didn't cave in to this carefully crafted mind-bending.
If progressives are ever going to make a dent politically, since we cannot make an appeal to this mentality, we must either find a way to change it or make an appeal that skirts it.
I don't think that Obama really wants healthcare for all. He is not liberal. He's a centrist at best, or center-right for that matter. The media makes him out to be this liberal that he is not.
he's more conservative than either of the republican presidencies of Eisenhower or Nixon!
a complete corporate whore... although I shouldn't disparage women of the night in such a low down- underhanded way!
Seriously, at least when whores fuck you out of your money, both sides generally have their expectations met (though I can't say that from experience!).
Jppst44, you are pointing out the crucial issue: motive. I am not completely certain you are right, but lean your direction. Where is the evidence that President Obama is a progressive, even though he has claimed to be one? I don't see much in terms of action, just words.
My hope in the president is that I believe he has a severe case of narcissism. The narcissistic framework is one where feelings of inferiority are deep-seated. And the solution to hiding these feelings from oneself is to create a fake, grandiose image, as theorist Heinz Kohut referred to it—a grandiose self.
If President Obama's psychological agenda is to be a person of greatness in the eyes of others, to be the fifth face carved into Mt. Rushmore, then when his preferred corporate, conservative, militarist agenda fails, he *may* turn from conservative (with his fake progressive veneer) to true progressive and populist policies and personnel, not because he believes in progressive policies and goals, but because he will see a progressive turn as the only way to be great, having exhausted the pro-corporate, pro-militarist, conservative, bi-partisan, traditional approach of rebranding the corporate regime.
We'll see. Personally I would like to see a movement to remove President Obama from office via a 2012 primary challenge from a credible, progressive challenger. I'm not sure who that would be. I'd love to see a primary debate between the president and Bernie Sanders, Robert Kennedy, Jr., or Keith Olbermann, or any number of other articulate, passionate progressives who have the name recognition to give him a battle. RFK challenged LBJ. It can happen.
Public opinion is there so the movement is there just waiting for someone who is NOT A COMPLETE CORPORATE SELLOUT to lead it!
Obama mobilized the movement for a while until it became clear he is just as bad as the rethugs.....
in fact he's worse.....OBAMA has destroyed the left by and large..... OBAMA promsied change and delivered CORPORATISM...
by saying there is no movement the author can at that point throw all progressives under the bus....
well the movement is there - we'll just see if it's the rethugs who grab a hold of it.....
and corporate Ameica does not want any democrat to acknowledge that the progressives are actually right in tune with the public.....
ability to buy into medicare - a majority want that....
rein in the bankers - a majority want that......
tax the wealthy( when defined as those making millions a year) a majority wants that.....
a defined manufacturing plan to bring back decent jobs..... a majority want that.....
when someone(Obomba) excites the electorate with rhetoric about ending reagan-trickle down economics then gets in and puts GOLDMAN SACHS in charge of the economy - and now the bailouts have reached over 20+ trillion(thru the FED)MORE THAN ENOUGH to pay off every residential mortgage in America.....
and offers NO HELP for the average working poor....
we know we have been shafted!
the democrats are the problem!
quit expecting them to do anything for WE THE PEOPLE - the bailouts and the last year should be clear enough for anyone who is not braindead that the demoncrats are more worried about their corporate buddies than they are about WE THE PEOPLE......
OBOMBA is the ENEMY!
until the majority of democrats come to that conclusion and begin to fight and agitate against the DLC and obomba NOTHING WILL CHANGE!
except we'll get poorer and poorer....
welcome to the new America....
and the CALI Democracy Movement words are beyond bland.....and as such is meaningless! reading that makes me want to go back to bed!
get some courage! half-steps and capulation is not something I can support any more......
instead I'd say all progressives should start showing up to the teabagger ralli with AUDIT THE FED signs - etc......get involved in the populist movement sweeping the country before it is completely controlled by the astro-turfers preying on idiocy
I respectfully disagree with
"Leaders can only lead if there is a pre-existing movement for them to get in front of."
Leaders can lead if there is a general feeling of dissatisfaction that they can harness. When President Obama was elected there was a general dissatisfaction with the economy and with health care that he harnessed. Instead of keeping the harness on those horses he took the harness off. First, with the economy with the stimulus that did not stimulate enough. Second with health care by not setting a direction forcefully enough.
Yes democracy is an important issue. But it is not the issue that motivates voters. Since the stimulus bill passed, voters will not see a democracy issue there and will blame the president and the frame will be the deficit, TARP and the Federal Reserve.
As you point out health care is so poorly framed, corruption, that voters favor minority rule no health care as opposed to corrupt health care, over democracy. Because of perception democrats take all the blame. Worse, Senators represent their states, not the country. Nelso, Landreau, (except Lieberman) have done a good job here.
The president needs to lead by reframing the issues. Ed Schulz did this brilliantly in the video at URL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aZpLHG4_g4&feature=player_embedded
Lawrence A. Welsch
lwelsch@gmail.com
When the people abrogate their power that power devolves to corporate interests. We the people are, in large majority, supporters of social programs, supporters of most liberal agendas in fact. Time and again polling data proves this fact.
Yet our politicians abandon these programs immediately after being elected , as did our current, and possibly one term, president. Through media control the electorate is deceived into believing that these so-called "teabaggers" hold a majority opinion. In fact they are a small and radical minority, easily manipulated to work against their, and our, best interests by appealing to passion rather than logic.
Mr. Lakoff asks, where is the movement, yet it is right there in front of us all. In the absence of a way to get a populist message out to the millions upon millions who are ready to join, we are deceived into thinking we are a minority. This movement recently succeeded in destroying Air America Radio by simply starving it to death while bloviated gas bags like Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity, O'Reilly et al ad nauseum wallow in huge advertising dollars all out of proportion to their shrinking audiences.
There is a movement in place, it owns the media, controls our politicians and ruins our lives. It is called fascism.
I couldn't stomach Air America Radio because it put progressive talking heads right down in the gutter with the right-wing bloviators. Why go to the gutter?
FastEddie75: I felt exactly the same way when I tried to listen to Air America.
Good questions: Why go to the gutter?
Sioux Rose
DOUBLEDEE: Excellent post. Wise words!
I was thinking about posts by Alan McDonald and whether it would be feasible to raise funds to put a big ad in a major mainstream newspaper essentially calling upon the few progressive political reps that remain entrenched in the two-party system, and essentially recruiting them to FOUND another viable party. We'd mention that the fervor is awakened, the need unmistakable.
The problem is one of cost, and since most people are constantly bombarded with tons of information, what works is the REPETITION of a message; and it's very difficult for the left to find the funds to have such access, and the funds to reproduce the necessary message again and again in a big way.
Our calling resonates with, as you said, the greater majority of Americans, but the task of assembling bodies, and drawing already established progressive luminaries together for a shared cause remains the challenge.
Perhaps Nader is right, funds must be gotten from some of the wealthy who, out of conscience, realize that their personal fortune is not a good enough reason to let the rest of the nation and lots of good people, sink.
After his performance during the student strikes at UC Berkeley last year, Lackoff revealed his true colors--the colors of a Reactionary, one absolutely not to trust or listen to anymore!!!!! http://www.counterpunch.org/maher11242009.html
Very disappointing. I've read a few of Lakoff's books, and think his more academic text, "Philosophy in the Flesh," is groundbreaking. Too bad he seems challenged to walk his talk.
karlof1 January 25th, 2010 10:39 am -- Here's "your boy" in action:
"Particularly egregious in this respect was Democratic Party “framing” strategist and self-styled movement guru George Lakoff. Visibly angered by the occupiers’ refusal to leave Wheeler voluntarily (without any of their demands having been met, of course), Lakoff seized the megaphone to spew the morally bankrupt argument that since the students knew they would be met with police violence, they would themselves be responsible for creating that violence if they chose to remain. No more repulsive a phrase was uttered that day. And were this not sufficient, Lakoff was even heard lying repeatedly to the occupiers, insisting that there had been no police violence, no rubber bullets, and no injuries outside the building, all in an effort to manipulate those inside into abandoning the occupation."
http://www.counterpunch.org/maher11242009.html
TRAITOR.
By their words AND actions you will know them. WE KNOW MR. LAKOFF.
To luckylefty; a tip of the hat for the revealing link
To Lackoff; a wag of the finger-off my reading list
You will note that I called him a Reactionary, which is to say he's certainly not "my boy." I have no idea why you would write such a thing. Too bad you couldn't include the italicized text from the quote you cited, or made some attempt to note the original's emphasis.
Yep. Not good stuff at all.
Especially bad as this Democracy Act looks like it might be a good idea for California.
The only movement I can perceive is in my bowels--every time I check "the news" it makes me just about shit my pants.
OK, that's low brow, butt WTF? Our options are the status quo or a VAST public demonstration. The longer we wait, the longer we put off strikes and boycotts, the more likely it is that our options will be reduced to insurrection.
"The Democrats have helped the conservatives."
"Democrats still have the presidency and a majority in the House and Senate, but the momentum is on the conservative side."
"The clearest articulator of what democracy is about has been Barack Obama - the campaigner we cheered for, campaigned hard for, and voted for."
Lakoff can't seem to think politically in any terms other than conservative/liberal, as if no other categories exist. Or if they do, they aren't worth the attention of a serious academic. What he routinely calls conservatives are in fact radical rightwing zealots intent for the past 30 years on drowning all government in a bathtub and turning over all its functions to private interests. That's not "conservatism." He also conventionally equates Democrats with liberals. This is antiquated as hell. There are as many arch-conservatives among the Democrats as the Repugs are the redoubt of reactionaries. And calling Obama "the clearest articulator of what democracy is about" is like calling Bush the clearest articulator of what freedom is about.
Lakoff obviously swallowed Obama's hollow rhetoric whole, unable to see through the slick sales pitch, as if he'd never heard of Bill Clinton. There are many still rattling around like Lakoff who simply have no capacity to detect fraud and deceit when it's clothed in the predictable attire of liberalism. They listen to politicians like Obama and Clinton and hear what they want to hear. It's the economy, stupid, and we want change we can believe in. Passionate stuff! What conviction and vision! Obama's as much a genius as Clinton was!
That there are many of us out here far to the left of Lakoff liberals is of little or no interest to them. So it will remain a staged battle between Democrats and Republicans for these conventional academics, even if Lakoff does have some good ideas about restoring democracy. But if all he intends is getting more Democrats elected to office in California, then good luck with that democracy movement. He's apparently still deluded enough to believe that democracy has something to do with the Democratic Party.
Good points, Lakoff needs to read some Sheldon Wolin, Steven Hill, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Chalmers Johnson and Arend Lijphardt. He may be a great cognitive scientist, but he is clearly ignorant of de-facto politics and political theory.
In the venacular of my generation - "right fucking on"!
Sioux Rose
EPHRAIM: I was thinking along the same lines. He suffers from "Lost in his own paradigm" disease. Being so focused on framing, his own frames have apparently become narrowed. I suppose he only sees what falls within the parameters of his own self-created cognitive universe. This article was a total apology for democrats. If RICH M shows up, it will be deconstructed with the expert skill of a surgeon whose tools are masterfully wrought word streams.
We have you here, Sioux Rose, and that's a good thing! But where oh where is RichM we need him?
This Lakoff article is a sorry attempt to rationalize remaining a Democrat. What does Lakoff expect us to do? Get shot with rubber bullets? Go to jail? Be fined? Or, we're supposed to think that if we beg hard enough, Obama will turn his back on the very same corporate entities that helped put him where he is today? Dream on Lakoff. Obama isn't as wishy-washy as you make him out to be. He is part of the problem, not the solution.
The way forward is to bail from the Democrats! I recommend the Green Party! If not now, when? Let's see both parties fall flat!
Sioux Rose
Good evening, RVR, I liked your posts on the Chris Hedges thread. If enough people intone "Rich M, Rich M" perhaps he will appear... shades of "Build the field, and they will come." Otherwise, he probably gets tired of repeating the same arguments, albeit fitted to whichever pundit poses another argument FOR the democrats, those mightly conquistadors, ever ready to fight for the real, the brave, the true, not...
This is the way. Direct democracy works. See: http://www.ni4d.us/
Fixing California's corrupt initiative and referendum system will put the state back in the black and make it an example for the entire country to follow.
Yes, a good one.
Thanks for reminding me.
I stopped listening to Air America radio some time ago because of its narrow range of left/liberal opinion. The Al Franken/Rachel Maddow conventional liberals were in force, but anyone of the Amy Goodman camp was eliminated early on. From then on, I knew it was just a media front for the Democratic Party.
Lakoff has once again proved to be an ivory-tower mainstream liberal that believes in fairy tales and euphemisms. This article misses the point altogether.
Prof. Lakoff: please read the Chris Hedges article (for starters) and then get back to us.
The endless calls for Obama to return to his roots overlook the fact that Obama has trampled his roots to death and in the process killed his own presidency.
Once you piss something away, as Obama has done with his base(1)and his moral leadership it can not be reborn. Once one has embraced villains as heroes and treated heroes as villains one finds that there are no heroes to stand beside and standing beside villains only results in knife wounds between the ribs. Once one has shown that his language is a variable depending upon the audience all audiences become audiences of skeptics. Once one has opened the vault at the treasury and given the banksters the people’s money, the people know whose fingerprints will be found at the scene of the crime.
Where's the movement? Check at the morgue, Dr. Lakeoff.
(1) (both the boots on the ground and the supporters that paid for his campaign)
Our democratic leadership is tone deaf to us:
Jason Altmire Rep 4th district:
"You won't see Single Payer in the Congress in my lifetime. It's just not going to happen"
Senator Casey to a bunch of Teabaggers:
"I hate this government run, (misleading charecterization on its face) as much as you do."
PA primary Candidate of Senator Joe Sestak:
"I believe the private market can more efficiently allocate Medical resources than Government Run Health Care can."
President Obama about private for Profit insurance:
We need to keep our uniquely American Health Care system. (about fpr profit Health insurance) They have a right to be there and make a profit but they have to accountable."
Why are we on the left so dispirited?-- because our leadership keeps on spouting center-right talking points. When the right accuses them of being "Socialist" their response is to say that they are just as right wing laissez faire capitalist as their accusers. They never defend a different perspective. I think it is because they are right wing. Our Democratic leaders have betrayed us. With respect to Lakoff, why exhort them to be different. It's not who they are. Nancy Pelosi says that all Health Care option are now back on the table. all but left and center left options like Single Payer because she believes, without having to say it that they are not real options, are not respectable, are not feasible. Don't blame the tone deafness and ineptness, the blinding,. mind numbing pragmatism that inspires and produces nothing on the left. Blame it on those in the Democratic party that hold leadership. They always learn the wrong lessons from our disatisfaction and anger. They always use it as an exuse to move more rightward. That's who they are. That's who they want to be. Let them collect all the corporate money they can by going there. We do not have to follow them.
I knew Obama's administration was 'Uncle Tomming' me when the hearings for health care ideas last summer failed to include anyone from the single payer house of thought and the Prez had private meetings with pharma and big medicine.
Guy Fawkes knew what to do. Our current form of government is not worth saving.
In forming his administration, President Obama abandoned the movement that had begun during his campaign for deal-making and a pragmatism that hasn't worked.
You cannot use the word "pragmatism" when talking about Obama. "Corruption" and "cowardice" are accurate.
Lakoff is a wimp.
At UC Berkeley, where he teaches, he did his best to dampen the ire of the students who were occupying admin offices to protest massive tuition increases.
He counseled calm and was against the occupation.
He is an ineffective liberal who believes that the system can be made to work with just a few tweaks in the way issues are framed.
Exactly. If Lakoff was really in support of creating a movement, he could have started with students at his own university. "Where's the movement"? Well, he should know he's doing his part to make sure it is still-born.
"Exactly. If Lakoff was really in support of creating a movement, he could have started with students at his own university." -- Tom Larsen
I agree! If he wanted to, he could lead his students right out the door and into the streets!
I always felt that Lakoff was over-rated. And, I read his book.
But don't let that prevent you from looking into the Initiative that he is advocating.
Whatever his issues IT looks important.
For a State Legislature to not be able to pass budget or revenue bills with a simple majority is outrageously Anti-Democratic!
I always thought his books were good. I am dissappointed about his role in the university protests though. I hope he gets the word. He could be a leader of the students as you guys say!
The movement is weak in part because progressives have ceded the interpretation of economic reality to the right. We have no economic framework to call our own. When we say "cost" we mean THEIR cost. When we say "value" we mean THEIR value. We see the world through THEIR economic lens.
Until we replace their interpretation with our own, very little of what Lakoff hopes to achieve with democracy will work. He is in fact enunciating what I call the "control fallacy" - the idea that progressive control is sufficient for significant economic betterment. It's not. We ALSO need an economic logic to replace the capitalist logic that is murdering people and killing the environment.
I've been working on this new framework/logic for the past two decades. I've written a book on the subject: see needsandlimits.org. But so far the world's progressive intellectuals have shown little interest. They'd rather enunciate vague principles and ignore the conceptual void under their feet.
hey, frankr29!
I like this sentence:
We have no economic framework to call our own.
I will have to check out your book, but wanted to ask:
how do you view property rights in relation to the economic framework you raise?
I believe 'owned' property, the denial of inherent residency, to be the underpinning of the societal control we are witnessing...
this is the same reason there is no strong, unified movement against the horrors being done to us, collectively, at this time...we will each meet individual horror in the form of job loss, foreclosure or eviction, as we have no common land to receive and sustain us...
my suggestion would be a return to the notion of commonality and shared resources...to reject the ownership of property, to abandon, mid-stroke, the industrialized world, to turn off whatever we have turned on and clean up whatever we have soiled...to do so globally, and at the same time:
September 22, 2012...I hope that's not too late...
My proposed framework (called the Economics of Needs and Limits, or ENL) offers a set of concepts and analytical tools to allow progressives to determine rational economic objectives. Specifically: targets for outputs, wastes, resource utilization rates, habitat destruction, and population that are consistent with the goal of sustainable well-being. In attempting to achieve these objectives, capitalist property rights will undoubtedly have to be revolutionized. Whether this means the rejection of property entirely is another matter - there are non-capitalist forms of property that should be considered.