I believe that most corporate Democrats have the problem of choosing the right thing to say in an election because they have conflicting values. They believe in both the Free Enterprise System and helping Americans have a higher income and support system to make their lives better. Its a zero sum game in spite of the objections.
To help the middleclass, the more affluent and wealthy have to be taxed at a higher level because we no longer have jobs that produce adequate income for most families. They have been shipped to other countries with much lower wages. Bush closed 50,000 Ohio Factories overseas, but they still voted for him in high numbers!
All the large corporate CEOs made enormous profits and the ones that fired the most workers got the highest salary too! Bush Republicans introduced no taxes while American profits were overseas, but taxable while here. Then towards the end of his term, he allowed the large corporations to bring back their profits from overseas without paying any taxes at all! Why aren't the Democrats talking about this too?
Reagan policy of making working Americans poorer only worked because they allowed credit cards easily accessible to increase the profits of banks and stores when the impulse buying of Americans kept they in debt at levels of $8,000 with interests rates as high as 29%. The Mafia chieftains
This is easily seen in the numbers where we have a system where the top one percent have incomes greater the all the bottom 90 percent! The top 10 percent make 47% of the total income in America. Before the Financial Devastation, Financials made up about 49% of GDP. After the collapse and recovery of financials, it made up 62% of the GDP!
Democrats rarely talk about this because they are afraid that Republicans will say that its class warfare. So far I have heard no Democrat say the opposite is true which can be easily proved.
Language does not have to be slick when talking directly to voters while looking at their eyes. It is easy to see if they were understood. Talk directly about democratic values and give examples of what it is. Don’t waffle. Don’t every say Republican values are good. Just state your values to Democrats and especially Independents.
If someone mentions abortion, don’t try to fight them. Tell them I don’t want someone telling imposing their religious beliefs in my personal life. Even with Evangelicals, abortion was not a big deal for them.
Only in the late 1970s under Schaeffer did it become a cause although it has always been a cause with the Catholic Bishops in the last half the 20th Century mainly. Abortion became illegal under Roman Emperor Constantine and the Christian now Catholic Bishops adopted it. Priestly celibacy was introduced in the Enlightenment period by corrupt Popes who wanted the Priests usually from wealthy families to give their wealth to the church.
Jim Kawakami, Sept 27, 2010, http://jimboguy.blogspot.com
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-lakoff/why-the-democrats-respons_b_740023.html Rearranged and Excerpted: Professor George Lakoff Communication Advice for Democrats Republicans hire experts and take their advise, Democrats Don’t Listen to Anyone!
They need to speak from their own moral perspective. They need to connect emotionally with voters. The need to stop trying to be bipartisan; that just helps Republicans, who know enough not to be bipartisan in the current electoral situation.
The Democratic strategy so far has been to see each race as separate, with no overall Democratic vision. Bill Clinton sees this as a mistake and I agree. …
In his campaign, Barack Obama articulated beautifully the Democratic moral vision of America. America is based on citizens caring about, and for, each other. The values of empathy, social as well as personal responsibility, and an ethic of excellence lead to a government of, by, and for the people, with values like freedom and fairness, and a governmental responsibility to protect and empower the people.
That is a Democratic view of America. It calls on Americans to come together in difficult times, and it characterizes the party's, as well as the President's, moral compass.
The voting public does not vote on the basis of the economic details, and the voting public does not fully accept the Democrats' system of values as they apply in this election.
First, all politics is moral. People vote for values they identify with, for what they see as right, not wrong.
Second, the facts alone don't set you free. Facts matter, but they must be understandable, that is, framed for normal human beings, and framed so as to be relevant to the moral views that define a voter's identity.
Third, there are two very different moral views at play in our country's politics. Liberal and conservative moral systems are inconsistent as they apply to most major issues. There is no neutral worldview, no worldview of the "center."
Fourth, there are, however, a significant number of voters --as many as 15 to 20 percent -- who have both worldviews, but may apply them to different issues in all sorts of ways. Some may be conservative on social issues, but liberal on economic issues, or conversely. Some may be "up in the air" -- not sure about given issues. I call these "biconceptual" voters. These are the voters who most matter in this election, as in most others.
Five, because people think with their brains, all ideas are physical. They occur in brain circuits called "frames." Biconceptual voters exist because inconsistent ideas can exist in the same brain due to what is called "mutual inhibition," in which the activation of one frame inhibits (that is, turns off) the other. The more a conservative frame is activated, the stronger it gets and the weaker the corresponding liberal frame gets. What activates frames? Language.
Sixth, what follows from all this is that liberals should never use conservative language (e.g., "tax relief" and "entitlements") because it activates conservative frames and weakens their own case. Liberals should not "move to the right" and adopt conservative positions since that will only make biconceptuals more likely to vote conservative.
Moreover, when you negate a frame, you strengthen it. When a liberal argues point by point against a conservative argument, he or she is repeating the conservative argument and hence strengthening its hold on the brain.
Seventh, in political discourse, numbers in themselves are meaningless. They can be made meaningful only in everyday terms and in moral terms. In themselves, numbers from the Congressional Budget Office don't mean much to most people. The facts alone, not properly framed, won't be convincing. This means avoiding policy-wonk talk, the kind of talk the Obama administration has been using nonstop.
Eighth, people tend to adapt their baseline expectations to what they already have. That is why the President gets little appreciation for what he has already accomplished. If he's done it, we take it for granted. People also tend to be risk-averse.
That is why conservative attacks on the president and the Democrats can be taken seriously, even if they are not based on hard economic facts. The moral: Always go on offense not defense.
Liberal morality means more than just empathy for one's countrymen. It means social and well as personal responsibility and it means excellence -- doing your best as a commitment to family, community and country. And it means framing in terms of such moral views and in terms of risk aversion, not just past accomplishments.
Ninth, there is no reason without emotion. Without emotion, you don't know what to want and what to avoid. Rationality requires the proper emotionality. Reagan knew how to connect emotionally without going into a tirade. So did Obama when he ran for President.
Tenth, repetition matters. The language that people hear most often repeated activates and strengthens the corresponding frames in their brains.
Conservatives are better at marketing their ideas. They are better at framing, because they understand the primacy of morality, how their moral system works, and how to talk to biconceptuals. They have a much more extensive communication system, built over three decades, with think tanks, training institutes, recruited speakers, owned media, and booking agencies -- in addition to ads and bloggers. Their messages are affecting the brains of voters 24/7, every day in every electoral district.
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