Posted on 01/19/2004 9:24:55 AM PST by .cnI redruM
Today's Washington Post features an excellent story teasing out the strategic calculations undergirding the Dean candidacy. The only quibble I have with this piece is that it attributes the view that Democrats must reach out to the center to Mark Penn. In fact, almost every Democratic strategist realizes that the party has to reach out to both the base and the center. Penn, who works for Joe Lieberman, represents the extreme right of this intra-Democratic debate. It would not be completely unfair to characterize his advice to Democrats as being to run as "Bush lite." So associating this view with Penn, then, allows Deaniacs to paint it as a crypto-Republican plot, when in fact even liberal Democrats realize you need to appeal to the center and not just the base.
But the important question is, where does Dean get this insane notion that you can win only by charging up your base? Some of it comes from Joe Trippi, who has said that Karl Rove's entire strategy is to fire up his base. Even if true, this wouldn't mean mirroring that strategy would work for Democrats; the GOP has a larger base. Anyway, it's not true. Bush's strategy all along has involved a mix of pleasing his base and reaching out to the center. Remember that stuff about "compassionate conservatism," Bush's obsession with being photographed in the company of black children, his support for prescription drug benefits and steel tariffs? These are not designed to win over white evangelicals in the South. Some of them involving paying off the business lobby, but they also allow Bush to co-opt issues of Democratic strength. This is basic politics. Everybody knows you have to do it. Everybody, that is, except Howard Dean and Joe Trippi.
But there's another source for Dean's ignore-the-center strategy: George Lakoff. According to The Boston Globe, Lakoff is Dean's favorite academic, and the two met in June. The January 19 edition of U.S. News reports:
Though Dean did not enter the race with the expectations of winning, he did see a way to win. "Karl Rove [President Bush's political guru] discovered it, too, but I discovered it independently," Dean says and adds that the theory is embodied in the writings of George Lakoff, a professor of cognitive science and linguistics at the University of California-Berkeley. "What you do is crank the heck out of your base, get them really excited and crank up the base turnout and you'll win the middle-of-the-roaders," Dean says. The reason, according to the theory, is that swing voters share the characteristics of both parties and eventually go with whatever party excites them the most. "Democrats appeal to them on their softer side--the safety net--but the Republicans appeal to them on the harder side--the discipline, the responsibility, and so forth," Dean says. "So the question is which side appears to be energetic, deeply believing in its message, deeply committed to bringing a vision of hope to America. That side is the side that gets the swing voters and wins." And the January 12 issue of Time has this:
Lately Dean has been intrigued by the writings of University of California, Berkeley, cognitive linguist George Lakoff, the author of Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think. Lakoff argues that liberals, with their "nurturing parent" view of the world, have lost ground in the values debate to "strict father" conservatives. In the middle, Lakoff writes, are "bi-conceptuals," who have internalized both parents. The question for Dean in reaching that small slice of swing voters is, Can he win over their inner mom without seeming like a too permissive dad?
Given that the Democratic Party may be in the verge of putting its fate in the hands of a wildly out of the mainstream political theory, it's worth delving a bit more into who George Lakoff is. One obvious point about Lakoff is that even many Deaniacs would regard him as a lefty. For instance, in an October 29, 2001 essay for In These Times, a socialist newspaper, Lakoff praised his representative, Barbara Lee, for casting the sole vote against going to war in Afghanistan. Lakoff wrote: Justice is called for, not vengeance. Understanding and restraint are what is needed. The model for our actions should be the rescue workers and doctors--the healers--not the bombers. We should not be like them, we should not take innocent lives in bringing the perpetrators to justice. Massive bombing of Afghanistan--with the killing of innocents--will show that we are no better than they.
Now, it's possible that Lakoff's political analysis is not being driven by his ideological preferences. But the even more relevant question is: Why should we trust his political analysis at all? It would be one thing if Lakoff were a consultant who had successfully put this ignore-the-center theory into practice in a bunch of hotly contested races. Barring that, there would be some smidgen of comfort if he were a political scientist who had crunched the polling data and drawn some conclusion about the electorate that had previously escaped everybody else. But Lakoff is a linguist. Not only does he lack any practical basis for his notion, he lacks any theoretical basis, as well. That Dean would be basing his strategy upon Lakoff's teachings may be the single most frightening thing I've heard about him yet.
If Lakoff were right, McGovern, Goldwater and Buchanan would all have one elections by now.
The reaction of the Bush administration is just what you would expect a conservative reaction would be—pure Strict Father morality: There is evil loose in the world. We must show our strength and wipe it out. Retribution and vengeance are called for. If there are "casualties" or "collateral damage", so be it. The reaction from liberals and progressives has been far different: Justice is called for, not vengeance. Understanding and restraint are what is needed. The model for our actions should be the rescue workers and doctors—the healers—not the bombers. We should not be like them, we should not take innocent lives in bringing the perpetrators to justice. Massive bombing of Afghanistan—with the killing of innocents—will show that we are no better than they. But it has been the administration's conservative message that has dominated the media. The event has been framed in their terms. As Newt Gingrich put it on the Fox Network, "Retribution is justice." We must reframe the discussion. I have been reminded of Gandhi's words: Be the change you want. The words apply to governments as well as to individuals.
So Dean isn't just a "metrosexual," he's "bi-conceptual" as well.
It is telling what was not in the President's September 7 speech. He sought help from other nations, but he refused to relinquish control over the shaping of Iraq's military, political, and economic future. It was to a large extent the issue of such control that lay behind the UN Security Council's refusal to participate in the American attack and occupation. The reason for the resentment against the U.S., both in Europe and elsewhere, stemmed from a widespread perception that American interests really lay behind the invasion of Iraq. Those interests are: control over the Iraqi economy by American corporations, the political shaping of Iraq to suit U.S. economic and strategic interests, military bases to enhance U.S. power in the Middle East, reconstruction profits to U.S. corporations, control over the future of the second largest oil supply in the world, and refining and marketing profits for U.S. and British oil companies. The 'Iraqi people' would get profits only from the sale of crude, and those profits would go substantially to pay American companies like Halliburton for reconstruction.
Feel free to click on the link and read on. It gets worse.
Hillary Clinton wasn’t the first, and she won’t be the last, to envision a "vast right-wing conspiracy." Like most dragons, this one is based in truth: right-wing conservatives have become extremely adept at expressing and communicating their message. This success is charted and discussed in a book entitled Moral Politics by George Lakoff, who is a professor in the department of linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley. TomPaine.com’s Sharon Basco spoke with him about his theories.
Oh boy.
And Howie is the "metro-conceptual"!
The halls of academia.
If you think Lakoff is a funny name, there's an even more renowned cognitive theorist whose name is Jackendoff.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.