At this point the Right has got their election rap down pat, and the Democrats have already written their ads, phone scripts, door to door canvassing messages and other media. So what’s left for us regular citizens to do about framing the issues and getting out the vote? Folks in the know are deeply aware […]
Stopping the Mega-Corp Coup
What could make Americans say “enough!” to mega-corporations’ meddling? Examples of it are everywhere now: the attempt to privatize water in Detroit, massive cuts to public education in Mississippi, Burger King’s tax evading move to Canada, to name just a few. (1) Their goal? Extracting the last dollar of corporate profit from increasingly desperate people […]
Say: “’True’ Public Safety Means Prevention!”
New reports suggest that some desperate Republicans are trying out “public safety” and “crime” as their 2013-4 state-level election frame.(1) Colorado and California are already seeing conservative moves to retake their state legislatures and governorships by accusing Democrats of being “soft on crime,” and putting “public safety” at risk. However, nationally crime rates have actually […]
Tell the Media Again: Say “Safety,” not “Control!”
Mayors Against Illegal Guns has recently reported that 100% of Americans want universal background checks for gun buyers. They say that even gun owners and hunters, grass roots NRA members, agree on this. Of course the national NRA leadership is against it. So right now it’s NRA head Wayne LaPierre vs We the People of […]
Counter-frame the Economy! Three Ways to Avoid Their Words
Although everyone’s focused on the election now, by the end of next week America will plunge into yet another harrowing contest over the future of our nation. Already some are frantically working behind the scenes to avoid the so-called “fiscal cliff.” (1) Economic metaphors will again be a very big part of the action. Given the […]
How to “Speak American” When You GOTV
Recent rash remarks and extreme ideas from the Romney/Ryan team have altered the political landscape. Before all that, polls had shown there were few undecided voters left. Now that’s not such a sure thing. There’s a new spotlight on character, on our shared ideals of American public morality, and on what kind of future we […]
Counter-frame It! How to Stop Using Their Words
Democrats, liberals, progressives, and radicals unite in frustration with the Right’s ability to capture the public mind with a few carefully selected words or phrases. As we all know, those words echo and re-echo through their top-to-bottom messaging machine. Their sound bites go from wordsmiths like Frank Luntz, to think tanks, to media outlets, to […]
Let’s Get Beyond Left “Groupspeak” Now!
As I write, the 2012 home stretch is still a few months away. There’s still time to get beyond our own disastrous Democratic/liberal/progressive “groupthink/groupspeak.” What is “groupspeak?” It’s the verbal equivalent of what Professor Haidt has described as “motivated reasoning,” preconceived ideas that get draped in rationalizations and then expressed in tired old words or […]
Let’s All Say “Cards on the Table,” Again!
Business and personal cards, that is. Once again, the word “disclose” is in the air. A federal appeals court recently ruled that big spending political groups must disclose their donors, despite Federal Election Commission fudging on the issue.(1) New light is also being focused on the much ignored second part of the Supreme Court’s naïve […]
Use the ‘One Big Family’ Frame!
Right now the news looks grim: Republican hostage taking in state capitals, federal shutdown narrowly averted, bombing in Libya at taxpayer expense, continued economic pain for many Americans. But public resistance is growing. To keep that going, we need to get our own narrative right and create smart language to spread it. But there’s a […]