First of all, there are those who 1. believe the climate crisis is real, but fear social, familial, and professional ostracism if they even say the words “climate change” or “human-caused climate change.” 2. They are usually surrounded by people who have been misled into believing it’s all a hoax by their peers, religious leaders, news sources, fossil fuel industry lies, and Congressional representatives. 3. Next come people whose financial and/or professional prospects depend in the near future on the fossil fuel industry doing well financially—industry executives, institutional investors and so on. 4. Add politicians dependent on the fossil fuel industry for political contributions and jobs in their districts. 5. Then there are whole countries whose economies are heavily dependent on fossil fuel sales—Saudi Arabia, Russia, the U.S., among others. (Don’t spend any time wondering why Putin has lassoed Trump and the GOP—Russia needs oil and gas sales, and the GOP serves the global fossil fuel industry!) Russia and all the other fossil fuel dependent states need to do what they can to keep fostering the global energy economy we have now, the one that still runs heavily on fossil fuels.

A depressingly long list, isn’t it? And you probably knew about them all. But we can’t begin to think clearly and strategically about effective framing aimed at the #ClimateHoldouts unless we see the whole picture at once. It’s good to think about how to appeal to each of these different audiences, but until we have a pretty broad across the board consensus, we are still heading straight into the final fire on this planet.

What could create powerful top-down leverage to complement the grass roots push up that is growing everyday, all over the world? In general “bottom up” strategies are moving ahead right now, because at the local level people are starting to see and feel economically devastating #ClimateDamage. But while piecemeal regional, state and local action is vital and necessary, by itself it’s too slow for the late hour we’re in now. We all know it. We must have the kind of national and international leverage that can move us all very fast toward the changed energy economy we need for life to survive on this planet. We need business CEOs, whole industry sectors, and international institutions like the IMF, the World Bank, and the World Economic Forum on board, all rowing in the same direction. These are the powers that can move national political parties and ultimately national governments to do the right thing. They are also the ones who can swiftly change the idea of what is and what is not acceptable, even for ordinary non-tycoon #ClimateHoldouts.

How do you bring something like that to pass? Sometimes it takes a determined whistle-blower, a battle of business titans to do it, and a new opportunity to make money, plus a catchy frame to raise broad public awareness. Two examples come to mind: the way we got Detroit to include seat belts in cars, and the way we got an international accord to phase out chlorofluorocarbons. In the seat belt case, Ralph Nader was the whistleblower with his 1965 book, Unsafe at any Speed, and insurance companies lobbied for seat belt laws, prevailing over reluctant auto manufacturers. The catchy frame was, of course, “unsafe at any speed.” The American public always wants safety. As for the chlorofluorocarbons, the whistle-blowers were two scientists, Sherry Rowland and Mario Moline, who published a 1974 article about the damage they caused, and by 1978 the EPA banned commercial manufacturing and use of CFCs and aerosol propellants in the U.S. However, DuPont lobbied against the ban and any further regulation until 1986 when they got a patent for a substitute. Then they too began lobbying for a total ban on chlorofluorocarbons, aided by the famous “hole in the ozone” that was discovered in 1987. There you have the new profit incentive and the catchy frame. That “hole in the ozone” frame was actually a metaphor for the serious damage taking place, not a literal scientific description. But the idea of a “hole” in our atmosphere was deeply alarming to people.

We will need something as powerful as that to catalyze turning the #ClimateCrisis around. And it will have to be “nonpartisan.” Even Greta was recently quoted as saying this. Right now of course everything in the U.S. seems partisan, so it’s hard to imagine such a phrase. We also need something everyone can understand.  Right now the most universal idea in the U.S. and the world is the importance of making a profit or increasing sales or the fear of failing to do it. So here are some trial frames: “In the ‘20’s #ClimateSafeProfits will grow; #ClimateDamageCosts will explode.”   Another way to frame it could be this: “In the ‘20’s let’s grow ClimateSafeProfits and cut #ClimateDamageCosts.” American audiences fear costs and still love safety.  If we can make these frames or even better ones like them go viral, our language can increase public pressure on all the #ClimateHoldouts, whoever they are.  As for the whistle-blowers, we’ve had plenty of those already. The only other thing we need now is the battle of business titans.

If you think that the titans of global finance will just laugh these phrases off at first, that’s probably true. But deep down in their guts they will know it’s true. They also know that the rest of the world won’t drag its feet to start making even more #ClimateSafeProfits, especially China. And they know that some of their own financial leaders already see fossil fuel investments as “stranded assets,” that is worthless  very soon. BlackRock, a leading manager of investment funds, has announced new environmental sustainability criteria for investments and started a fund that focuses on long term business value. A few days later Chris Hohn, CEO of the $30 billion hedge fund, TCI Fund Management, announced he is pressuring the boards of companies the fund invests in to fire CEOs who don’t make “credible” emission reduction plans. If they don’t, Hohn says, TCI will sell its shares. The SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) has granted permission for a new “long term” stock exchange to counter the frenetic, short-term, and destructive effects of today’s form of capitalism. Individual companies like Microsoft are taking action to become more sustainable, and business leaders like  Marc Benioff, chief executive of SalesForce just described capitalism as we know it today as dead in his Davos 2020 call for a new “stakeholder capitalism.” Moreover, the EIB, the European Investment Bank, has already announced they will be making no more fossil fuel investments after the end of 2021. I know—it’s easy to be cynical about all this and to feel that it is too little too late or just green wash, but calls for new regulations and taxes also sound unrealistic in the face of the government we have. At least some of these business entities are talking the correct talk and even taking some actions. That trend is likely to snowball faster than turning all of DC blue overnight. In fact, the financial industry has the power to bring the fossil fuel industry to its knees and move politicians too; our job is to egg the financial industry on. And talking about #ClimateSafeProfits and #ClimateDamageCosts is a good way to get more of the public pushing the finance titans. So let’s all get at it!
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Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, http://www.metaphorproject.org, and author of our book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong, on The Metaphor Project on Facebook, and check out her TEDx talk too.

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Let’s start with the “the red button.” When Trump was elected in 2016, one of the things that people feared the most was that he would be the one to push to “push the red button.”  Given the fact that he asked his campaign advisors that very year about the possibility of using our nukes, this was a reasonable fear. When he was told it would be a big mistake, his answer, “Then why do we have them?” did not reassure anyone.  However, the risk of Trump himself setting off a nuclear exchange is   overshadowed by a deliberately hidden reality. As Daniel Ellsberg revealed in his 2017 book, The Doomsday Machine, many military officers in the two biggest nuclear- armed countries actually have red buttons of their own.  You could describe the situation as “a red button in every silo.”   Ellsberg shows that this far-flung delegation was  deliberately concealed from Congress, the American public, and the   entire world.  All of these red buttons are always “on,” not just the one in the White House. That’s hair trigger alert on—“launch on warning.”  Push one by mistake, and there is no going back, no time to check the actual source of an apparent threat or to think twice. There have already been many nuclear close ones over the years since the 1940’s, including one triggered by a flight of Canada geese.

But there’s another equally dangerous nuclear metaphor out there. That’s the phrase “nuclear winter.”  What’s wrong with that? I’m a veteran of the anti-nuclear protests back in the 1980’s. I understand the power of the phrase in its original time. But things have changed. Today the most powerful Armageddon image in the public mind is our global ecosystem destroyed by fossil fuels. In that context, talking about nuclear “winter” is a mistake. “Winter” usually evokes something temporary in people’s minds, followed by “spring.” Even worse, the Chernobyl area where the Russian nuclear power plant melted down is well-known to be harboring some life now, however compromised.  Entrepreneurs are beginning to promote tourist visits to it. But the idea that any kind of “spring” would follow a nuclear exchange is false.  It would also risk a full-scale nuclear war.  The effect of a modern nuclear war anywhere on earth would be omnicide, given the way wind moves in our atmosphere. #NukeDoomsday = omnicide, not just “winter.”  

So while we’re demanding that our presidential candidates address the climate emergency, we must also say: “Talk about how you plan to stop a #NukeDoomsday! This is urgent right now, because    nuclear restraint is rapidly breaking down, amid sharply rising international tensions.  Trump and Putin destroyed the INF treaty, amid mutual charges of cheating on it. Our government is going ahead with new types of nuclear weapons, including the infamous “battlefield” type.  And The Russians have announced that underwater nuclear drones will be placed on their new class of giant subs.  Plus the North Koreans just launched a new, nuclear missile capable submarine.

What do we want our candidates to promise to do? In The Doomsday Machine, Ellsberg lays out a wish list of initial risk reduction actions the U.S. should take.  These steps, he says, would not compromise basic nuclear deterrence. They are:  1. Take our own nuclear weapons off hair trigger alert, inviting all nuclear-armed nations to follow suit 2. Stop building even more devastating new types of nuclear weapons.  3. Declare a policy of no first use.  In addition, we should restart nuclear weapons reduction negotiations with the Russians and with Iran over their new enrichment steps.

Number 1, taking our nuclear weapons off hair trigger alert would buy precious time in a crisis. It would address the most shocking revelation in Ellsberg’s book: that the power to launch is widely delegated throughout a far-flung network, which, like all things human, is dangerously subject to human error.  In the meantime, we must start birddogging our candidates and legislators about the “red button” and  “nuclear winter” myths now, using language that tells the truth about the risks we actually face: a red button in every silo and instant nuclear omnicide: #NukeDoomsday.
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Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, http://www.metaphorproject.org, and author of our book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong, check out her TEDx talk, and like, follow & review The Metaphor Project on Facebook.

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As most Americans understand our freedom, it’s about our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But the deeply corrupt #AltGOP now in control of the White House, Senate, and Supreme Court aims to violate these and our other basic constitutional rights. Their agenda includes attacking the right to free speech, both personal and in the media. They are challenging our freedom of religion, which should mean no attacks on other people’s religion and no state religion. They are hoping to cut protections the Affordable Care Act provides against being refused life-saving care.  As for freedom from fear, they consistently encourage unfair personal attacks on us by our highest officials and our neighbors on the basis of ethnic and gender identity. And they are doing everything they can to strip us of the right to vote too.

Of course the GOP wasn’t always like this. Many landmark environmental rules and other socially beneficial measures were actually approved in the past by GOP Congress members and presidents. The old-style GOP had at least a discernible moral core, however imperfect.  In Robert Reich’s 2018 book, The Common Good, he lays out a capsule history of how, since the 1980’s, the GOP and corporate America fell into the #AynRandTrap of radical, shortsighted selfishness. They have been systematically destroying American moral fiber from the top and ruthlessly preying on everyone else. As Reich shows, this form of national self-destruction has cost us trust in government, in each other, and trust in all the institutions and leaders of our society. A country this sick cannot last long without decaying into a Hobbesian war of all against all. This is in fact what President Trump is calling for if he is not reelected. Rwanda in America—a prospect far worse than any of the horrors of our own Civil War.

Of course, the first stimulus for a return to sanity has already happened: the 2018 election. With any luck, the 2020 election will serve as even more of a corrective.  Speaker Pelosi has spelled out what      the 2020 Democratic platform must include: the same type of “kitchen table” issues that worked in 2018. But in the face of the #AltGOP’s attempt to own the idea of American “freedom,” it seems to me that we also have to spell out exactly what #TrueAmericanFreedom means. And we must call out the ways the #AltGOP is trying to destroy what they claim to own.  Part of that step is calling for a national moral revival that transforms the selfish, corrupt behavior of our business and political leaders.  In her best-selling book,  Daring Greatly, well-known Social Work Research Professor Brené Brown has laid out specific, doable steps for sincerely and openly  “bridging the gap” between our highest ideals and our everyday behavior. Her experience is that the process she has developed works.

But we ourselves also have to do a bit more to be clear about what #TrueAmerican Freedom means. It’s about how we talk. We must scrupulously avoid the specific language traps the GOP has set for us. I have long been warning our own people about these traps, which will unquestionably be high profile in the 2020 election fight. For years I have watched in horror as supposedly intelligent members of the Democratic Party, liberals of all kinds, and every type of progressive mindlessly repeat such GOP-launched or GOP friendly frames as “Obamacare,” “carbon tax,” “gun control,” and the most senseless of all in my view, “single payer.”

Let’s start with “Obamacare.” This is a word specifically created by the GOP to kill the Affordable Care Act. Never call the ACA “Obamacare.  Since we’re on the subject of healthcare, let’s move on here to “single payer.” To the average American, that is a meaningless phrase that suggests you are talking about “an unmarried payer.”  Then there’s Medicare for All. While it’s a lot better than “single payer,” it is still, by itself, with no modifiers, very dangerous in the coming election. Lately there has been a rapid proliferation of different kinds of proposals, all labelled “Medicare for All. If there’s one thing Americans desperately fear today a recent Kaiser poll found, it’s losing the health insurance or healthcare they already have. Confusing people about what you mean by that phrase is a recipe for sure defeat at the polls. The cure? Come up with a simple add on to the phrase, like “Medicare for All+50,” if your proposal is buy in after 50 years of age, or “Medicare for All: Buy-in,” and so on. Think Americans will sit still to pore over the details of how the proposal you call “Medicare for All” will be set up? Think again: if you can’t say it clearly in one breath, your idea is doomed and will destroy your candidate too.

Then there’s “carbon tax.” Never trust anyone arguing for a “carbon tax.”  Call the “carbon fee and citizen dividend idea” a ”tax” and it will be DOA. Yes, I know it’s a drop in the climate-fix bucket, but it could be a first wedge in the denial door.  And while you are upgrading your language about this issue, be careful to say “climate damage,” and “climate damage costs.” People understand damage, and we all know money talks. Drop “climate change.” It’s a phrase that sounds way too mild these days. And now for one of my favorite peeves: calling for “gun control” when what we want is “gun safety” or “gun sense.” Yes, I know folks are angry and want to control those guns. But “gun control” is the NRA’s favorite frame, because they use it to scare even responsible gun owners into voting against the “gun safety” or “gun sense” they would otherwise favor, knowing as they do exactly what guns can do.
With new levels of self-awareness about the words we use, we Democrats, liberals and progressives can finally stop shooting ourselves in the foot.

Now for the good news. As I have often reminded my readers, America is a punch-back fighter. The sight of American high school students rallying to push our government to act on rules for gun safety and climate action is a case in point. Though they don’t get civics courses in school anymore, they know perfectly well what their rights as Americans are. Their courage and patriotism in the cause of  #TrueAmericanFreedom is another big step in the massive turnaround we need.  Let’s do all we can to restore #TrueAmericanFreedom here in the “land of the free!” That starts by calling it by its right name.
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Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, http://www.metaphorproject.org, and author of our book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong, check out her TEDx talk, and like, follow & review The Metaphor Project on Facebook.

Want to comment on this post? Please go to one of the following sites where my pages have comment capability. Thanks!

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In early 2013, the U.S. justice Department launched a program named “Smart on Crime.” It included a review of the criminal justice system in order to identify much needed  reforms. But putting the focus on “crime” in the title just plays into the hands of those whose game plan is to revive vague public fear of “crime,” with prison as the all-purpose solution. If we say “smart on prison dollars” instead, the focus goes to the problem—prisons, and their cost, which has a lot of persuasive power right now. Although the progressive/liberal argument for sentencing reform is moral and about building true community security, the current climate of debate in our country is dominated by conservative values. So we will be better off to focus first on the waste of tax payer dollars on ineffective mass incarceration.

If we can get the initial framing right, we can add a lot of persuasive power to a few of the hopeful signs out there that criminal justice reform  can survive the 2016 campaign.  Recently two Republican governors, Governor Snyder of Michigan and Governor Bentley of Alabama, signed historic reforms into law. And it has even been reported that the infamous Koch brothers are actually on the correct side of the criminal justice reform issue, for a change. Despite their strong support for Scott Walker in other ways, some pundits speculate that the Kochs may hope to influence Walker to move away from a campaign attack on commonsense criminal justice reform.  Senator Rand Paul is also taking a strong stand in favor of it. Although the majority of criminal justice reform must take place at the state level, the coming presidential campaign will raise the level of visibility and debate on the issue in ways that will inevitably affect state politics across the nation.

Though it might feel funny to be on the same side as the Kochs about anything, that kind of “strange bedfellows” behavior is one of the best things about the classic One Big American Family style in politics.  That means the following:  “The most important thing about this ‘one big family’ frame is exactly this way people focus on real problem solving together, looking at what really works  and what doesn’t, emphasizing what they agree on (saving public money, for example), having a shared goal they work for even if their reasons for wanting
the result differ. . .” (quote from the One Big American Family style).

A fine example of how well this can actually work comes from the results of Living Room Conversations  (LRC) on criminal justice. Says founder Joan Blades, “Living Room Conversations have demonstrated extraordinary power to transform the debate.” Indeed, their work on criminal justice reform is an outstanding case in point. Starting with a “conversation” between Joan and Mark Meckler of Tea Party Patriots in January 2013 about this subject, LRC went on to convene a meeting in DC in October 2014 of leaders from the left, the right, the beltway and beyond to talk about opportunities to work together on the issue. That helped inspire the creation of the remarkable cross-partisan Coalition for Public Safety, which includes such unlikely partners as the ACLU and Koch Industries, among others.

We can hope that the momentum of these efforts will be strong enough to overcome an ugly presidential campaign attack. But just in case, let’s also say “smart on prison dollars” everywhere we can, because we the people are going to need to hear it from each other too, all through the long and dreary election season coming up. Even the Kochs can’t do it all by themselves!

Although I sometimes start with a positive framing suggestion, in this case we have to call a spade a spade first. That’s why the title of this piece includes the phrase “sabotage America.”  But it’s not just the GOP Congress that is acting out so badly. Some important parts of the media have jumped on board—among others,  60 Minutes repeating lies about Social Security and disabled recipients of SSDI all being cheats and malingerers. (See note 2. for others.)  Recent history suggests that the media can be turned around more easily than right wing congress members by skillful, massive social media push back.  Stopping their PR machine is vital. So that looks like the place to start.  Ask these mainstream media venues why they are jumping on the right wing “sabotage America” bandwagon, and warn them to stop it right now.

However, we on the progressive left still have some homework to do about the way we use language. Recently my own regional newspaper, The San Francisco Chronicle, wrote an editorial critiquing last minute right wing congressional sabotage of the bipartisan Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act. The editors ended their remarks by saying that “compromise” is necessary for good national leadership. But today the word “compromise” has become a poison pill in the U.S.  Using it just guarantees failure. Instead we should be talking about how true American patriots “collaborate” or “cooperate” to keep America moving forward.   It’s the best way to talk about what will actually rebuild America.  One state that raised taxes,  wages, and stopped the cuts is showing good results—the Minnesota economy is rebounding. Others have raised the minimum wage.  The results are in.  Austerity government fails.  So say: “GOP spending cuts push America down. “ Good, patriotic American politicians work together to “raise America up!”

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1. For more information on this particular dirty trick, widely seen as the opening wedge of a full scale attack on Social Security, see the following:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/02/09/republicans-planning-stealth-attack-on-social-security-democrats-fear/

http://www.politicususa.com/2015/01/12/bernie-sanders-exposes-republican-plot-cut-social-security-11-million-disabled-people.html

2. Other media outlets reporting lies about and Social Security and SSDI are described here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/02/09/republicans-planning-stealth-attack-on-social-security-democrats-fear/

The exact quote is “Reports that SSDI is riddled with fraud and overrun with false claims have showed up in an ideologically diverse array of news sources over the past two years, from public radio’s This American Life to CBS’ 60 Minutes to the conservative media machine. The reality is that just 41 percent of those who apply for disability benefits receive it thanks to the program’s uniquely strict eligibility rules and stringent, multi-layered application process. Among those who do clear the program’s hurdles and enroll, fraud is extremely rare.”

Why is it still working? One reason is that mega-corporations have played a dirty trick on us all. Corporate lobbyists used a key element of the ideal American story as a front for their own lawless agenda.  Too many Congress members fell for it.   It’s the big one, for Americans: “freedom.”  Freedom from what?   “Government,” of course.  Well, “freedom” works for us too—freedom from the mega-corp mob and their attacks on us.

But there’s a second reason why the mega-corp coup is gaining on us so fast. It’s about names, frames and despair. Talk of the 1% and the 99% points to our growing inequality. But we need to get more specific about who is doing what to whom and how in an equally powerful way. Some have called the mega-corp mob the “dark state” or the “deep state,” “the shadow government,” or even the “corporate state.”  Those names evoke an abstract force that sounds metaphysically evil,  impossible to fight, defeat, or even find out about.  None of that is true.  So that’s why I am suggesting we talk about a “mega-corp coup” by the” mega-corp mob”.

Next, we require equally visceral language to name our fight back strategies.   The latest entry into this effort is the Mayday Pac, a crowdfunding project to elect candidates committed to real campaign finance reform.  “Mayday” is universally understood to signify a life-threatening emergency. But we also need to pay attention to other levels of the problem.  According to Ralph Nader, in his new book,Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State, many Congress members are well aware that bipartisan policy proposals they were willing to join got derailed by subtle parliamentary moves behind the scenes.(2)  These tricks were initiated by a few of their colleagues acting on behalf of the mega-corp mob.  In response, Nader calls for a special “convergence” project, independent of both parties, that would push for increased resistance to corporate “divide and conquer” tactics, protect those willing to fight back, and be in the game for the long haul. (I strongly recommend reading his action proposal,  laid out in Chapter 10 of his new book. Read the rest of the book too!) Nader also suggests that opinion leaders at every level should be publically calling for   more “statesmanship” and “patriotism” from leaders of the corporate world. (That’s a nice positive touch.)

In the meantime, there’s a lot we can do closer to the ground. Already some state legislatures in “red states” have resisted efforts by the Koch brothers to stop them approving alternative energy projects.  Those state representatives, red as they are, understood that the money from green energy stays home and creates jobs. (3) Even at the congressional level, there are now encouraging signs of bipartisan agreement about things like sentencing reform for low level, nonviolent offenders convicted of drug offenses. I’m sure the prison lobbies don’t like it, but Congress members of all stripes have finally got  that our overstuffed prisons are wasting tax payer money. Conservatives want to save government dollars, and liberals want to help the afflicted. This kind of agreement about outcome rises above differing reasons for support. That’s the true American way of solving problems and getting things done.   Nader suggests that there still are a great many other opportunities for this kind of bipartisan problem solving, if we can expose the secret spoilers.

Today, our survival as a people, an economy, and a nation depends on all of that becoming crystal clear to mainstream America.  It’s never been more true–we Americans are one big family, and the mega-corp wolves are at the door, with some very big feet already inside.  We need the rebirth of a vast and deep movement for political and economic reform, but it starts with just two ideas: l. a mega-corps mob is trying to seize complete control of our country and our economy, by hamstringing our governments at every level. 2. When the chips are down, we must all come together to protect our freedom from the biggest, most dangerous threat of all—the mega-corp coup.

Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, metaphorproject.org,  and author of our new book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong.

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(1) If anyone reading this is puzzled about who is in the mega-corp mob and what they’re up to, here’s a short list: all members of ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council), the Koch brothers, Monsanto, the fossil fuel industry, and almost every other major multinational corporation in the world. Many books and articles have been written about this subject by such noted authors as David Korten, Gar Alperovitz, Hedrick Smith, and others too numerous to name; there’s a great film about it, Who Stole the American Dream?,and the latest issue of YES! Magazine contains a handy chart and summary on pp.18-19 (Fall 2014).   The terms “megacorporations,”  “megacorp” or “mega-corp” are already out there in many other contexts, especially the action/dystopian fantasy/sci-fi/war video gaming world.  Hooking our message to popular mythology may be an important way to make it go viral.

(2) Nation Books, New York, 2014, 240 pp.

(3) See kansascity.com/news/government-politics/article364302/Green-energy-has-been-a-political-giant-but-a-threat-looms-in-Kansas.html

Why the emphasis on “today” or “now?” Because one of the most important aspects of a changed national security effort is that today the world has changed—the worldwide web and modern transportation have in fact changed the world into a global village. So how do people/nations behave most successfully in a small village? They follow some common sense rules: they “demonstrate responsible leadership, work cooperatively with others, respect the rule of law, help others in need, protect the place in which everyone lives (in this case our planet), and choose peaceful solutions to conflicts as often as possible.” (1) This simple statement of rules for nations to live by just happens to come from a recent pamphlet called Shared Security: Reimagining U.S. Foreign Policy,jointly published in 2013 by the Friends Committee on National Legislation and the American Friends Service Committee. But these rules are in essence exactly the same ones proposed by another, very different Washington policy document, one that comes from the D.C. world of national security analysts.

That document is titled A National Strategic Narrative, published by the Woodrow Wilson Institute in 2011, and authored by “Mr. Y,” a pseudonym for Capt. Wayne Porter and Col. Mark “Puck” Mykleby, USMC, who were actively serving military officers at the time. These gentlemen employ a lot more classic American framing and “Beltway speak” in their version of this simple proposal. But they too warn of dire consequences if the U.S. does not change course about seeing “national security” as a purely military matter. In fact, Shared Security cites the “Mr. Y” document in its own bibliography. Both documents share a common premise: the time is ripe now for rethinking what American national security is and how we get it.

Of course, both of these documents pre-date the latest explosion of new knowledge about aggressive NSA spying. They don’t reflect new information about the NSA’s forthcoming code-breaking supercomputer that can breach every “secure” https ever created.(2) The two documents I’ve cited above also preceded the current level of critique, both at home and abroad, of U.S. war-proxy drone attacks. New information is now available about not-so-reliable, way too general, and far too remote NSA drone targeting info that does kill the innocent. (3)

But the rules of successful behavior in a village have remained the same, no matter how much military and spy tactics have recently changed. Humans had many millennia to work these out and move beyond whatever came before them, though new primate and anthropological research suggests we have always succeeded better by cooperating than by competing. More recently in the history of our species we’ve learned that dueling and blood feuds are extremely stupid ways to settle conflicts. Over time we can and do change our ideas about what kind of violence “works”, and it’s time for another big shift in this department, because it is increasingly clear that war, threats of war, preparing for war, mega-spying and war-proxy drone attacks really don’t “work” anymore. (4) They don’t bring us the results we planned. They are also counterproductive. They produce “blowback,” or “boomerang” effects far in excess of the original insult or attack, whatever it was. In addition, they lead to an explosion of new folks filled with rage and the desire for revenge. That decreases, rather than increases our national security–it actually goes “down.”

On the other hand, peace-building steps help us retreat safely from the brink of conflict, which makes our national security “go up.” This is especially true in situations like the current Ukraine-Russian crisis, which carries the risk of armed confrontation between major, nuclear-armed powers. Moreover, globally, as the number of resource conflicts brought on by climate change increases, we are going to have to figure out new peaceable ways of “just getting along” with each other. For example, the coming conflicts over water resources or arable land don’t have to lead to violence. Cooperative solutions have worked, even among those not known for being too friendly with each other. Shared Security cites some very interesting examples of peaceable water sharing between India and Pakistan (Indus Waters Treaty), in Central Asia, Africa, and also Central America.(5)  I’m sure an honest bit of research could turn up a lot more examples of rational, common sense sharing even among potential foes.

Ultimately, that’s exactly what it’s about: learning to share and build or rebuild trust. Either we figure out how to coexist peacefully on this planet or we are going to flame out fast. That would definitely cause our national security to go “down,” long before the end.  Another place to start rebuilding the peace is by halting obsessive mega-spying on our own citizens, Congress, as well as others around the globe. These actions destroy every bit of trust we have that our liberty, our civil rights, our finances, and even our medical records, are safe from the risk of unscrupulous security breaches by unknown parties. Trust is what has always held human communities together, no matter what their size, scale, or character. Lose community trust, and our security goes way, way down. It’s very clear: in every possible way: the “NSA – military corporations” axis has “gone too far,” as we Americans say. They are actually making our real security “go down.”  It’s time to stop them.

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Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project,http://www.metaphorproject.org,  and author of our new book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong.

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Notes: 

l. Shared Security: Reimagining U.S. Foreign Policy, available online, p.19.

2. See NSA Seeks to Build Quantum Computer That Could Crack Most Types of Encryption

3. See “The Dangerous Seduction of Drones,” by Medea Benjamin

4. See David Swanson, War No More: The Case for Abolition, and also his new “World Beyond War” website

5. p. 18.

So what “American truth bites” do we need on this subject? Well, for starters, the administration should immediately change the title of their “This is Obamacare” informational website, www.thisisobamacare.com.While the info on it is good and the graphics lively, they’ve already lost by using that title. A recent Democracy Nowshow demonstrated that people like the “Affordable Care Act,” but hate “Obamacare:” too many Americans don’t realize they are one and the same.(3) I’m not going to suggest an alternative domain name here; some opponent reading this would quickly buy it up, but any fool could do better than “This is Obamacare!” So President Obama, hurry up and change it right now, and fire whoever told you to use it.

But what about the rest of us? First of all, we need a very simple phrase to say something positive about what the ACA was designed to be: it’s a RESCUE. It’s PATIENT PROTECTION, that phrase having been part of the original title of the law. It’s supposed to rescue sick Americans and protect them from the abuses of a rogue industry, one that actually denied them health care. The ACA’s goal is to get all Americans the medical care they need in order to be productive citizens. (See 4 for answers re objections to these statements.) The law is designed to reduce the exorbitant cost and backwards medical process unique to this country. And there is some good news about this subject already. Paul Krugman has just reported that health care costs are starting to fall, and health care providers are behaving in a more productive and sensible manner.(5)

In states where the governors agreed to set up state-based ACA insurance exchanges, things are going well.(6) People are signing up easily and are deeply grateful. So say: SOME STATES MAKE AFFORDABLE CARE WORK JUST FINE.  It also means that in those states the whole population will be healthier, and that should lead to a better state economy too. HEALTH LEADS TO WEALTH, because HEALTH GROWS ECONOMIC ENERGY. A recent study compared the economies of Minnesota (thriving) and Wisconsin (lagging). It shows that slashing jobs and benefits, throwing people out of work, starving poor children by cutting their food, and the whole rest of the Right’s agenda is actually bad for a state’s economy.(7)

Now, as my regular readers know, I always recommend starting positive in a framing fight, sandwiching the negative in the middle, then going positive to finish up. So now for the negatives: what is the Right doing? SABOTAGE. Why? Because they are IN THE PAY OF CORRUPT [INSURANCE] CORPORATIONS. Those are the folks who want to get their profit-rich, abusive system back, making money by refusing to help sick people and children get health care. The Right’s “Obamacare” attack is just a HEALTH CARE SHUTDOWN TRICK. They try to dupe ordinary Americans hooked by the idea that ‘Obamacare” is about taking their money and freedom, instead of what the ACA really intends to do. That’s where the Right’s new “redistribution” framing ploy comes in too, but there is real doubt even in DC about whether this will work in a country where everyone knows that the 99% have already lost their money to the 1%. (8) So say: NOW THE 1% WANT TO TAKE OUR HEALTH CARE TOO!

So much for the negatives. Now it’s time to circle back to the positives. Say: THE AFFORDABLE CARE LAW PROTECTS US WHEN WE’RE SICK.(9) Or: THE AFFORDABLE CARE LAW RESCUES SICK AMERICANS. Or: SOME STATES ARE MAKING THE AFFORDABLE CARE LAW WORK JUST FINE. And add: GOOD HEALTH LEADS TO WEALTH!

Even if the actual workings of the law over time prove that the insurance companies managed to fully sabotage it internally, it must still stand as a witness to what America’s best intentions for health care reform are. If we succeed in reframing “Obamacare,” that American dream will continue to generate real political power for the idea of sane health care, no matter what health insurance company mischief turns up. When and if it does, just call it by its right name: betraying America.

Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, http://www.metaphorproject.org,  and author of our new book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong.

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1. Using the opposition’s frame without tweaking it significantly enough to give people the feeling that it is something really different and opposed has been scientifically proven to be a losing strategy. George Lakoff wrote an entire book, Don’t Think of an Elephant¸ to teach Democrats, liberals, and progressives about this fact. Why this knowledge hasn’t penetrated the White House enough by now is hard to understand. Re tweaking a word or phrase enough to make a strongly felt difference in meaning, here are a few examples from my own work with The Metaphor Project: l. During the Iraq War, we countered “stay the course” with “course change.” 2. During the 2010 congressional debate over the financial regulation bill, we countered the known negatives of the word “regulation,” with the word “rules,” as in everyone should “play by the [same] rules” (The Right uses the word “regulation” to imply “hurts business, costs jobs etc.”)  It doesn’t matter a bit for the process of swaying public opinion that the bill was actually about “regulations.” It was also really about “rules.” What matters is the story the words tell on the stump, online, and in the media. That’s where you win or lose.
2. Lakoff’s piece is available at: http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/4339256?utm_source=Alert-blogger&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Email%2BNotifications;
   Reich’s is at: http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/272-39/20576-three-obamacare-truths-that-the-republicans-ignore
3. http://m.democracynow.org/stories/14006
4. Although several analysts have suggested that the ACA is full of traps for the people and outs for the health insurance industry, (http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/19692-obamacare-the-biggest-insurance-scam-in-history?tmpl=component&print=1 andhttp://paulcraigroberts.org/2013/02/03/obamacare-a-primer/), the stated values and goals of the Act have huge political power for the future. If people really can’t or don’t get what the Act promises, pressure will mount for a real solution that does give them what they need. Already, in Vermont, which is one of the states that have set up a state-based exchange, the model is more like a Medicare extension, or as some call it, a “single payer” system. (See http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/11/24/1258135/-Obama-just-launched-single-payer-in-America?detail=email for details.) We need to understand that this health care fight is a long haul, given the enormous power of the health insurance industry. It’s one that should never have been set up as a profit-earning business, because everyone needs health care sooner or later. That’s not the way any other insurance business works; for fire insurance to work, only a few houses must burn down, not everybody’s!
5. See http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/29/opinion/krugman-obamacares-secret-success.html
6. See http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/09/us/politics/uninsured-find-more-success-via-health-exchanges-run-by-states.html?_r=0
7. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/24/opinion/sunday/right-vs-left-in-the-midwest.html
8. See the last paragraphs in:http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/24/us/dont-dare-call-the-health-law-redistribution.html?ref=todayspaper
9. Calling the ACA an “Act” might suggest to some that it is still in play. Calling it a Law” reminds everyone that it is the law.

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Let’s start with educating the convinced about possible fixes. Years of research have shown that trying to motivate people on this issue by scaring them fails. Up-to-date framing research proves that people respond better to a “prevent damage” message than to an “avoid risk” one.(2) So, the real focus of our framing on this issue should be action to prevent more damage to our economy: who can do what, who is doing what, what is working now.(3) Americans are pragmatic, action-oriented optimists. We need to pose the climate change problem as a challenge we can all meet.

Along these lines, some language picks I’d make from the Metaphor Project’s “American Story” lists include these: being prosperous, saving money, being clean, safe, and healthy, being free, and doing it ourselves. Big political change in this country always starts with the grassroots. That bottom-up path calls on our most prized national traits –doing things in our own communities, being part of a grassroots groundswell, being innovative, pragmatic, showing can-do, rolling-up-our sleeves, helping to reinvent a new, healthier economy from the ground up.

So much for educating the convinced about solutions. What about convincing more of our fellow citizens that the problem is real? First, we need to bear in mind the fact that most Americans are primarily extroverted sensing types—they require proof about the reality of a problem from their five senses. Climate change is a bit like cancer—it’s silent, and it’s been happening somewhere else. The warning signs are easy to miss for the average American. So be understanding of anyone who honestly seems to be unaware or incredulous. Start by talking about how much we all want a prosperous new economy. Then describe climate change as the “growing climate crisis that threatens our economy and our way of life,” because for some it may not seem like a full-fledged “crisis” yet. When we get to the moment for going into detail, we need to use stories about what’s already been happening to other Americans lately: increasing drought, mega-storms, floods, fire storms beyond anything we’ve seen before, rising sea levels, bad changes in local weather patterns and their costs. Once you get people’s ear this way, you can quickly move on to talking about suggestions for positive action. (If you encounter a Fox News denial fan, just laugh, and say, “Oh, you’ve been watching Fox News!” and then walk away laughing. Don’t stay to argue. Especially don’t argue about what the majority of scientists say. Don’t waste your energy on hardcore deniers.)

If you need to give a cause for the climate change problem, describe it as the result of too much carbon getting into our air. (To learn more about natural ways to get carbon back where it belongs in plants and in the soil, see Note 4.) Pollution is something everyone knows is dirty and bad for your health And please avoid talking about “greenhouse gases.” To the general public, greenhouses are good things that help you grow more food! (It would be nice if even the experts stopped saying “greenhouse gases” to each other too. That unfortunate metaphor inevitably slips out in public and harms the cause of reform. I like “hothouse gases” better, because it sounds more like the real thing and nasty too. Also please avoid using any evidence that relies on pictures of or references to the fate of the “environment,” or of other species of all kinds such as polar bears, penguins, etc. Avoid talking about polar and glacier melts, using charts or graphs, and talking about CO2!” Everyone who can be convinced by the means I’m criticizing here is already on board.

Now it’s time to consider our third task, which is actually quite separate from the two previous ones above. As Bill McKibben and others have pointed out, we do have to hold the carbon crooks and climate crisis deniers up for public shaming. But even when your project is shaming the fossil fuel gang, it’s vital to start and conclude with a positive vision of the clean energy world and prosperous economy we could have instead. In between these two positive notes there are a number of classic American negatives you can sound: the deniers are “telling lies and betraying the public trust.” They are on the take, they are stealing subsidy money from the taxpayers, they are sabotaging our clean energy future, they are blocking progress, they are holding our country and our economy back or hostage, and they are profiting from damaging our health, our economy, and our country. Their CEOs are blocking the dawn of a new energy age, they are criminal cons, they have gone too far, they are corrupt, and as for their ‘wait and see” strategy—do you wait until your house burns down to buy insurance? They are costing us too much. You can also warn people that everyone will soon be selling their fossil fuel stocks and moving their money into alternative energy investments, because “the carbon bubble is going to burst.” (For more about this “divestment” strategy, see what’s new about it on http://www.350.org/.) 

So much for going negative. Always, whatever our messages or audiences might be, we must start and end by returning to the positive: “We can do it, it will be good for us, it will prevent new damage, it will save/make money/jobs, save our health, our economy, our communities. We can improve our economy by meeting the climate change challenge!

Let’s put powerful new American Story energy into all of our campaigns now and get the massive liftoff we so desperately need!

Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, www.metaphorproject.org, and author of our new book, Move Our Message: How to Get America’s Ear. The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong.

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Notes

1.This fact has recently been noted in “U.S. Energy Policy: A Bridge to Nowhere,” by Bob Burnett, on Huffington Post.

2. The following links provide details about the new research on framing climate change action:

climateshiftproject.org/winning-the-conversation-framing-and-moral-messaging-in-environmental-campaigns/

talkingclimate.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Language-Words-and-Phrases.pdf

valuesandframes.org/blue-valuing-green/

www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/

3. Cows Save the Planet: And Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth, by Judith D. Schwartz, (Chelsea Green Publishing, 2013.)

As we all know, the first problem all the new gun safety proposals have is the same as ever. Congress members are afraid of the NRA, its lobbying power, its members, and the loss of its dollars. Of course, We the People are going to call our representatives and send a message to Walmart about their assault rifle sales too. But the media, along with some well-meaning advocates of gun “control,” are creating the second problem. They keep talking about gun “control,” in headlines, articles, on the air, on the web. Then the politicians and opinion leaders follow suit, because “control” seems like the dominant frame again.

As my regular readers already know, “control” is the NRA’s favorite frame. They like it because they can use it to scare. They know what it does to moderates who just like to hunt or shoot skeet. So everyone who really cares about new gun safety laws has to stop calling them “control.” Every newspaper or magazine editor, online media gatekeeper or well-meaning gun “control” advocate who cares about our poor bullet-ridden country must switch.  There are many ways to say it in a way that will draw support: sensible gun limits, sane gun rules, stricter gun rules, commonsense gun measures. Just avoid “regulation/s” (a G.O.P. bugaboo word), and be sure to talk about “safety” too. As for those gun “control” advocates who want to say “control” because they are just so mad, ask them to please recall that we need to keep our eyes on the prize. We must do what works, because lives are at stake.

Just in case you need to offer more explanation, here’s a bit about why the framing matters. We have to get massive, bipartisan grass roots lobbying power to move forward on gun safety. That means we have to stop the reborn “control” boogeyman again. It wasn’t always this way. As of January 8^th, 2013, the White House was using “gun safety” in its communications about Biden’s task force: Mike Allen’s Playbook reported the following:

“THE NEW AGENDA – ‘White House ramping up gun violence discussions,’ by AP White House Correspondent Julie Pace : ‘Biden will meet Wednesday with gun violence victims’ groups and gun safety organizations [emphasis mine]…”

This was followed on 1.10.13 by an item in the San Francisco Chronicle, p.A8,

[Headline] ‘Biden convenes gun task force, promises action.”

‘Biden told a group of gun safety {emphasis mine} advocates and victims of gun violence [that] the President and I are determined to take action.’

As far back as 12.23.12, I started getting reports from Metaphor Project Network members that our “gun safety” frame had gone viral. Key opinion leaders like Willie Nelson, Ed Schulz, and James Fallows were using the new language on the air.

Friends, we outran the gun “control” frame once. It’s time to put our shoulders to the wheel again. Lobby all the media sources and activist opinion leaders you follow about dropping “control.”  Tweet, facebook it, email it, write letters to the editor, call up the editorial or the station staff, write comments, demonstrate, threaten to cancel subscriptions or stop donating, etc.  If any of the people you contact protest, ask them just whose side they are on: Wayne LaPierre and the gun makers or We, the fed up People of America?

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Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, metaphorproject.org, and author of the  new book, Move Our Message: How To Get America’s Ear.  The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997.

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