Some dude sent a memo around the Hill. Yawn. What insight!
“Republicans have been kicking our rhetorical butt since about 1995,” [Dave] Helfert wrote…
His memo is sharply critical of Republican policies but also suggests a neurological explanation for Republican message success: By using emotional appeals and warning of dire threats, Republicans can trigger neurons called “amygdalae” in the temporal lobe, which is the seat of the “fight or flight” response in the brain.
“Almost every Republican message contains a simple and direct moral imperative, a stark contrast between good and evil, right and wrong, common sense and fuzzy liberal thinking,” Helfert wrote. “Meanwhile, we’re trying to ignite passions with analyses of optimum pupil-teacher ratios.”
Score one for George Lakoff. Who cares?
Here’s what interested me (emphasis mine).
But another Democratic aide said Helfert’s memo reflects the frustration of many of those with a role in getting the message out. Several hundred of them assembled for Monday’s meeting in the Ways and Means Committee room.
“I don’t agree with every point he’s making, but the sentiment of exasperation I totally agree with,” said the aide.
As a case in point, he cited Democrats’ frustration over the likely showdown with President Bush over supplemental spending for the Iraq war. Democrats are discussing not sending a supplemental spending bill to the floor until Bush changes course on the war. But that makes many Democrats nervous that Bush will use the tactic to say Democrats aren’t supporting the troops.
“Are we any more prepared to deal with the threats that are going to come about cutting off funds to the troops?” asked the aide.
Okay!! Democrats are ‘discussing not sending a supplemental spending bill to the floor until Bush changes course on the war.’. That’s good. That’s very, very good. Here’s a piece of advice. Follow through on this idea. What’s more, get the presidential candidates to support you and take the lead on this strategy. If any candidate won’t support it, toss them aside. Just say no.
The president is polling at 24%. His idea of a comeback is to veto health care for children and cut off people’s heat in the middle of winter. And you are afraid of this?
Republicans have done a better job by developing poll data into focus group-tested messages like “culture of life” and “defending marriage,” along with attacks like “cut and run” and “plan for surrender” in Iraq, he argued.
In particular, Helfert points to Republican pollster Frank Luntz, who helped develop the 1994 “Contract with America” and is credited with helping Republicans come up with terms for polices like “Healthy Forests” and “Death Tax.”
Here is our rebuttal. ‘You elected us to get us out of Iraq and we are going to get us out of Iraq. We gave the president a surge…it hasn’t worked. We will appropriate no more money for Iraq except funds to facilitate a total withdrawal of our troops. We will not drop this fiasco on the doorstep of the next president.’
Say it over and over again.
Democrats in general and liberals in particular need to get better at describing what they stand for and what they are going to do about it in a simple. direct, and strong fashion.
We need to get out of this whiney mode where we buy into stupid republican frames and then getting distracted by some silly mock scandal about a singer at a campaign event.
Dems form the worst political opposition ever, anywhere.
Even when they make a good move, they make sure to make it insignificant. And you can count on them to avoid doing exactly what is needed to be done.
Democrats spend too much time appealing to reason. I understand why – it seems like the way that civilized human beings should go about making decisions. It’s actually a good chunk of the reason that I vote for Dem candidates nowadays – they usually have well-reasoned stances on issues that have been well-researched and don’t just rely on “booga-booga vote for me or else” tactics and coded winks and nods to their “base”.
Republicans spend a lot of time appealing to emotion. This is, as BooMan points out, not any kind of new insight. But it works. That’s why when Dems pull out the appeal to emotion card the GOPers go APE. SHIT. Look at how they reacted to the S-CHIP debate when the Dems had the audacity to show people who had been helped by the program (which was actually an appeal to reason, I think, but they accidentally stumbled into a good emotional appeal):
APE. SHIT. The GOP was reduced to throwing stinky monkey poo all over the place because they couldn’t figure out how to react, they just knew they HAD to react. They’ve been playing the “think of the children” card for decades and they KNOW that it works. Suddenly the Dems were throwing the “think of the children” card right in their faces. The smart ones knew it was coming and supported the program – the dumb ones were left slackjawed when the Dems used their own trick against them.
The problem with the Iraq war debate is that all of the good reasons for getting out of Iraq are reasonable ones. And all of the reasons for staying in Iraq are emotional ones. That’s a tough sell – the folks who can be convinced by reason have been convinced. And coming up with emotional reasons to get out of Iraq is HARD – especially when the troops there are volunteers and have a strong sense of loyalty to their fellows and a strong sense of duty. When the folks on the ground get repeatedly quoted as saying “I want to stay here and fight until we win” it makes it hard to come up with an emotional appeal on their behalf. And any emotional appeal for the Iraqis is a double-edged sword – there’s always the argument that things might get worse if we leave. That’s a powerful emotional appeal right there – doing something that might make things worse is harder to justify than maintaining a status quo – even if maintaining the status quo actually makes things worse.
I wish there was an easy answer to this but there isn’t. But Democrats have to stop trying to govern with the citizenry they wish they had and start acknowledging the way the world actually works. Work to change it by all means, but don’t ignore the fact that people in this country just aren’t as reasonable as one might want them to be and work with that. If you want to call it “framing” fine, whatever, but the point is figure out what you want to do through reason, find a good emotional appeal to sell it to the masses and then DO IT. Don’t fret and panic and go through a litany of all the bad things that Republicans are going to do to you over it – commit to the damn action and make figuring out how to neutralize the Republican emotional appeals part and parcel with that action. Stop being such whiny pissants and DO SOMETHING. That is why we elected them after all.
“You go to war with the citizenry you have, not the citizenry you wish you had”
Ahhhh…..the Rumsfeld spirit lives on!!!
Your comments sound very much on-the-mark to me.
I agree that emotional appeals are important, though I would not say that the repubs did not know how to react in the CHIP debate. They knew exactly what they were doing – and they succeeded to won satisfaction (so far). On the other hand, Dems never now well they are connecting either with emotional or rational appeals – they can’t see any midway results, and just hope that next election will be rewarding.
But I do not quite agree with this:
To me, dems are playing appeals to reason, and showing (whether willfully or not) that reason does not work. The regard of reason is the biggest casualty of the 21st century political process. Of course, it all started in full with the media liberalization act of 1996 (thanks, Clinton). But the thing is: Dems showed no capability to sustain rational manners of political discourse. Kerry missed a lot of chances, for example. We need to connect emotionally, but we badly need to (re)impose more rational discourse as well – rationality is on our side, and that is why it is skillfully diminished by the opponents.
On the other hand, routines of rational thinking should not be seen as restriction of ourselves. We can play with rationality more creatively and less predictively, so to overwhelm the opponents a little and take some initiative.
…it’s what they should say relentlessly, repeatedly:
‘You elected us to get us out of Iraq and we are going to get us out of Iraq. We gave the president a surge…it hasn’t worked. We will appropriate no more money for Iraq except funds to facilitate a total withdrawal of our troops. We will not drop this fiasco on the doorstep of the next president.’
And some of them will. Unfortunately, that idea does [make] many Democrats nervous that Bush will use the tactic to say Democrats aren’t supporting the troops.
It’s been the same since January 2007. And it will be the same until January 2009. And then, who knows…?
It’s hard work, but somebody’s got to be the grown-up.
Cut off the allowance – they used to call this tough love.
From the article:
I don’t know who this unnamed aide is, but he’s not only not listening (as usual) he’s actually quite disdainful of the whole effort to turn things around.
I don’t understand how the democrats are ignoring their low approval ratings, or how they’re rationalizing breaking their most important promises, but this guy’s comment certainly provides a clue. There are none so blind as those that refuse to see. It’s kind of like my old man in this interminable argument we’ve been having, in which he says the argument is about anything but what it’s about.
How patronizing can you get? These are people who are simply NOT LISTENING. They seem to have told themselves a completely different narrative about what their 06 victory meant, and while I’m also pleased that “Democrats are discussing not sending a supplemental spending bill to the floor until Bush changes course on the war”, I’m resigned to the fact that the leadership aides quoted above will probably have the final say in the matter. Which means Bush will get more money, no strings attached.
Well, it seems like another opportunity to prove they stand for something has come along. Doesn’t it just seem like the opportunities are endless?
Sound like fighting words???
Hmmmmmm……….You mean like this, Tony?
Okay, Democrats. Once again I’m waiting with bated breath. Show me the money.
only part that gets my attention:
But that makes many Democrats nervous that Bush will use the tactic to say Democrats aren’t supporting the troops.
note how he is worried about what others will say as if that speech act was only available to one party and the dems were rendered in impotent silence at all times. tacit acknowlegement that dems have no message control, and the media is a hostile environment for the democratic perspective. you’d think a majority would try to do something about that, but instead today’s dems just accept that playing field and always bring their trusty knives to the gunfight. what losers.
“Are we any more prepared to deal with the threats that are going to come about cutting off funds to the troops?” asked the aide.
what kind of threats, from whom? he’s not talking about angry bobbleheads on teevee; he’s already admitted that’s a lost cause. he means threats from those who profit from continued war, those who are currently pouring money into dem coffers, those who once supported the bushies but have felt the popular tide turn. the ones paying for a political rebranding of the war (HRC’s “fewer” troops).
Nothing like doing something to increase your support among the lowly masses of common folk.
Clinton throws glitzy $1M birthday bash
Man oh man……..There is going to be some hay made out of this!!!!!!
Can’t be good throwing a 1 million dollar b-day party. Whatever happen to cake and ice cream or a pizza party at Show-Biz Pizza?
Maybe she is trying to deflect attention to her vote giving W defacto authority to invade Iran, I think it was that traitor Joe sponsored the bill.
While I guess he was probably afraid to come out of the house on his birthday, I’m sure someone like Brit Hume will sarcastically point out the contrast with how Bush celebrated his 60th birthday.
Faux News will be in full blown Category 5 spin mode on this one. Way to go Hillary !!
To Republicans everything is “giving comfort” to terrorist. At 24% poling numbers for W, Democrats have nothing to fear, unless their afraid of their own shadow.
Nothing is working in Iraq, it is time to force the Iraqi Military to stand-up while the U.S. pulls out. A kinda of sink or swim mentality for the Iraqi Military.