Metaphors and Politics 2004

The Republican Party holds the high ground when it comes to communicating their agenda and ideas to Americans. It is actually more accurate to say that a small sub-species of Conservative Republicans hold the high ground. They captured this high ground by carefully crafting their message over the past forty years—not because of the truth of their propositions.

That makes it tough going for the millions of Progressives who by and large are Democrats. Progressive Democrats have not done nearly as well crafting a consistent message that typifies their ideas and agenda and plays well to Americans. The best they have achieved in over two decades is the tactical victories of President Clinton.

Story, metaphor, and framing have now taken their rightful place in the discussion of strategies required to capture share of political mind and win elections.

Mr. Kerry’s campaign has been ineffective because they do not understand those strategies. They, consequently, do not know how to frame an agenda in a manner agreeable to the American public. They have even been ineffective in discussing simple concepts such as the difference between means and ends. At this late date in the campaign they have just come around to making the distinction between agreed upon goals and poor management and execution toward those goals.

Mr. Cheney pushed the illogic and emotion of the campaign to its ultimate and extreme conclusion several weeks ago. Mr. Cheney stated that if America elected Mr. Kerry, then America would be visited by acts of terrorism more terrible than 9/11. How many people deduced from his proposition its logical conclusion contained in the following syllogism?

Presidents are accountable and responsible for the acts of terrorism that occur on their watch.

9/11 occurred on Mr. Bush’s watch.

Therefore, Mr. Bush is accountable and responsible for 9/11.

Some folks in the Kerry campaign may have noticed it, but since they are not well schooled in helping people sort through logical subtleties, they were unable to capitalize on it.

Informal logic and rhetoric are ancient and stodgy kinds of studies although highly worthy of our use and admiration. Researchers studying how the human brain works have, however, moved beyond traditional logic in understanding how people reason. Metaphor plays a significant role in our reasoning.

This is something Conservative ideologues have intuitively known for several decades. They have crafted a message that plays strongly in many American’s imaginations.

The interesting thing that is happening during this election is that there is a growing split amongst Conservatives. The people who worked hard for several decades to frame the Conservative metaphors so that they are strongly entrenched in many American’s psyches, now see that message being eroded by Mr. Bush’s Administration.

Americans have historically taken a business like and pragmatic view of their politics. They scratch where it itches. It is not surprising that people of all political persuasions are becoming rapidly frustrated with the Bush Administration’s disregard for success as significant measure of the effectiveness of their policies. The veneer of moral certitude by hypocrites as the only overarching measure of the success of a policy or an idea is rapidly wearing thin.

The Constitution creates and nourishes a great amount of pluralism in the United States. Slowly, but surely, Progressives will be forced to face their failures in doing the hard work needed to tap into this pluralism by effectively framing and communicating their ideas to Americans. But Progressives are starting to get it if only because they are getting slaughtered at election time. Traditional Conservatives now see that a new onslaught will be made against their most cherished ideas and messages.

Mr. Bush will be reelected. It is not surprising though. Mr. Bush has crafted a message on top of the traditional Conservative message that is highly successful at the moment. That message would not exist if it had not been for the 9/11 attack.

Mr. Bush’s message will prove to be an alien message to Americans and quickly be repudiated after the election. There is nothing in his message that does not pander to the emotions of the time and does not have its goal his reelection.

Four years from now it will be hard to find those folks who shrilly advocated his reelection. The Bush message is an anomaly that holds no permanent place in the American psyche where business, pluralism, and pragmatism are seen as the way to progress.