PraiseforTheALLNEWDon’tThinkofanElephant!

“When the original Don’t Think of an Elephant!came out in 2004, Lakoff showed us that progressiveDemocrats voted on values, not issues—just like theright. Now, Dr. Lakoff is back to prevent a relapse ofbad framing. The ALL NEW Don’t Think of anElephant!is amust read, every bit as important as thefirstedition.Thistimewehavetotrainourselvestothinkforthelongterm.Buythisbook,memorizeit,andteachitto your children. Progressives may be smart, but wedon’t communicate our ideas well. This book is theblueprintforhowtodobetter.”

—HowardDean,formerchairoftheDemocraticNationalCommitteeandfounderofDemocracyfor

America

“Lakoff single-handedly convinced liberals of theimportanceof language inwinningpoliticalbattles.Nowhe’sbacktofinishwhathestarted.”

—MarkosMoulitsas,founderandpublisher,DailyKos

“The All New Don’t Think of an Elephant! is anindispensable tool for progressives—packed with new

thinking on framing issues that are hotly debated rightnow, and new insights on how to reclaim the politicaldebateonmeaningfultermsthatcanyieldtrueprogress,notjustpoliticalgains.”

—JenniferM.Granholm,formergovernorofMichigan

Praiseforthefirstedition,Don’tThinkofanElephant!

“It’snotenoughthatwehavereasononourside.Wealso have to usewords and images powerful enough topersuadeothers.Lakoffofferscrucial lessonsinhowtocounterright-wingdemagoguery.Essentialreadinginthisneo-OrwellianageofBush-speak.”

—RobertReich,author,Aftershock ,formerUSSecretaryofLabor

“Fascinating insights intowhy progressives lose goodcauses and how they can startwinning again.Youwillnever listen to a political speech the same way afterreadingthisbook.”

—TinaBrown,cofounder,TheDailyBeast“Don’tletanyonetellyouthatthewordsdon’tmakea

difference;theycanevokethebestandtheworstinus.

Read thisbookandbepart of transformingourpoliticaldialogue to support our highest ideals and speak to theheartsofAmericans.”

—JoanBladesandWesBoyd,MoveOn.org

“Everwonder how the radical right has been able toconvince averageAmericans to repeatedly vote againsttheirowninterests?It’stheframing,stupid!Don’tThinkof an Elephant! is a pithy and powerful primer on thelanguageofAmericanpolitics, and a vital reminder thathe who creates the political framework controls thepicturethat’sput inside.It’salsoadetailedroadmapoutof themessweare in.Lakoff showshowprogressivescan reclaim the political narrative—and, in the process,changeourcountryandourworldforthebetter.”

—AriannaHuffington,cofounderandeditor-in-chief,TheHuffingtonPost

“Thisisapocketmanifestoforthosewhostillwonderhow a small group of rich, powerful oligarchs tiedtogether the shoelaces of the progressive movement.Read it once, and know why we are losing. Read ittwice,andwecanrestoresanitytotheworld.”

—PaulHawken,authorofNaturalCapitalism“Don’tThinkofanElephant!isaworkofgenius.As

George Lakoff explains how the right has framed the

notion of the political center, he presents both themostoriginal and themostpractical analysisofUnitedStatespoliticsinmanyyears.”

—GeorgeAkerlof,NobelPrizewinnerinEconomics

“GeorgeLakoff’sDon’t Think of anElephant! is awonderfulexampleofwhathappenswhenyoucombinea linguist’s ear for the subtleties of language with anunderstandingof thecomplexitiesofmodernpoliticsanda commitment to progressive ideals.Whether you thinkofyourselfasaliberal,aprogressive,orsimplysomeonewithaninterestinhowpoliticallanguageworks,thisisamustread.”

—GeoffreyNunberg,UniversityofCalifornia,Berkeley

“Progressives have a lot to learn about persuadingswingvoters toourcause,andthere’snobetter teacherthanGeorgeLakoff.Thisreadabletextcouldn’tbemoretimely; it should be readwidely and put towork beforeNovember!”

—DanielEllsberg,authorofSecrets:AMemoirofVietnamandthePentagonPapers

“If you want to take back our country, you have totakebackyourcommunity.Ifyouwanttotakebackyour

community,youneedtotakebackthedebate.Thisbook,and thevideo that goeswith it, are your essential tools.What theBush administration has done for obfuscation,GeorgeLakoff’sworkdoesforclarification.”

—CarlPope,formerpresident,SierraClub

PreviousBooksByGeorgeLakoff★PoliticalAction★TheLittleBlueBook

Don’tThinkofanElephant!ThinkingPoints★DeepPolitics★MoralPoliticsWhoseFreedom?ThePoliticalMind

★LinguisticsandCognitiveScience★MetaphorsWeLiveBy

Women,Fire,andDangerousThingsPhilosophyintheFlesh

WhereMathematicsComesFromMoreThanCoolReason

★★TheALLNEW★★Don’tThinkofanElephant!

KnowYourValuesandFrametheDebate

GeorgeLakoff

ChelseaGreenPublishingWhiteRiverJunction,Vermont

Copyright©2004,2014byGeorgeLakoff.Allrightsreserved.

Nopartofthisbookmaybetransmittedorreproducedinanyformbyanymeanswithoutpermissioninwritingfromthepublisher.

ThefirsteditionofthisbookwaspublishedasDon’tThinkofanElephant!

Editor:JoniPradedProjectManager:PatriciaStoneCopyEditor:DeborahHeimannProofreader:EricRaetzDesigner:MelissaJacobson

PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica.FirstprintingSeptember,2014.109876543211415161718

OurCommitmenttoGreenPublishingChelseaGreenseespublishingasatoolforculturalchangeandecologicalstewardship.Westrivetoalignourbookmanufacturingpracticeswithoureditorialmissionandtoreducetheimpactofourbusinessenterpriseontheenvironment.Weprintourbooksandcatalogsonchlorine-freerecycledpaper,usingvegetable-basedinkswheneverpossible.Thisbookmaycostslightlymorebecauseitwasprintedonpaperthatcontainsrecycledfiber,andwehopeyou’llagreethatit’sworthit.ChelseaGreenisamemberoftheGreenPressInitiative(www.greenpressinitiative.org),anonprofitcoalitionofpublishers,manufacturers,andauthorsworkingtoprotecttheworld’sendangeredforestsandconservenaturalresources.TheALLNEWDon’tThinkofanElephant!wasprintedonpapersuppliedbyThomson-Shorethatcontains100%postconsumerrecycledfiber.

ISBN978-1-60358-594-1(paperback)—ISBN978-1-60358-595-8

(ebook)

TheLibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationDataisavailableuponrequest.

ChelseaGreenPublishing85NorthMainStreet,Suite120WhiteRiverJunction,VT05001(802)295-6300www.chelseagreen.com

ToKathleen,Whoseinsightsilluminateeverypage

★Contents★★Preface★Introduction:ReframingIsSocialChangePartI:Framing101:TheoryandApplicationFraming101:HowtoTakeBackPublicDiscourse

PartII:Framing102:FramingtheUnframedFramingtheUnframedReflexivity:TheBrainandtheWorldSystemicCausationPoliticsandPersonhoodThePrivateDependsonthePublic

PartIII:FramingforSpecificIssuesFreedomIssuesThePikettyInsightontheAcceleratingWealthGapGovernmentbyCorporation

PartIV:Framing:LookingBackaDecadeWhat’sinaWord?Plenty,IfIt’sMarriageMetaphorsofTerrorMetaphorsThatKill

PartV:FromTheorytoActionWhatConservativesWantWhatUnitesProgressives

FrequentlyAskedQuestionsHowtoRespondtoConservatives★ACKNOWLEDGMENTS★

★Preface★

Tenyearsago,in2004,whenthefirsteditionofthisbookappeared, hardly anyonehadheardof or thought about,muchlessdiscussed,howsocialandpoliticalissueswereframed. Framing was an unknown and undiscussedconcept, outside of the academic field of framesemantics.Don’t Think of an Elephant! became a best seller

and changed all that. Discussions of how issues areframed are now commonplace in the national media.Millionsofpeopleheartheword“frame”inadiscussionof issues and understand, at least basically, what itmeans. That is a lot for one small book to haveaccomplished.But Don’t Think of an Elephant! had higher goals.

At the time, theRepublicanswere doing amuch betterjob at framing issues their way than the Democratswere.Republicanframingsuperiorityhadplayedamajorpart in their takeoverofCongress in1994. I andothershad hoped that, starting in 2004, a widespreadunderstanding of how framing worked would allowDemocratstoreversethetrend.Inthe2008election,BarackObamaledaDemocratic

sweep of the White House and Congress, using far

superior framing, as well as superior on-the-groundtactics—besides being a far superior candidate. I hadhopedthatthesuperiorframingwouldcontinue.It didn’t. Almost immediately after Obama’s

inauguration in 2009, the Republicans regained framingsuperiority in public discourse, and that played a majorroleintheascendancyoftheTeaPartyinCongressandin statehouses throughout thenation.NowRepublicansaresettingtheirframingsightsonthecitiesaswellasthestates.Whathappened?This tenth anniversary edition ofDon’t Think of An

Elephant!will domore than just recapwhat framing isand how itworks. The goal of this edition is to explainwhat happened,why theDemocrats havegoneback tolosingframingwars,andwhatcanbedoneaboutit.That’s a tall order. Let’s get started. We will recap

Framing101andthengoontoFraming102andbeyond.GeorgeLakoff

Berkeley,CaliforniaJune,2014

★INTRODUCTION★ReframingIsSocialChange

We think with our brains.We have no choice. It mayseemthatcertainpoliticiansthinkwithotherpartsoftheiranatomy.Buttheytoothinkwiththeirbrains.Whydoesthismatterforpolitics?Becauseallthought

isphysical.Thoughtiscarriedoutbyneuralcircuitsinthebrain.Wecanonlyunderstandwhatourbrainsallowustounderstand.The deepest of those neural structures are relatively

fixed.They don’t change readily or easily.Andwe aremostlyunconsciousoftheiractivityandimpact.Infact,about98percentofwhatourbrainsaredoing

isbelowthelevelofconsciousness.Asaresult,wemaynot know all, or even most, of what in our brainsdeterminesourdeepestmoral,social,andpoliticalbeliefs.Andyetweactonthebasisofthoselargelyunconsciousbeliefs.Myfield—cognitivescience—hasfoundwaystostudy

unconscious,aswellasconscious,modesofthought.Asa cognitive scientist, my job is to help make theunconsciousconscious,tofindoutandlettheworldknowwhat is determining our social and political behavior. Ibelieve that such knowledge can lead to positive social

and political change. Why? Because what goes on inpeople’sbrainsmatters.Dowehavetogototheneuralleveltounderstandour

politics? In some cases, yes. Diving that deep will beimportant,andwewilldiscussthebrainwhennecessary.But,onthewhole,themostimportantbrainstructuresforour politics can be studied from the perspective of themind.Theyarecalled“frames.”

Frames

Framesarementalstructuresthatshapethewayweseetheworld.Asaresult,theyshapethegoalsweseek,theplanswemake, thewaywe act, andwhat counts as agood or bad outcome of our actions. In politics ourframes shape our social policies and the institutionsweform to carry out policies. To change our frames is tochangeallofthis.Reframingissocialchange.Youcan’tseeorhearframes.Theyarepartofwhat

wecognitivescientistscallthe“cognitiveunconscious”—structures in our brains that we cannot consciouslyaccess, but know by their consequences.Whatwe call“common sense” ismadeupofunconscious, automatic,effortless inferences that follow from our unconsciousframes.Wealsoknowframesthroughlanguage.Allwordsare

definedrelative toconceptual frames.Whenyouhearaword,itsframeisactivatedinyourbrain.Yes, in your brain. As the title of this book shows,

evenwhenyounegatea frame,youactivate theframe.IfItellyou,“Don’tthinkofanelephant!,”you’llthinkofanelephant.Though I found thisout first in the studyof cognitive

linguistics,ithasbeguntobeconfirmedbyneuroscience.When a macaque monkey grasps an object, a certaingroup of neurons in the monkey’s ventral premotorcortex(whichchoreographsactions,butdoesnotdirectlymove the body) are activated. When the monkey istrainednottograsptheobject,mostofthoseneuronsareinhibited (they turn off), but a portion of the sameneuronsusedingraspingstillturnon.Thatis,toactivelynotgrasprequiresthinkingofwhatgraspingwouldbe.Not only does negating a frame activate that frame,

but the more it is activated, the stronger it gets. Themoral for political discourse is clear: When you argueagainst someone on the other side using their languageand their frames, you are activating their frames,strengthening their frames in those who hear you, andundermining your own views. For progressives, thismeansavoidingtheuseofconservativelanguageandtheframes that the language activates. It means that youshould say what you believe using your language, not

theirs.Reframing

When we successfully reframe public discourse, wechange the way the public sees the world.We changewhat counts as common sense. Because languageactivates frames, new language is required for newframes.Thinkingdifferentlyrequiresspeakingdifferently.Reframing isnoteasyor simple. It isnotamatterof

finding some magic words. Frames are ideas, notslogans.Reframing ismore amatter of accessingwhatweandlike-mindedothersalreadybelieveunconsciously,making it conscious, and repeating it till it entersnormalpublic discourse. It doesn’t happen overnight. It is anongoing process. It requires repetition and focus anddedication.Toachievesocialchange,reframingrequiresachange

in public discourse, and that requires a communicationsystem. Conservatives in America have developed avery extensive and sophisticated communication systemthat progressives have not yet developed. FoxNews isonly the tip of the iceberg. Progressives need tounderstand what an effective communication system isand develop one. Reframing without a system ofcommunicationaccomplishesnothing.

Reframing, as we discuss it in this book, is abouthonesty and integrity. It is the opposite of spin andmanipulation. It is about bringing to consciousness thedeepestofourbeliefsandourmodesofunderstanding.Itis about learning to expresswhatwe reallybelieve in away that will allow those who share our beliefs tounderstandwhat theymostdeeplybelieveand toactonthosebeliefs.Framingisalsoaboutunderstandingthosewedisagree

with most. Tens of millions of Americans voteconservative.For themostpart theyarenotbadpeopleor stupid people. They are people who understand theworld differently and have a different view of what isright.

AllPoliticsIsMoral

When a political leader puts forth a policy or suggestshow we should act, the implicit assumption is that thepolicy or action is right, not wrong. No political leadersays, “Here’s what you should do. Do it because it iswrong—pure evil, but do it.” No political leader putsforth policies on the grounds that the policies don’tmatter. Political prescriptions are assumed to be right.The problem is that different political leaders havedifferentideasaboutwhatisright.

Allpolitics ismoral, butnot everybodyoperates fromthe same view of morality. Moreover, much of moralbelief is unconscious.We are often not even aware ofourownmostdeeplyheldmoralviews.As we shall see, the political divide in America is a

moral divide. We need to understand that moral divideand understand what the progressive and conservativemoralsystemsare.Most importantly, a great many people operate on

different—and inconsistent—moral systems in differentareas of their lives. The technical term is“biconceptualism.”Herethebrainmattersevenmore.Eachmoralsystem

is, in the brain, a system of neural circuitry. How caninconsistent systems function smoothly in the samebrain?Theansweristwofold:(1)mutualinhibition(whenonesystemis turnedontheother is turnedoff);and(2)neural binding to different issues (when each systemoperatesondifferentconcerns).Biconceptualismiscentraltoourpolitics,anditisvital

to understand how it works. We will be discussing itthroughoutthisbook.

WhatIsRationality?

Thebrainandcognitivescienceshaveradicallychanged

ourunderstandingofwhatreasonisandwhatitmeanstoberational.Unfortunately,alltoomanyprogressiveshavebeen taughta falseandoutdated theoryof reason itself,oneinwhichframing,metaphoricalthought,andemotionplaynoroleinrationality.Thishasledmanyprogressivesto the view that the facts—alone—will set you free.Progressivesareconstantlygivinglistsoffacts.Facts matter enormously, but to be meaningful they

must be framed in terms of their moral importance.Remember,youcanonlyunderstandwhat theframesinyourbrainallowyoutounderstand.If thefactsdon’tfitthe frames in your brain, the frames in your brain stayand the facts are ignoredor challengedor belittled.Wewillexplorethoseframesindetailinthepagesahead.It is by popular demand that this book is short and

informal. It is meant to be a practical guide both forcitizenactivistsandforanyonewithaseriousinterest inpolitics. Those who want a more systematic andscholarly treatment should read my books MoralPolitics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think(second edition), Thinking Points, Whose Freedom?,The Political Mind, and The Little Blue Book (withElisabeth Wehling). And for those just dying to readclearly written 600-page academic books and hundredsofarticlesonbothpoliticalandacademictopics,youcanfind them on my website: www.georgelakoff.com. But

foraquickinformativereadandyourfirstintroductiontoframing,starthere.Itisvital—forus,forourcountry,andfortheworld—

thatweunderstandtheprogressivevaluesonwhichthiscountry was founded and that made it a greatdemocracy. Ifweare tokeep thatdemocracy,wemustlearn to articulate those values loud and clear. Ifprogressivesaretowininthefuture,wemustpresentaclear moral vision to the country—a moral visioncommon to all progressives. It must be more than alaundry list of facts, policies, and programs. It mustpresent a moral alternative, one traditionally American,onethatliesbehindeverythingAmericansareproudof.Thisupdateof theoriginalversionofDon’tThinkof

anElephant!iswrittenintheserviceofthatvision.Enjoy!

★★PartI★★

Framing101:TheoryandApplication

★1★Framing101:HowtoTakeBackPublic

Discourse—January21,2004—

OnthisdateIspokeextemporaneouslytoagroupofabout two hundred progressive citizen-activists inSausalito,California.Someupdateshavebeenmade.

When I teach the study of framing at Berkeley, inCognitive Science 101, the first thing I do is I givemystudentsanexercise.Theexercise is:Don’t thinkofanelephant!Whateveryoudo,donot thinkofanelephant.I’veneverfoundastudentwhoisabletodothis.Everyword, like elephant, evokes a frame, which can be animageorotherkindsofknowledge:Elephantsare large,have floppy ears, tusks, and a trunk, live naturally injungles, are associated with circuses, and so on. Thewordisdefinedrelativetothatframe.Whenwenegateaframe,weevoketheframe.Richard Nixon found that out the hard way. While

under pressure to resign during theWatergate scandal,Nixonaddressed thenationonTV.Hestoodbefore thenation and said, “I am not a crook.” And everybody

thoughtabouthimasacrook.This gives us a basic principle of framing:Whenyou

are arguing against the other side, do not use theirlanguage. Their language picks out a frame—and itwon’tbetheframeyouwant.Letmegiveyouanexample.OnthedaythatGeorge

W. Bush arrived in the White House, the phrase taxrelief started coming out of the White House. It wasrepeated almost every day thereafter, was used by thepress in describing his policies, and slowly became somuchapartofpublicdiscoursethatliberalsstartedusingit.Thinkof theframingforrelief.For there toberelief,

there must be an affliction, an afflicted party, and areliever who removes the affliction and is therefore ahero.Andifpeopletrytostopthehero,thosepeoplearevillainsfortryingtopreventrelief.When theword tax is added to relief, the result is a

metaphor:Taxation isanaffliction.And thepersonwhotakesitawayisahero,andanyonewhotriestostophimisabadguy.Thisisaframe.Itismadeupofideas,likeafflictionandhero.Thelanguagethatevokestheframecomes out of the White House, and it goes into pressreleases, goes to every radio station, every TV station,everynewspaper.AndsoontheNewYorkTimesisusingtaxrelief.AnditisnotonlyonFox;itisonCNN,itison

NBC,it isoneverystationbecauseit is“thepresident’stax-relief plan.”And soon theDemocrats are using taxrelief—andshootingthemselvesinthefoot.It is remarkable.We have seen Democrats adopting

the conservative view of taxation as an afflictionwhentheyhaveoffered“taxreliefforthemiddleclass.”They were accepting the conservative frame. The

conservatives had set a trap: Thewords draw you intotheirworldview.Thatiswhatframingisabout.Framingisaboutgetting

languagethatfitsyourworldview.Itisnotjustlanguage.The ideas are primary—and the language carries thoseideas,evokesthoseideas.There was another noteworthy example of

conservative framing inGeorgeW.Bush’s State of theUnion address in January 2005. This one was aremarkable metaphor to find in a State of the Unionaddress. President Bush said, “We do not need apermissionslip todefendAmerica.”Whatwasgoingonwith a permission slip? He could have just said, “Wewon’t ask permission.” But talking about a permissionslip is different. Think about when you last needed apermission slip. Think about who has to ask for apermission slip. Think about who is being asked. Thinkabouttherelationshipbetweenthem.Those are the kinds of questions you need to ask if

you are to understand contemporary political discourse.Whileyouarecontemplatingthem,Iwant toraiseotherquestionsforyou.Mywork on politics beganwhen I askedmyself just

such a question. Itwas back in the fall of 1994. IwaswatchingelectionspeechesandreadingtheRepublicans’“Contract with America.” The question I askedmyselfwas this:Whatdo theconservatives’positionson issueshave to dowith each other? If you are a conservative,whatdoesyourpositiononabortionhavetodowithyourpositionontaxation?Whatdoesthathavetodowithyourpositionontheenvironment?Orforeignpolicy?Howdothesepositionsfittogether?Whatdoesbeingagainstguncontrol have to do with being for tort reform? Whatmakes sense of the linkage? I could not figure it out. Isaid to myself, These are strange people. Theircollection of positions makes no sense. But then athought occurred to me. I have exactly the oppositepositiononeveryissue.Whatdomypositionshavetodowith one another?And I could not figure that outeither.That was extremely embarrassing for someone who

doescognitivescienceandlinguistics.Eventuallytheanswercame.Anditcamefromavery

unexpected place. It came from the study of familyvalues. I had asked myself why conservatives were

talkingsomuchaboutfamilyvalues.Andwhydidcertainvalues count as “family values” while others did not?Why would anyone in a presidential campaign, incongressional campaigns, and soon,when the futureoftheworldwas being threatened by nuclear proliferationandglobalwarming,constantlytalkaboutfamilyvalues?At this point I remembered a paper that one of my

students hadwritten some years back that showed thatwe all have ametaphor for the nation as a family.WehaveFoundingFathers.TheDaughtersoftheAmericanRevolution.We“sendoursons”towar.Thisisanaturalmetaphor because we usually understand large socialgroups, likenations, in termsof small ones, like familiesorcommunities.Giventheexistenceofthemetaphorlinkingthenation

tothefamily,Iaskedthenextquestion:Iftherearetwodifferentunderstandingsofthenation,dotheycomefromtwodifferentunderstandingsoffamily?Iworkedbackward.Itookthevariouspositionsonthe

conservativesideandontheprogressivesideandIsaid,“Let’sput themthrough themetaphor fromtheoppositedirection and see what comes out.” I put in the twodifferent views of the nation, and out popped twodifferentmodelsofthefamily:astrictfatherfamilyandanurturantparentfamily.Youknowwhichiswhich.Now,whenI firstdid this—andI’ll tellyouabout the

details in a minute—I was asked to give a talk at alinguistics convention. I decided I would talk about thisdiscovery. In the audience were two members of theChristian Coalitionwhowere linguists and good friendsofmine.Excellentlinguists.Andvery,verygoodpeople.Very nice people. People I liked a lot. They took measide at the party afterward and said, “Well, this strictfathermodelof the family, it’sclose,butnotquite right.We’llhelpyougetthedetailsright.However,youshouldknowallthis.HaveyoureadDobson?”Isaid,“Who?”Theysaid,“JamesDobson.”Isaid,“Who?”They said, “You’re kidding. He’s on three thousand

radiostations.”I said, “Well, I don’t think he’s on NPR. I haven’t

heardofhim.”Theysaid,“Well,youliveinBerkeley.”“WherewouldI...doeshewritestuff?”“Oh,” they said, “oh yes. He has sold millions of

books.HisclassicisDaretoDiscipline.”My friends were right. I followed their directions to

mylocalChristianbookstore,andthereIfounditall laidout:thestrictfathermodelinallitsdetails.Dobsonatthetime was an influential figure in conservative politics,with a 100-to-200-million-dollar-a-year operation, a

widely distributed and read column in newspapers alloverAmerica, aswell as his own zip code because somany people were writing to order his books andpamphlets. He was effectively teaching people how touse the strict father model to raise their kids, and heunderstoodtheconnectionbetweenstrictfatherfamilies,right-wing politics, evangelical religion, laissez-faireeconomics,andneoconservativeforeignpolicy.The strict father model begins with a set of

assumptions: The world is a dangerous place, and italways will be, because there is evil out there in theworld. The world is also difficult because it iscompetitive. There will always be winners and losers.There is an absolute right and an absolute wrong.Childrenarebornbad,inthesensethattheyjustwanttodo what feels good, not what is right. Therefore, theyhavetobemadegood.Whatisneededinthiskindofaworldisastrong,strict

fatherwhocan:

•protectthefamilyinthedangerousworld,•supportthefamilyinthedifficultworld,and•teachhischildrenrightfromwrong.

Whatisrequiredofthechildisobedience,becausethestrict father is amoral authoritywho knows right from

wrong. It is furtherassumed that theonlyway to teachkids obedience—that is, right from wrong—is throughpunishment,painfulpunishment,whentheydowrong.This includes hitting them, and some authors on

conservative child rearing recommend sticks, belts, andwooden paddles on the bare bottom. Some authorssuggest this start at birth, butDobsonwasmore liberal.“There is no excuse for spanking babies younger thanfifteen or eighteen months of age” (Dobson, The NewDaretoDiscipline,65).Therationalebehindphysicalpunishmentisthis:When

children do something wrong, if they are physicallydisciplined,theylearnnottodoitagain.Thatmeansthatthey will develop internal discipline to keep themselvesfrom doing wrong, so that in the future they will beobedient and actmorally.Without such punishment, theworldwillgotohell.Therewillbenomorality.Such internal discipline has a secondary effect. It is

what is required for success in thedifficult, competitiveworld.That is, ifpeoplearedisciplinedandpursue theirself-interest in this landofopportunity, theywillbecomeprosperousandself-reliant.Thus, thestrictfathermodellinks morality with prosperity. The same discipline youneedtobemoraliswhatallowsyoutoprosper.Thelinkisindividualresponsibilityandthepursuitofself-interest.Givenopportunity, individual responsibility, anddiscipline,

pursuingyourself-interestshouldenableyoutoprosper.Now, Dobson was very clear about the connection

between the strict father worldview and free marketcapitalism.Thelinkisthemoralityofself-interest,whichis the conservative version of Adam Smith’s view ofcapitalism. Adam Smith said that if everyone pursuestheir ownprofit, then theprofit of allwill bemaximizedby the invisible hand—that is, by nature—just naturally.Go about pursuingyour ownprofit, andyou are helpingeveryone.This is linked to a generalmetaphor that viewswell-

being as wealth. For example, if I do you a favor, yousay, “I owe you one,” or “I’m in your debt.” Doingsomethinggoodforsomeoneismetaphoricallylikegivinghim money. He “owes” you something. And he says,“HowcanIeverrepayyou?”ApplythismetaphortoAdamSmith’s“lawofnature”:

If everyone pursues her own self-interest, then by theinvisible hand, by nature, the self-interest of all will bemaximized. That is, it is moral to pursue your self-interest,andthereisanameforthosepeoplewhodonotdo it. The name is do-gooder. A do-gooder is someonewho is trying to help someone else rather than herselfandisgettinginthewayofthosewhoarepursuingtheirself-interest.Do-goodersscrewupthesystem.Inthismodelthereisalsoadefinitionofwhatitmeans

to become a good person. A good person—a moralperson—is someone who is disciplined enough to beobedient to legitimateauthority, to learnwhat is right, todowhatisrightandnotdowhatiswrong,andtopursueher self-interest to prosper and become self-reliant. Agood child grows up to be like that. A bad child is onewhodoesnot learndiscipline,doesnot functionmorally,doesnotdowhatisright,andthereforeisnotdisciplinedenough to becomeprosperous.She cannot take care ofherselfandthusbecomesdependent.When thegood children aremature, they either have

learneddisciplineandcanprosper,orhavefailedtolearnit.Fromthispointonthestrictfatherisnottomeddleintheirlives.Thistranslatespoliticallyintonogovernmentmeddling.

Consider what all this means for social programs: It isimmoral to give people things they have not earned,because then they will not develop discipline and willbecome both dependent and immoral. This theory saysthat social programs are immoral because they makepeopledependent.Promotingsocialprogramsisimmoral.Andwhatdoesthissayaboutbudgets?Well,iftherearea lot of progressives in Congress who think that thereshouldbesocialprograms,and ifyoubelieve that socialprograms are immoral, how do you stop these immoralpeople?

Inthestrictfatherframe, it isquitesimple.Whatyouhave todo is reward thegoodpeople—theoneswhoseprosperity reveals their discipline and hence theircapacity for morality—with a tax cut, and make it bigenoughso that there isnotenoughmoneyleft forsocialprograms. As Grover Norquist says, it “starves thebeast.”For example, as a result of the Republican House’s

refusaltoeithercuttaxloopholesorraisetaxestopayitsbills, the 2013 “sequester”—an across-the-board cut ingovernment programs—was put into place. Here aresome examples of what was cut from variousgovernmentagencies’budgets,fromaFebruary20,2013,articleintheWashingtonPost:

• The National Institutes of Health: cut by $1.6billion.•TheCenters forDiseaseControlandPrevention:cutbyabout$303million.• Head Start: cut by over $400 million, kicking57,000kidsoutoftheprogram.•FEMA’sdisasterreliefbudget:cutby$928million.•Publichousingsupport:cutbyabout$1.74billion.•TheFDA:cutby$209million.•NASA:cutby$896million.•Specialeducation:cutby$827million.

• TheEnergyDepartment’s programs for securingournukes:cutby$903million.• The National Science Foundation: cut by about$361million.• State Department diplomatic functions: cut by$665million.•Globalhealthprograms:cutby$411million.•TheNuclearRegulatoryCommission: cut by $53million.•TheSEC:cutby$74million.•TheUnitedStatesHolocaustMemorialMuseum:cutby$3million.•TheLibraryofCongress:cutby$30million.• The Patent and Trademark Office: cut by $148million.

Conservativessee thisascutting“wasteful spending”—thatis,spendingfor“bad”socialprograms.Are conservatives against all government?No. They

are not against the military; they are not againsthomeland security; they are not against tax cuts,loopholes, and subsidies for corporations; they are notagainsttheconservativeSupremeCourt.Therearemanyaspects of government that they like very much.Subsidiesforcorporations,whichrewardthegoodpeople—the investors in those corporations—are great. No

problemthere.But they are against nurturance and care. They are

against social programs that take care of people—earlychildhood education, Medicaid for the poor, raising theminimumwage, unemployment insurance. That is whatthey see as wrong. That is what they are trying toeliminate on moral grounds. That is why they are notmerely a bunch of crazies or mean and greedy—orstupid—people, as many liberals believe. What is evenscarier is that conservatives are acting on principle, onwhat they believe is moral. And they have supportersaround the country. People who have strict fathermoralityandwhoapply it topoliticsaregoing tobelievethatthisistherightwaytogovern.Thinkforaminuteaboutwhatthissaysaboutforeign

policy. Suppose you are a moral authority. As a moralauthority, how do you deal with your children? Do youask themwhat they should do or what you should do?No.Youtell them.Whatthefathersays,thechilddoes.Nobacktalk.Communicationisone-way.Itisthesamewithforeignpolicy.Thatis,thepresidentdoesnotengageindiplomacyoraskthehelpofallies;thepresidenttells.Ifyouareamoralauthority,youknowwhatisright,youhave power, and you use it. You would be immoralyourselfifyouabandonedyourmoralauthority.Map this onto foreign policy, and it says that you

cannotgiveupsovereignty.TheUnitedStates,beingthebest and most powerful country in the world—amoralauthority—shouldnotbeaskinganybodyelsewhattodo.Weshouldbeusingourmilitarypower.This belief comes together with a set of metaphors

that have run foreign policy for a long time. There is acommonmetaphorlearnedingraduateschoolclassesoninternational relations. It is called the rational actormetaphor.Itisthebasisofclassical“realist”internationalrelationstheory,andinturnitassumesanothermetaphor:thateverynationisaperson.Thereforethereare“roguestates,” there are “friendly nations,” and so on. Andthereisanationalinterest.What does it mean, in this worldview, to act in your

self-interest? In themost basic sense itmeans that youact inways thatwill helpyoubehealthy and strong. Inthesameway,bythemetaphorthatanationisaperson,itisgoodforanationtobehealthy(thatis,economicallyhealthy—defined as having a large GDP) and strong(that is,militarily strong). It isnotnecessary that all theindividuals in the country be healthy, but the companiesshouldbe,and thecountryasawholeshouldhavea lotofmoney.Thatistheidea.The question is: How do you maximize your self-

interest?Thatiswhatforeignpolicyisabout:maximizingself-interest—not working for the interest of all. The

rational actor metaphor says that every actor, everyperson, is rational, and that it is irrational to act againstyour self-interest. Therefore it is rational for everyperson to act to maximize self-interest. Then by thefurther metaphor that nations are persons (“friendlynations,” “rogue states,” “enemy nations,” and so on),thereareadultnationsandchildnations,whereadulthoodis industrialization. The child nations are called“developing”nationsor“underdeveloped”states.Those,again in this view, are the backward ones. And whatshould we do? If you are a strict father, you tell thechildrenhowtodevelop,tellthemwhatrulestheyshouldfollow, and punish them when they do wrong. That is,you operate using, say, the policies of the InternationalMonetaryFund.AndwhoisintheUnitedNations?MostoftheUnited

Nations consists of developing and underdevelopedcountries. That means they are metaphorical children.Now let’s go back to the State of the Union address.Should the United States have consulted the UnitedNations and gotten its permission to invade Iraq? Anadult does not “ask for a permission slip”! The phraseitself,permissionslip,putsyoubackingrammarschoolorhigh school, where you need a permission slip from anadulttogotothebathroom.Youdonotneedtoaskforapermission slip if you are the teacher, if you are the

principal, if you are the person in power, the moralauthority. The others should be asking you forpermission.Thatiswhatthepermissionslipphraseinthe2004 State of the Union address was about. Everyconservative in the audience got it. They got it rightaway.Twopowerfulwords: permission slip.WhatBush did

was evoke the adult–child metaphor for other nations.Hesaid,“We’retheadult incharge.”Hewasoperatingin the strict fatherworldview, and it did not have to beexplained.Itisevokedautomatically.Thisiswhatisdoneregularlybytheconservatives.Finally, there is the conservative view of the moral

hierarchy.Aswehaveseen,therichandthosewhocantakecareofthemselvesareconsideredmoremoralthanthepoorandthosewhoneedhelp.Butmoralsuperiorityonawiderscopeiscentraltoconservativethought.Thebasicideaisthatthosewhoaremoremoralshouldrule.Howdoyouknowwho ismoremoral?Well, in awell-ordered world (ordered by God), the moral have comeouton top.Here is thehierarchy:Godaboveman;manabove nature; adults above children; Western cultureabove non-Western culture; our country above othercountries. These are general conservative values. Butthe hierarchy goes on, and it explains the oppressiveviewsofmoreradicalconservatives:menabovewomen,

Christiansabovenon-Christians,whitesabovenonwhites,straightsabovegays.Thus, disobedient children in southern states can be

“paddled” in school with sticks by teachers; womenseeking abortions must undergo embarrassing medicalprocedures, and notification of husbands and fathers;African Americans and Hispanics have voting rightstakenaway;legislationagainstgaymarriageispassedbyconservativelegislatures.Inshort,themoralhierarchyisanimplicitpartoftheculturewars.Now let me talk a bit about how progressives

understandtheirmoralityandwhattheirmoralsystemis.It too comes out of a family model, what I call thenurturantparentmodel.Thestrictfatherworldviewissonamedbecauseaccordingtoitsownbeliefs,thefatheristheheadofthefamily.Thenurturantparentworldviewisgenderneutral.Both parents are equally responsible for raising the

children. The assumption is that children are born goodandcanbemadebetter.Theworldcanbemadeabetterplace,andourjobistoworkonthat.Theparents’jobistonurture theirchildrenand to raise theirchildren tobenurturersofothers.What does nurturance mean? It means three things:

empathy, responsibility for yourself and others, and acommitmenttodoyourbestnotjustforyourself,butfor

yourfamily,yourcommunity,yourcountry,andtheworld.If you have a child, you have to knowwhat every crymeans. You have to know when the child is hungry,when she needs a diaper change, when she is havingnightmares.Andyouhavea responsibility—youhave totake care of the child. Since you cannot take care ofsomeoneelseifyouarenot takingcareofyourself,youhave to takecareofyourself enough tobeable to takecareofthechild.All this is not easy. Anyone who has ever raised a

child knows that it is hard.Youhave to be strong.Youhavetoworkatit.Youhavetobeverycompetent.Youhavetoknowalot.Inaddition,allsortsofothervaluesimmediatelyfollow

fromempathy,responsibilityforyourselfandothers,andcommitmenttodoyourbestforall.Thinkaboutit.First,ifyouempathizewithyourchild,youwillprovide

protection.Thiscomesintopolitics inmanyways.Whatdo you protect your child from? Crime and drugs,certainly.You also protect your child from carswithoutseat belts, from smoking, from poisonous additives infood. So progressive politics focuses on environmentalprotection, worker protection, consumer protection, andprotection from disease. These are the things thatprogressives want the government to protect theircitizensfrom.But therearealso terroristattacks,which

liberals and progressives have not been very good attalkingaboutintermsofprotection.Protectionispartofthe progressive moral system, but it has not beenelaborated on enough. And on September 11, 2001,progressives did not have awhole lot to say. Thatwasunfortunate, becausenurturant parents andprogressivesdo care about protection. Protection is important. It ispartofourmoralsystem.Second, if you empathize with your child, you want

yourchildtobefulfilledinlife,tobeahappyperson.Andifyouareanunhappy,unfulfilledpersonyourself,youarenot going to want other people to be happier than youare.TheDalaiLamateachesusthat.Thereforeitisyourmoral responsibility tobeahappy, fulfilledperson.Yourmoralresponsibility!Further,itisyourmoralresponsibilityto teach your child to be a happy, fulfilled person whowants others to be happy and fulfilled. That is part ofwhat nurturing family life is about. It is a commonpreconditionforcaringaboutothers.Therearestillothernurturantvalues.

• If you want your child to be fulfilled in life, thechildhastobefreeenoughtoseekandpossiblyfindfulfillment.Thereforefreedomisavalue.•Youdonothaveverymuchfreedomifthereisnoopportunity or prosperity. Therefore opportunity

andprosperityareprogressivevalues.•Ifyoureallycareaboutyourchild,youwantyourchild to be treated fairly by you and by others.Thereforefairness isavalue.• If you are connecting with your child and youempathize with that child, you have to have open,two-way communication. Honest, opencommunication.Thatbecomesavalue.•Youlive inacommunity,and thatcommunitywillaffect how your child grows up. Thereforecommunity-building,servicetothecommunity,andcooperationinacommunitybecomevalues.•Tohavecooperation,youmusthavetrust,andtohave trust, youmust havehonesty andopen two-way communication. Trust, honesty, and opencommunication are fundamental progressive values—inacommunityasinafamily.

These are the nurturant values—and they are theprogressive values. As a progressive, you have them.Youknowyouhavethem.Yourecognizethem.Everyprogressivepoliticalprogramisbasedononeor

more of these values. That is what it means to be aprogressive.There are several types of progressives. Howmany

types? I am asking as a cognitive scientist, not as a

sociologistorapoliticalscientist.Fromthepointofviewof a cognitive scientist,who looks atmodes of thought,there are six basic types of progressives, each with adistinctmodeof thought.They share all theprogressivevalues,butaredistinguishedbysomedifferences.

• Socioeconomic progressives think thateverything isamatterofmoneyandclassand thatallsolutionsareultimatelyeconomicandsocialclasssolutions.•Identitypoliticsprogressives sayit istimefortheiroppressedgrouptogetitssharenow.•Environmentaliststhinkintermsofsustainabilityof the earth, the sacredness of the earth, and theprotection of native peoples. And they recognizethatglobalwarmingisthemajormoralchallengeofour time, making all other issues pale bycomparison.• Civil liberties progressives want to maintainfreedomsagainstthreatstofreedom.•Spiritualprogressives haveanurturantformofreligionorspirituality.Theirspiritualexperiencehastodowith their connection tootherpeopleand theworld, and their spiritual practice has to do withservice to other people and to their community.Spiritual progressives span the full range from

Catholics and Protestants to Jews, Muslims,Buddhists, Goddess worshippers, and paganmembersofWicca.• Antiauthoritarians say there are all sorts ofillegitimateformsofauthorityoutthereandwehaveto fight them,whether theyarebigcorporationsoranyoneelse.

All six types are examples of nurturant parentmorality. The problem is that many of the people whohaveoneofthesemodesofthoughtdonotrecognizethattheirsisjustonespecialcaseofsomethingmoregeneral,anddonotseetheunityinall thetypesofprogressives.Theyoften think that theirs is theonlyway tobea trueprogressive. That is sad. It keeps people who shareprogressivevaluesfromcomingtogether.Wehavetogetpast thatharmful idea.Theothersidedid.Until theTeaPartycamealong.Backinthe1950sconservativeshatedeachother.The

financial conservatives hated the social conservatives.The libertarians did not get along with the socialconservatives or the religious conservatives. Andmanysocial conservatives were not religious. A group ofconservative leaders got together around William F.Buckley Jr. and others and started asking what thedifferent groups of conservatives had in common and

whethertheycouldagreetodisagreeinordertopromotea general conservative cause. They started magazinesandthinktanks,andinvestedbillionsofdollars.Thefirstthing they did, their first victory, was getting BarryGoldwaternominatedin1964.Helost,butwhenhelost,they went back to the drawing board and put moremoneyintoorganization.DuringtheVietnamWar,theynoticedthatmostofthe

bright young people in the country were not becomingconservatives. Conservative was a dirty word.Therefore,in1970,LewisPowell,justtwomonthsbeforehebecameaSupremeCourt justiceappointedbyNixon(atthetimehewasthechiefcounseltotheUSChamberof Commerce), wrote a memo—the Powell memo. Itwas a fateful document.He said that the conservativeshadtokeepthecountry’sbestandbrightestyoungpeoplefrombecomingantibusiness.Whatweneedtodo,Powellsaid,issetupinstituteswithintheuniversitiesandoutsidethe universities. We have to do research, we have towrite books,we have to endowprofessorships to teachthesepeopletherightwaytothink.AfterPowellwent to theSupremeCourt, these ideas

were taken up by William Simon, secretary of thetreasuryunderNixon.Heconvincedsomeverywealthypeople and families with foundations—Coors, Scaife,Olin—to set up the Heritage Foundation, the Olin

professorships, the Olin Institute at Harvard, and otherinstitutions. These institutes have done their job verywell. People associated with them have written morebooksthanthepeopleonthelefthave,onallissues.Theconservatives support their intellectuals. They createmedia opportunities.They havemedia studios down thehallintheirinstitutessothatgettingonTViseasy.When the amount of research money spent by the

rightoveraperiodof timeiscomparedwiththeamountof media time during that period, we see a directcorrelation. At present, the Koch brothers are pouringmoneyintoright-wingcampaigns.This is not an accident. Conservatives, through their

think tanks, figured out the importance of framing, andtheyfiguredouthowtoframeeveryissue.Theyfiguredouthow toget those framesout there, how toget theirpeople in the media all the time. They set up traininginstitutes.TheLeadershipInstituteinVirginiatrainstensof thousands of conservatives a year and runs constantprogramsaroundtheUnitedStatesandinfifteenforeigncountries. Trained conservative spokespeople receiveregular talking points and are booked by bookingagenciesonradio,TV,andotherlocalvenues.Conservatives figured out how to bring their people

together.EveryWednesday,GroverNorquisthasagroupmeeting—aroundeightypeople—ofleadersfromthefull

range of the right. They are invited, and they debate.Theywork out their differences, agree to disagree, andwhen they disagree, they trade off. The idea is: Thisweekhe’llwinonhisissue.Nextweek,I’llwinonmine.Eachonemaynotgeteverythinghewants,butoverthelonghaul,hegetsa lotofwhathewants.Themeetingshave gone on for two decades. In recent years, theWednesdaymorningNorquistmeetingshaveexpandedtoforty-eight states. Via ALEC (American LegislativeExchangeCouncil),conservatismhasspreadatthestatelevel, allowing conservatives to take over statelegislatures,gerrymandercongressionaldistricts,andtakeover the House of Representatives with a minority ofnationalvotersupport.It isonly in thewakeof the2008Obamasweep that

the radical conservative Tea Party movement has splitfromthepreviouslyunifiedconservativemovement.Theprogressiveworldhasnotcaughtup.And what is worse is a set of myths believed by

liberals and progressives. These myths come from agoodsource,buttheyenduphurtingusbadly.ThemythsbeganwiththeEnlightenment,andthefirst

onegoeslikethis:The truth will set us free. If we just tell people the

facts,sincepeoplearebasicallyrationalbeings,they’llallreachtherightconclusions.

But we know from cognitive science that people donot think like that. People think in frames. The strictfatherandnurturantparent frameseach forceacertainlogic.Tobeaccepted,thetruthmustfitpeople’sframes.If the facts do not fit a frame, the frame stays and thefactsbounceoff.Why?Neuroscience tells us that each of the concepts we

have—the long-term concepts that structure how wethink—is instantiated in the synapses of our brains.Concepts are not things that can be changed just bysomeone telling us a fact. We may be presented withfacts,butforustomakesenseofthem,theyhavetofitwhat is already in the synapsesof thebrain.Otherwisefactsgoinandthentheygorightbackout.Theyarenotheard,ortheyarenotacceptedasfacts,ortheymystifyus:Whywouldanyonehavesaidthat?Thenwelabelthefact as irrational, crazy, or stupid. That’swhat happenswhenprogressives just “confront conservativeswith thefacts.”Ithaslittleornoeffect,unlesstheconservativeshaveaframethatmakessenseofthefacts.Similarly,a lotofprogressiveshearconservatives talk

and do not understand them because they do not havethe conservatives’ frames. They assume thatconservativesarestupid.They are not stupid. They are winning because they

are smart. They understand how people think and how

people talk. They think! That is what those think tanksareabout.Theysupporttheirintellectuals.Theywriteallthosebooks.Theyputtheirideasoutinpublic.There are certainly cases where conservatives have

lied. That is true. Of course, it is not true that onlyconservativeslie.Butitistruethatthereweresignificantlies—evendailylies—bytheBushadministration.However, it is equally important to recognize that

many of the ideas that outrage progressives are whatconservatives see as truths—presented from their pointof view. We must distinguish cases of out-and-outdistortion, lying, and so on, from cases whereconservativesarepresentingwhattheyconsidertruth.Is ituseful togoand telleveryonewhat the liesare?

Well,itiscertainlynotuselessorharmfulforustoknowwhen they are lying. But also remember that the truthalonewillnotsetyoufree.The scientific facts about global warming are stated

and restated day after day around the country, but theyfallonconservativedeafbrains—brainswithframesthatdon’tfitthosefacts.There is another myth that also comes from the

Enlightenment, and it goes like this: It is irrational to goagainstyourself-interest,andthereforeanormalperson,who is rational, reasons on the basis of self-interest.Moderneconomictheoryandforeignpolicyaresetupon

thebasisofthatassumption.Themyth has been challenged by cognitive scientists

suchasDanielKahneman(whowontheNobelPrize ineconomicsforhistheory)andAmosTversky,whohaveshown that people do not really think that way.Nevertheless, most of economics is still based on theassumption that people will naturally always think intermsoftheirself-interest.ThisviewofrationalitycomesintoDemocraticpolitics

in a very important way. It is assumed that voters willvote their self-interest. Democrats are shocked orpuzzled when voters do not vote their self-interest.“How,” Democrats keep asking me, “can any poorperson vote for Republicans when Republican policieshurt themsobadly?”TheDemocraticresponseis to tryto explain over and over to the conservative poor whyvoting Democratic would serve their self-interest.Despite all evidence that this is a bad strategy,Democratskeepbangingtheirheadsagainstthewall.In the 2012 election, Democrats argued that Mitt

Romney’s policies would only help the rich. But mostpoor conservatives still voted Republican against theirself-interest, even thoughRomneywas recorded sayingnotverynicethingsaboutthepooringeneral.It is claimed that about a thirdof thepopulace thinks

that they are, or somedaywill be, in the top 1 percent,

and that for this reason they vote on the basis of ahoped-for future self-interest.Butwhat about the othertwo-thirds, who have no dream that they will ever getsuper-rich? They are clearly not voting in their self-interest,oreventheirhoped-forfutureself-interest.People do not necessarily vote in their self-interest.

They vote their identity. They vote their values. Theyvote forwho they identifywith.Theymay identifywiththeirself-interest.Thatcanhappen. It isnot thatpeoplenever care about their self-interest. But they vote theiridentity. And if their identity fits their self-interest, theywillvoteforthat.Itisimportanttounderstandthispoint.It is a seriousmistake toassume thatpeopleare simplyalwaysvotingintheirself-interest.A third mistake is this: There is a metaphor that

political campaigns aremarketing campaignswhere thecandidateistheproductandthecandidate’spositionsonissuesarethefeaturesandqualitiesoftheproduct.Thisleads to the conclusion that polling should determinewhich issues a candidate should run on. Which issueshows the highest degree of support for a candidate’sposition?Ifit’sprescriptiondrugs,yourunonaplatformfeaturingprescriptiondrugs.Isitkeepingsocialsecurity?Thenyourunonaplatformfeaturingsocialsecurity.Youmakealistofthetopissues,andthosearetheissuesyourun on. You also do market segmentation: District by

district,youfindoutthemostimportantissues,andthosearetheonesyoutalkaboutwhenyougotothatdistrict.It doesnotwork.Sometimes it canbeuseful, and, in

fact, the Republicans use it in addition to their realpractice.But their realpractice, and the real reason fortheir success, is this: They say what they idealisticallybelieve. They say it; they talk to their base using theframesoftheirbase.Liberalandprogressivecandidatestend to follow their polls and decide that they have tobecome more “centrist” by moving to the right. Theconservativesdonotmoveatalltotheleft,andyettheywin!Why? What is the electorate like from a cognitive

pointofview?Probably35to40percentofpeoplehavea strict father model governing their politics. Similarly,there are people who have a nurturant view governingtheirpolitics,probablyanother35to40percent.Andthenthere are all the people who are said to be in the“middle.”There isno ideologyof themiddle.There isnomoral

systemorpoliticalpositionthatdefinesthe“middle.”Thepeople in the “middle” are largely biconceptuals, peoplewhoareconservativeonsomeissuesandprogressiveonothers,inallsortsofcombinations.NoticethatIsaidgoverningtheirpolitics.Weallhave

both models, either actively or passively. Progressives

seeaJohnWaynemovieoranArnoldSchwarzeneggermovie, and they can understand it. They do not say, “Idon’tknowwhat’sgoingoninthismovie.”Theyhaveastrict fathermodel, at least passively.And if you are aconservative and you understand Oprah, you have anurturantparentmodel, at leastpassively.Everyonehasboth worldviews because both worldviews are widelypresent inourculture,butpeopledonotnecessarily livebyoneworldviewallofthetime.Sothequestionis:Areyoulivingbyoneofthefamily-

basedmodels?But that question is not specific enough.Therearemanyaspectsoflife,andmanypeoplelivebyone family-based model in one part of their lives andanother in another part of their lives. I have colleagueswho are nurturant parents at home and liberals in theirpolitics, but strict fathers in their classrooms. Reaganknew that blue-collar workers who were nurturant intheirunionpoliticswereoftenstrictfathersathome.Heused political metaphors that were based on the homeandfamily,andgotthemtoextendtheirstrictfatherwayofthinkingfromthehometopolitics.This is very important to understand. The goal is to

activate your model in the people in the “middle.” Thepeople who are in the middle have both models, usedregularlyindifferentpartsof their lives.Whatyouwantto do is to get them to use your model for politics—to

activate your worldview and moral system in theirpoliticaldecisions.Youdothatbytalkingtopeopleusingframesbasedonyourworldview.However,indoingthat,youdonotwanttooffendthe

peopleinthemiddlewhohaveuptothispointmadetheoppositechoice.Sincetheyhaveandusebothmodelsintheir lives, theymight still be persuaded to activate theoppositemodelforpolitics.Clinton figured out how to handle this problem. He

stoletheotherside’slanguage.Hetalkedabout“welfarereform,” for example. He said, “The age of biggovernmentisover.”Hedidwhathewantedtodo,onlyhe took their languageandused theirwords todescribeit.Itmadethemverymad.Itturnsoutthatwhatisgoodforthegooseisgoodfor

the gander, and guess what? When George W. Busharrived, we got “compassionate conservatism.” TheClear Skies Initiative. Healthy Forests. No Child LeftBehind.Thisistheuseoflanguagetomollifypeoplewhohave nurturant values, while the real policies are strictfather policies. This can even attract the people in themiddlewhomighthavequalmsaboutyou.Thisistheuseof Orwellian language—language that means theoppositeofwhatitsays—toappeasepeopleinthemiddleat thesame timeasyoupumpup thebase.That ispartoftheconservativestrategy.

Liberals and progressives typically react to thisstrategy in a self-defeating way. The usual reaction is,“Those conservatives are bad people; they are usingOrwellian language. They are saying the opposite ofwhattheymean.Theyaredeceivers.Bad.Bad.”All true. But we should recognize that they use

Orwellian language precisely when they have to: whentheyareweak,whentheycannotjustcomeoutandsaywhat theymean. Imagine if theycameout supportinga“DirtySkiesBill”ora“ForestDestructionBill”ora“KillPublicEducation”bill.Theywouldlose.Theyareawarepeopledonotsupportwhattheyarereallytryingtodo.Orwellian language points to weakness—Orwellian

weakness. When you hear Orwellian language, notewhere it is, because it is a guide to where they arevulnerable. They do not use it everywhere. It is veryimportant to notice this and use theirweakness to youradvantage.Averygoodexamplerelates to theenvironment.The

right’slanguagemanisFrankLuntz,whoputsoutbooksof language guidelines, which are used as trainingmanualsforconservativecandidates,aswellaslawyers,judges, and other public speakers—even high schoolstudentswhowant to be conservativepublic figures. Inthesebooks,Luntz tellsyouwhat language touse for aconservativeadvantage.

It was Luntz who persuaded conservatives to stoptalking about “global warming” because it sounded tooscaryandsuggestedhumanagency. Instead,hebrought“climatechange”intoourpublicdiscourseonthegroundsthat “climate” sounded kind of nice (think palm trees)and change just happens, with no human agency. By2003, with the scientific consensus going againstconservatives, Luntz suggested Orwellian language. Hesuggested using words like healthy, clean, and safeeven when talking about coal or nuclear power plants.Hence “clean coal.” Conservative legislation thatincreases pollution is called the Clear Skies Act. He issupporting global warming denial by suggesting thatpeople say that the science is not settled and that oureconomy should not be threatened. Recently, his focusgroup research showed support for cap and tradelegislation. He has suggested using the language of“energy independence,” which supports continuedfracking,butnottalkingaboutsavingtheplanet.Luntzoncewroteamemofortalkingtowomen.How

doyou talk towomen?According toLuntz,women likecertainwords,sowhenyouaretalkingtoanaudienceofwomen, here are thewords you use asmany times aspossible:love,fromtheheart,andforthechildren.AndifyoureadGeorgeW.Bush’sspeechesfromthatperiod,love,fromtheheart,andforthechildrenshowupover

andoveragain.This kind of language use is a science. Like any

science,itcanbeusedhonestlyorharmfully.Thiskindoflanguageuseistaught.Thiskindoflanguageuseisalsoadiscipline.Conservativesenforcemessagediscipline.Inmany offices there is a pizza fund: Every time you usethe “wrong” language, you have to put a quarter in thepizza fund. People quickly learn to say tax relief orpartial-birthabortion,notsomethingelse.But Luntz is about much more than language. He

recognizesthattherightuseoflanguagestartswithideas—with the right framing of the issues, a framing thatreflects a consistent conservative moral perspective,what we have called strict father morality. Luntz’swriting is not just about language. For each issue, heexplains what the conservative reasoning is, what theprogressive reasoning is, and how the progressivearguments can be best attacked from a conservativeperspective.Heisclear:Ideascomefirst.One of themajormistakes liberalsmake is that they

thinktheyhavealltheideastheyneed.Theythinkthatallthey lack ismediaaccess.Ormaybesomemagicbulletphrases,theliberalequivalentofpartial-birthabortion.Whenyou thinkyou just lackwords,what you really

lackareideas.Ideascomeintheformofframes.Whentheframesarethere,thewordscomereadily.There’sa

wayyoucantellwhenyoulacktherightframes.There’sa phenomenon you have probably noticed. AconservativeonTVusestwowords,liketaxrelief.Andthe progressive has to go into a paragraph-longdiscussionofhisownview.Theconservativecanappealto an established frame, that taxation is an affliction orburden,whichallowsforthetwo-wordphrasetaxrelief.Butthereisnoestablishedframeontheotherside.Youcantalkaboutit,butittakessomedoingbecausethereisnoestablishedframe,nofixedideaalreadyoutthere.In cognitive science there is a name for this

phenomenon. It’s called hypocognition—the lack of theideas you need, the lack of a relatively simple fixedframethatcanbeevokedbyawordortwo.TheideaofhypocognitioncomesfromastudyinTahiti

in the 1950s by the late anthropologist Bob Levy, whowasalsoatherapist.Levyaddressedthequestionofwhythere were so many suicides in Tahiti, and discoveredthatTahitiansdidnothaveaconceptofgrief.They feltgrief. They experienced it. But they did not have aconcept for itoranamefor it.Theydidnot see it asanormalemotion.Therewereno ritualsaroundgrief.Nogrief counseling, nothing like it. They lacked a conceptthey needed—and wound up committing suicide all toooften.Progressives are suffering from massive

hypocognition.Theconservativesused tosuffer fromit.WhenGoldwater lost in1964, theyhadvery fewof theconcepts that they have today. In the intermediate fiftyyears, conservative thinkers have filled in theirconceptualgaps.Butourconceptualgapsarestillthere.Let’sgobacktotaxrelief.Whatistaxation?Taxationiswhatyoupaytoliveina

civilizedcountry—whatyoupaytohavedemocracyandopportunity, andwhat you pay to use the infrastructurepaid forbyprevious taxpayers: thehighwaysystem, theInternet, the entire scientific establishment, the medicalestablishment, the communications system, the airlinesystem.Allareorwerepaidforbytaxpayers.You can think of taxation metaphorically in at least

twoways.First,asaninvestment.Imaginethefollowingad:

Our parents invested in the future, ours aswell astheirs, through their taxes. They invested their taxmoney in the interstate highway system, theInternet, the scientific and medical establishments,our communications system,our airline system, thespaceprogram.Theyinvestedinthefuture,andweare reaping the tax benefits, the benefits from thetaxes theypaid.Todaywehaveassets—highways,schools and colleges, the Internet, airlines—that

comefromthewiseinvestmentstheymade.

Imagineversionsofthisadrunningoverandover,foryears.Eventually,theframewouldbeestablished:Taxesarewiseinvestmentsinthefuture.Ortakeanothermetaphor:Taxation is paying your dues, paying yourmembership fee in America. If you join a countryclub or a community center, you pay fees. Why?You did not build the swimming pool.You have tomaintain it. You did not build the basketball court.Someone has to clean it. You may not use thesquash court, but you still have to pay your dues.Otherwiseitwon’tbemaintainedandwillfallapart.Peoplewhoavoidtaxes,likecorporationsthatmoveto Bermuda, are not paying their dues to theircountry. It is patriotic to be a taxpayer. It istraitorous to desert our country and not pay yourdues.

PerhapsBillGatesSr.said itbest. Inarguing tokeeptheinheritancetax,hepointedoutthatheandBillJr.didnot invent the Internet. They just used it—to makebillions. There is no such thing as a self-made man.Every businessman has used the vast American

infrastructure,which the taxpayerspaidfor, tomakehismoney. He did not make his money alone. He usedtaxpayer infrastructure. He got rich on what othertaxpayers hadpaid for: thebanking system, theFederalReserve,theTreasuryandCommerceDepartments,andthe judicial system, where nine-tenths of cases involvecorporate law. These taxpayer investments supportcompanies and wealthy investors. There are no self-made men! The wealthy have gotten rich using whatprevious taxpayers have paid for. They owe thetaxpayers of this country a great deal and should bepayingitback.These are accurate views of taxes, but they are not

yet enshrined in our brains. They need to be repeatedover and over again, and refined until they take theirrightful place in our synapses. But that takes time. Itdoesnothappenovernight.Startnow.It is not an accident that conservatives are winning

where they have successfully framed the issues.They’vegot a forty- to fifty-yearhead start.Andmorethantwobilliondollarsinthinktankinvestments.Andtheyarestillthinkingahead.Progressivesarenot.

Progressivesfeelsoassaultedbyconservativesthattheycan only think about immediate defense. Democraticoffice holders are constantly under attack. Every daythey have to respond to conservative initiatives. It is

always, “What do we have to do to fight them offtoday?” This leads to politics that are reactive, notproactive.Anditisnotjustpublicofficials.Ihavebeentalkingto

advocacygroupsaroundthecountry,workingwith themand trying to help them with framing issues. I haveworkedwithmorethanfourhundredadvocacygroupsinthisway.Theyhavethesameproblems:Theyareunderattack all the time, and they are trying to defendthemselvesagainst thenextattack.Realistically, theydonot have time to plan. They do not have time to thinklong-term. They do not have time to think beyond theirparticularissues.They are all good people—intelligent, committed

people.But theyareconstantlyon thedefensive.Why?Itisnothardtoexplainitwhenwethinkaboutfunding.The right-wing think tanksget largeblockgrants and

endowments. Millions at a time. They are very wellfunded.Furthermore,theyknowthattheyaregoingtogetthe

moneythenextyear,andtheyearafterthat.Remember,these are block grants—no strings attached. Do whatyou need. Hire intellectuals. Bring talent along. Theseinstitutionsalsobuildhumancapitalforthefuture.Progressive foundations spread the money around—

thinly. They give twenty-five thousand dollars here,

maybe fifty thousand,maybe even a hundred thousand.Sometimes it is a big grant. But recipients have to dosomething different from what everyone else is doingbecause the foundations see duplication as a waste ofmoney.Notonly that,butalso theyarenotblockgrantslike conservative foundations get; the recipients do nothave full freedom to decide how to spend the money.And it is certainly not appropriate to use it for careerdevelopment or infrastructure building or hiringintellectuals to think about long-term as well as short-term or interrelated policies. The emphasis is onproviding direct services to the people who need theservices: grassroots funding, not infrastructure creation.This is, for the most part, how progressive foundationswork.And because of that, the organizations they fundhave to have a very narrow focus. They have to haveprojects, not just areas they work on. Activists andadvocates are overworked and underpaid, and they donothave timeor energy to thinkabouthow they shouldbelinkingupwithotherpeople.Theymainlydonothavethe time or training to think about framing their issues.Thesystemforcesanarrowfocus—andwithit,isolation.You ask, “Why is it like this?” There is a reason.

There is a deep reason, and it is a reason you shouldthinkabout. In the right’shierarchyofmoralvalues, thetop value is preserving and defending themoral system

itself. If that is your main goal, what do you do? Youbuild infrastructure.Youbuyupmedia in advance.Youplan ahead.Youdo things likegive fellowships to right-winglawstudentstogetthemthroughlawschooliftheyjoin the Federalist Society. And you get them nice jobsafter that. If you want to extend your worldview, it isverysmarttomakesurethatoverthelonghaulyouhavethepeopleandtheresourcesthatyouneed.Ontheleft,thehighestvalueishelpingindividualswho

needhelp.So ifyouarea foundationoryouare settingup a foundation, what makes you a good person? Youhelp as many people as you can. And the more publicbudgets get cut, the more people there are who needhelp.Soyouspread themoneyaround to thegrassrootsorganizations,andthereforeyoudonothaveanymoneyleftforinfrastructureortalentdevelopment,andcertainlynotforintellectuals.Donotwasteapennyinduplicatingefforts,becauseyouhavetohelpmoreandmorepeople.Howdoyoushowthatyouareagood,moralpersonorfoundation?By listing all the people you help; themorethebetter.Andsoyouperpetuateasystemthathelpstheright.In

the process, it also does help people.Certainly, it is notthat people do not need help. They do. But what hashappenedasbudgetsandtaxesgetcutisthattherightisprivatizing the left.The right is forcing the left to spend

evermoreprivatemoneyonwhatthegovernmentshouldbesupporting.There aremany things thatwe can do about all this.

Let’stalkaboutwheretostart.Therightknowshowtotalkaboutvalues.Weneedto

talkaboutvalues.Ifwethinkaboutitalittle,wecanlistour values. But it is not easy to think about how thevalues fit the issues, to know how to talk about everyissuefromtheperspectiveofourvalues,nottheirs.Progressives also have to look at the integration of

issues.Thisissomethingthattherightisvery,verysavvyabout.Theyknowaboutwhat I call strategic initiatives.A strategic initiative is a plan inwhich a change in onecarefully chosen issue area has automatic effects overmany,many,manyotherissueareas.Forexample,taxcuts.Thisseemsstraightforward,but

asa resultof taxcuts there isnotenoughmoney in thebudgetforanyofthegovernment’ssocialprograms.Notjustnotenoughmoneyfor,say,homelessnessorschoolsor environmental protection; instead, not enoughmoneyfor everything at once, the whole range. This is astrategicinitiative.Or tort reform,whichmeansputting limitsonawards

in lawsuits. Tort reform is a top priority forconservatives. Why do conservatives care so muchaboutthis?Well,assoonasyouseetheeffects,youcan

seewhytheycare.Becauseinonestrokeyouprohibitallof the potential lawsuits thatwill be the basis of futureenvironmental legislationandregulation.That is, it isnotjust regulation of the chemical industry or the coalindustryorthenuclearpowerindustryorotherthingsthatareatstake. It is theregulationofeverything. Ifpartieswho are harmed cannot sue immoral or negligentcorporations or professionals for significant sums, thecompaniesarefreetoharmthepublicinunlimitedwaysin thecourseofmakingmoney.And lawyers,who takerisksandmakesignificantinvestmentsinsuchcases,willno longermake enoughmoney to support the risk.Andcorporationswillbe free to ignore thepublicgood.Thatiswhat“tortreform”isabout.Inaddition,ifyoulookatwhereDemocratsgetmuch

of theirmoney in the individual states, it is significantlyfromthelawyerswhowintortcases.Manytortlawyersare important Democratic donors. Tort “reform”—asconservativescall it—cutsoff this sourceofmoney.Allof a sudden three-quarters of the money going to theTexas Democratic Party is not there. In addition,companieswhopoison theenvironmentwant tobeableto cap possible awards.Thatway they can calculate inadvance the cost of paying victims and build it into thecostofdoingbusiness.Irresponsiblecorporationswinbigfrom tort reform. The Republican Party wins big from

tort reform. And these real purposes are hidden. Theissue appears to be eliminating “frivolous lawsuits”—peoplegetting thirtymilliondollars forhavinghotcoffeespilledonthem.However,what the conservatives are really trying to

achieve is not in the proposal.What they are trying toachieve follows from enacting the proposal. They don’tcareprimarilyabout the lawsuits themselves.Theycareaboutgettingridofenvironmental,consumer,andworkerprotectionsingeneral.AndtheycareaboutdefundingtheDemocraticParty.Thatiswhatastrategicinitiativeis.Therehavebeenacoupleofstrategicinitiativesonthe

left—environmental impact reports and the EndangeredSpeciesAct—butithasbeenfortyyearssincetheywereenacted.Unlike the right, the left does not think strategically.

Wethinkissuebyissue.Wegenerallydonottrytofigureout what minimal change we can enact that will haveeffects across many issues. There are very fewexceptions.There are also strategic initiatives of another kind—

what I call slippery slope initiatives: Take the first stepandyou’reonyourwayoff thecliff.Conservativesareverygoodatslipperyslopeinitiatives.Take“partial-birthabortion.” There are almost no such cases. Why doconservatives care so much? Because it is a first step

down a slippery slope to ending all abortion. It puts outthere a frame of abortion as a horrendous procedure,whenmostoperationsendingpregnancyarenothinglikethis.Whyaneducationbill about school testing?Once the

testing frame applies not just to students but also toschools, then schools can, metaphorically, fail—and bepunished for failing by having their allowance cut. Lessfunding in turn makes it harder for the schools toimprove,whichleadstoacycleoffailureandultimatelyelimination for many public schools.What replaces thepublic school system is a voucher system to supportprivateschools.Thewealthywouldhavegoodschools—paid for in part by what used to be tax payments forpublic schools.Thepoorwould not have themoney forgoodschools.Wewouldwindupwitha two-tier schoolsystem, a good one for the “deserving rich” and a badoneforthe“undeservingpoor.”The conservatives don’t have to win on issue after

issue after issue. There are many things a progressivecandoaboutit.Hereareeleven.

First,noticewhatconservativeshavedonerightandwhereprogressiveshavemissedtheboat.Itismorethanjustcontrolofthemedia,thoughthatisfarfromtrivial.Whattheyhavedone

rightistosuccessfullyframetheissuesfromtheirperspective.Acknowledgetheirsuccessesandourfailures.Second,remember“Don’tthinkofanelephant.”Ifyoukeeptheirlanguageandtheirframingandjustargueagainstit,youlosebecauseyouarereinforcingtheirframe.Third,thetruthalonewillnotsetyoufree.Justspeakingtruthtopowerdoesn’twork.Youneedtoframethetruthseffectivelyfromyourperspective.Fourth,youneedtospeakfromyourmoralperspectiveatalltimes.Progressivepoliciesfollowfromprogressivevalues.Getclearonyourvaluesandusethelanguageofvalues.Dropthelanguageofpolicywonks.Fifth,understandwhereconservativesarecomingfrom.Gettheirstrictfathermoralityanditsconsequencesclear.Knowwhatyouarearguingagainst.Beabletoexplainwhytheybelievewhattheybelieve.Trytopredictwhattheywillsay.Sixth,thinkstrategically,acrossissueareas.Thinkintermsoflargemoralgoals,notintermsofprogramsfortheirownsake.Seventh,thinkabouttheconsequencesofproposals.Formprogressiveslipperyslopeinitiatives.

Eighth,rememberthatvotersvotetheiridentityandtheirvalues,whichneednotcoincidewiththeirself-interest.Ninth,unite!Andcooperate!Here’show:Rememberthesixmodesofprogressivethought:(1)socioeconomic,(2)identitypolitics,(3)environmentalist,(4)civillibertarian,(5)spiritual,and(6)antiauthoritarian.Noticewhichofthesemodesofthoughtyouusemostoften—whereyoufallonthespectrumandwherethepeopleyoutalktofallonthespectrum.Thenriseaboveyourownmodeofthoughtandstartthinkingandtalkingfromsharedprogressivevalues.Tenth,beproactive,notreactive.Playoffense,notdefense.Practicereframing,everyday,oneveryissue.Don’tjustsaywhatyoubelieve.Useyourframes,nottheirframes.Usethembecausetheyfitthevaluesyoubelievein.Eleventh,speaktotheprogressivebaseinordertoactivatethenurturantmodelofbiconceptualvoters.Don’tmovetotheright.Rightwardmovementhurtsintwoways.Italienatestheprogressivebaseandithelpsconservativesbyactivatingtheirmodelinbiconceptualvoters.

★★PartII★★

Framing102:FramingtheUnframed

★2★FramingtheUnframed

There are two common mistakes people make whenthinkingaboutframing.The firstmistake isbelieving that framing is amatter

of coming up with clever slogans, like “death tax” or“partial-birth abortion,” that resonate with a significantsegment of the population. Those slogans only workwhen there has been a long—often decades-long—campaign of framing issues like taxation and abortionconceptually, so that the brains of many people arepreparedtoacceptthosephrases.IwasonceaskedifIcould reframe—that is,provideawinningslogan for—aglobal warming bill “by next Tuesday.” I laughed.Effective reframing is thechangingofmillionsofbrainsto be prepared to recognize a reality. That preparationhadn’tbeendone.Thesecondmistakeisbelievingthat, ifonlywecould

presentthefactsaboutacertainrealityinsomeeffectiveway,thenpeoplewould“wakeup“tothatreality,changetheir personal opinion, and start acting politically tochange society. “Why can’t people wake up?” is thecomplaint—asifpeopleare“asleep”andjusthavetobearoused toseeandcomprehend theworldaround them.

Buttherealityisthatcertainideashavetobeingrainedinus—developed over time consistently and preciselyenough to create an accurate frame for ourunderstanding.Here is an example. Pensions, even by those who

advocate for them, are often framed as benefits—“extras”grantedbyanemployertotheemployed.Yetwhat isapension, really?Apension isdelayedpaymentforworkalreadydone.Asaconditionfortakingajob,apension is part of your earned salary, withheld andinvested by your employer, to be paid later, afterretirement.So if an employer says, “we just don’t havethemoney topay foryourpension,” thatmeans thathehas either embezzled, stolen, ormisspent your earnings,whichbycontractheisresponsibleforpayingyou.Youremployerisathief.I’ve had the repeated experience of talking to union

leadersandgroupsofworkers,pointingout to themthata pension is delayed payment forwork already done. Iget universal agreement. Then I ask, “Have you eversaidit?”“No.”“Doyoubelieveit?”“Yes.”“Wouldyoustart saying it?”That iswhere itgetsdifficult.Evenforprogressives, it is hard to shake the frame constructedoveryearsbypunditson the right thatpensionsarepayfornotworking.Yetthefactthatpensionsaredelayedpaymentsisan

obvioustruththatwouldunderminetheideapromulgatedby pundits on the right that pensions are pay for notworking.Sowhy can people perceive an important truth on a

topic crucial to them, a truth that needs to be out inpublic,andnotsay it,notmake itpartof theireverydaydiscourse?The reason is that just telling someone something

usually does not make it a neural circuit that they useevery day or even a neural circuit that fits easily intotheirpre-existingbraincircuitry—theneuralcircuits thatdefine their previous understandings and forms ofdiscourse.It is difficult to say things that you are not sure the

public is ready tohear, to say things thathavenotbeensaidhundredsoftimesbefore.As noted in chapter 1, this problem has a name—

hypocognition—the lack of the overall neural circuitrythatmakes common sense of the idea and that fits theforms of communication that one normally engages in,the thingsyouare ready to sayand that thepeopleyouspeaktoarereadytohear.Sloganscan’tovercomehypocognition.Onlysustained

public discussion has a chance. And that takesknowledge of the problem and a large-scale seriouscommitmenttoworkforachange.

Several important issues thatconfrontus rightnow—from global warming to the wealth gap and beyond—demand this kind of sustained discussion andcommitment.Iamofferingthissectionofthebookinthehope that various readerswill take on the various tasksof working to provide frames—that is, automatic,effortless, everyday modes of understanding that wedesperatelyneed.

★3★Reflexivity:TheBrainandtheWorld

You might think that the world exists independently ofhowweunderstandit.Youwouldbemistaken.Ourunderstandingoftheworldispartoftheworld—a

physicalpartoftheworld.Ourconceptualframingsexistinphysicalneuralcircuitryinourbrains,largelybelowthelevel of conscious awareness, and they define and limithow we understand the world, and so they affect ouractionsintheworld.Theworldisthus,inmanyways,areflectionof howwe frame it and act on those frames,creatingaworldinsignificantpartframedbyouractions.Accordingly,theframe-inherentworld,structuredbyourframed actions, reinforces those frames and recreatesthose frames in others as they are born, grow, andmatureinsuchaworld.This phenomenon is called reflexivity. The world

reflectsourunderstandings throughour actions, andourunderstandings reflect the world shaped by the frame-informedactionsofourselvesandothers.To function effectively in the world it helps to be

awareofreflexivity.Ithelpstobeawareofwhatframeshaveshapedandarestillshapingrealityifyouaregoingtointervenetomaketheworldabetterplace.

Reflexivityjustis.Initself,itisneitheragoodnorbadthing.Itcanbeeither.Framing102 is abouthow reflexivitycanbeused for

thegood,atleastforthegoodofmostpeople,mostlivingthings, and for the beauty and bounty of the physicalworldthatsupportsalllife.In all too many cases, new frames—new forms of

understanding—arerequiredtocomprehendtheworldsoas to take advantageof reflexivity andmake it a betterplace.Thisisespeciallytruewhentheissuesconfrontingus,andneedingframing,arecomplexandsystemic—likeglobal warming, thewealth gap, andmany other issuesthathaverisentogreatimportanceoverthelastdecade.Letusproceed.

★4★SystemicCausation

Studyingcognitivelinguisticshasitsuses.Everylanguageintheworldhasinitsgrammaraway

toexpressdirectcausation.Nolanguageintheworldhasinitsgrammarawaytoexpresssystemiccausation.What’s the difference between direct and systemic

causation?From infanthood on we experience simple, direct

causation.We see direct causation all around us: ifwepushatoy,ittopplesover;ifourmotherturnsaknobontheoven,flamesemerge.Pickingupaglassofwaterandtaking a drink is direct causation.Slicingbread is directcausation. Punching someone in the nose is directcausation. Throwing a rock through a window is directcausation.Stealingyourwalletisdirectcausation.Anyapplicationofforcetosomethingorsomeonethat

producesanimmediatechangetothat thingorpersonisdirect causation. When causation is direct, the wordcause is unproblematic. We learn direct causationautomatically as children because that’s what weexperience on a daily basis. Direct causation, and thecontrol over our immediate environment thatunderstanding it allows, is crucial in the life of every

child. That’swhy it shows up in the grammar of everylanguage.Thesame isnot trueofsystemiccausation.Systemic

causation cannot be experienced directly. It has to belearned, its cases have to be studied, and repeatedcommunication is necessary before it can be widelyunderstood.That’sright.Nolanguageintheworldhasawayinits

grammar to express systemic causation. You drill a lotmoreoil,burnalotmoregas,putalotmoreCO2 in theair, the earth’s atmosphere heats up, more moistureevaporates from the oceans yielding bigger storms incertain places and more droughts and fires in otherplaces,andyes,morecoldandsnowinstillotherplaces:systemiccausation.Theworldecologyisasystem—liketheworldeconomyandthehumanbrain.As a result, we lack a concept that we desperately

need. We need it to understand and communicate, forinstance, about the greatest moral issue of our time—global warming. The ecology is a system operating viasystemic causation. Without an everyday concept ofsystemic causation, global warming cannot be properlycomprehended. In other words, without the systemiccausation frame, the oft-repeated facts about globalwarming cannot make sense. With only the directcausation frame, the systemic causation facts of global

warmingareignored.Theoldframestays,andthefactsthatdon’tfititcannotbecomprehended.

TheStructureofSystemicCausation

Systemic causation has a structure—four possibleelementsthatcanexistaloneorincombination.Drivingacomplex,systemicproblem,therecanbeone,two,three,or all four of these elements in play.Here is how theymight be explained in conversations about globalwarming.

Anetworkofdirectcauses.(1)GlobalwarmingheatsthePacificOcean.Thatmeansthatthewatermoleculesintheoceangetmoreactive,movewithmoreenergy,evaporatemore,andmoveintheairwithmoreenergy.(2)Windsinthehighatmosphereovertheoceanblowfromsouthwesttonortheast,blowingthelargeramountofhigh-energymoistureoverthepole.(3)Inwinter,themoistureturnstosnowandcomesdownovertheEastCoastasahugeblizzard.Thus,globalwarmingcansystemicallycausemajorblizzards.Feedbackloops.(1)Thearcticicepackreflectslightandheat.(2)Astheearth’satmosphereheatsup,thearcticicepackmeltsandgetssmaller.(3)Thesmalleramountofarcticicereflectslesslight

andheat,andmoreheatstaysintheatmosphere.(4)Theatmospheregetswarmer.(5)Thefeedbackloop:Evenmorearcticicemelts,evenlessheatisreflected,evenmoreheatstays,evenmoreicemelts,andonandon.Multiplecauses.Becauseoftheinteractionbetweenthepolarvortexandthejetstream,partsofthevortexmovesouthintocentralNorthAmericacausingabnormalfreezingtemperaturesasfarsouthasOklahomaandGeorgia.Probabilisticcausation.Manyweatherphenomenaareprobabilistic.Whatiscausedisaprobabilitydistribution.Althoughyoucan’tpredictwhetheraflippedcoinwillcomedownheadsortails,youcanpredictthatoverthecourseofalargenumberofflips,almostexactly50percentwillcomedownheadsandanother50percenttails.

Yes, global warming systemically caused freezes inthe American south. Yes, global warming systemicallycausedHurricaneSandy—andtheMidwestdroughtsandthefiresinColoradoandTexas,aswellasotherextremeweatherdisastersaroundtheworld.Let’ssayitoutloud:It was causation, systemic causation! Network causes,feedback loops, multiple causes—all actingprobabilistically as part of the global weather system—

have been systemically causingweather disasters.Yes,systemically causing untold human harm and billions, ifnottrillions,ofdollarsindamage.Systemic causation is familiar. Smoking is a systemic

causeoflungcancer.HIVisasystemiccauseofAIDS.Workingincoalminesisasystemiccauseofblacklungdisease.Drivingwhiledrunkisasystemiccauseofautoaccidents.Sexwithoutcontraceptionisasystemiccauseofunwantedpregnancies,whichareasystemiccauseofabortions.Systemic causation, because it is less obvious than

direct causation, is more important to understand. Asystemic cause may be one of a number of multiplecauses.Itmayrequiresomespecialconditions.Itmaybeindirect, working through a network of more directcauses. It may be probabilistic, occurring with asignificantly high probability. It may require a feedbackmechanism. In general, causation in ecosystems,biologicalsystems,economicsystems,andsocialsystemstendsnottobedirect,butisnolesscausal.Andbecauseit is not direct causation, it requires all the greaterattentionifitistobeunderstoodanditsnegativeeffectscontrolled.Aboveall,itrequiresaname:systemiccausation.TheprecisedetailsofHurricaneSandycouldnothave

been predicted in advance, any more than when, or

whether, a smokerdevelops lungcancer,or sexwithoutcontraceptionyieldsanunwantedpregnancy,oradrunkdriver has an accident. But systemic causation isnonethelesscausal.Semantics matters. Because the word cause is

commonlytakentomeandirectcause,climatescientists,trying to be precise, have too often shied away fromattributingcausationofaparticularhurricane,drought,orfire to global warming. Lacking a concept—a frame—and language for systemic causation, climate scientistshave made the dreadful communicative mistake ofretreating to weasel words. Consider this quote from“Perception of Climate Change,” by James Hansen,Makiko Sato, and Reto Ruedy, published in theProceedingsoftheNationalAcademyofSciences:

...wecanstate,withahighdegreeofconfidence,thatextremeanomaliessuchas thoseinTexasandOklahoma in 2011 and Moscow in 2010 were aconsequence of global warming because theirlikelihood in the absence of global warming wasexceedinglysmall.

The crucial words here are high degree ofconfidence, anomalies, consequence, likelihood,absence, and exceedingly small. Scientific weasel

words!Thepowerofthebaldtruth,namelycausation,islost.This is no small matter: The fate of the earth is at

stake.The science is excellent.The scientists’ ability tocommunicate is lacking. Without the words, the ideacannotevenbeexpressed.Andwithoutanunderstandingof systemic causation, we cannot understand what ishittingus.Globalwarming is real, and it ishere. It is causing—

yes,causing—death,destruction,andvasteconomicloss.Andthecausaleffectsaregettinggreaterwithtime.Wecannot merely adapt to it. The costs are incalculable.What we are facing is huge. Each day, the amount ofextraenergyaccumulatingviatheheatingoftheearthistheequivalentof400,000Hiroshimaatomicbombs.Eachday!

WhatJournalistsCanDo

Because systemic causation hasmostly gone unframedand unnamed, journalists have previously been at a lossand have been driven to resort to inadequate andmisleading metaphors. Charles Petit, writing in theKnightScienceJournalismTrackerofJanuary7,2014,givesalistofsuchmetaphors.Herearesomebeauts:

A weaker polar vortex moving around the Arctic

like a slowing spinning top, eventually falling overandblowingopenthedoortotheArcticfreezer...

This big slug of deadly cryosphere air slipped itsNorthPolemoorings,maraudedacrossCanada,andsweptthroughtheeasternUS...

When the winds weaken, the vortex can begin towobblelikeadrunkonhisfourthmartini...inthiscase, nearly the entire polar vortex has tumbledsouthward...

Responsiblejournalistscandobetter.Responsible journalists need to discuss systemic

causation.Certainlywhendiscussingglobalwarmingandits climate effects, and also when discussing othersystemic effects—such as those of fracking, theprivatization of education, the decline of unions, and soon.Responsible journalists also need to discuss a

devastating systemic effect on our economics, recentlydiscovered but not brought into public discourse by thepress: the systemic effect of the relationship betweenproductivewealthandreinvestmentwealth.The version of systemic causation just discussed is

designed to fit global warming phenomena. In addition,thereareotherformsofsystemiccausationthatwewillbe discussing, for example, in the study of economics.But for our purposes in this book, the most importantformofsystemiccausationconcernsthebrainitself.Thephenomenon of reflexivity is a form of systemiccausation.And the relationshipbetweenourpoliticsandtheconceptofpersonhoodisoneofthehardestcasesofsystemiccausationtogetacrosstothepublic,especiallyto political pundits, policy makers, strategists, pollsters,andotherpoliticalprofessionals.

★5★PoliticsandPersonhood

Eachofushas a senseofpersonal identity:your senseof who you are as a person. Central to that personalidentity is a moral sense, a sense of what is right andwrong,what justifiesouractions.Thatmoral sense, likeall thatwebelieve andunderstand, is physical, built intotheneural circuitryofourbrains. If that changes, if thecircuitry characterizing our moral sense changes, itchangesourpersonhood.That is, it changes thekindofpeopleweare:whatwethinkisrightandhowweact.We have seen that all politics ismoral, since political

policiesareassumedtoberight,notwrongorirrelevant.Our political divisions come down to moral divisions,characterized in our brains by very different braincircuitry. We’ve seen that the major moral divisions inour politics derive from two opposed models of thefamily: a progressive (nurturant parent) morality and aconservative(strictfather)morality.That isnoaccident,sinceyourfamily lifehasaprofoundeffectonhowyouunderstandyourselfasaperson.Theeffectoffamilylifeiscomplex,andpeershavean

effect as well. One result of that is biconceptualism.Biconceptualshavebothkindsofmoralcircuitry in their

brain, mutually inhibiting each other and applying todifferentissues,personbyperson.Thereisno“middle,”no morally based political ideology common to allmoderates.Regardless of whether you are progressive,

conservative, or biconceptual, though, your morality—yoursenseofwhatapersonshouldbeanddo—isdeeplyconnected to the way your brain triggers emotions anddetermines whether you feel good or bad in certainsituations and about certain ideas. It is worthunderstandingwhy.

TheSciencebehindEmpathyandMorality

One of the great discoveries of neuroscience is themirrorneuronsystem.Simplyput,thatsystemoperatesinour brains and gives us the capacity to connect withothers, to know and even feel what they feel, and toconnect with the natural world. It is the heart of ourcapacityforempathy.Fromemotionresearch,weknowthatcertainemotionscorrelatewithcertainactionsinourown bodies—in facial muscles, in posture, and so on.Whenwefeelhappy,forinstance,ourfacialmusclesarepromptedtoproduceasmile,asopposedtoafrownorabaringoftheteeth.Wealsoknowthatthephysicalcuesthatbroadcastemotioninotherswillusuallytriggerinan

observerthesamebrainresponsethatwouldaccompanythose physical cues of the same emotion in ourselves.Thatiswhywecanusuallytellifsomeoneelseishappyor sad, or angry or bored—and why a smile is oftenunconsciously greeted with a smile or a yawn with ayawn.All this is thanks to themirror neuron system,which

has circuitry connecting the brain’s action centers andperception centers. As a consequence, what you seeothers doing is neurally paired with brain activity thatcouldcontrolyourownactions.Musclesareactivatedbyfiringneurons,andmanyof thesameneuronsare firingwhether you are performing an action or whether youare seeing someone else performing the same action.This “mirroring” allows you to see themusculature tiedto the emotions of others and sense in your brainwhatthe same musculature would be like in your body, andhence thesameemotions, inyourself. Inshort, it allowsyoutofeeltheemotionsofothers!Thatiswhatempathyisabout.But this effecthas further repercussions in thebrain.

Neuroscientists have discovered a brain overlap, too,between imagininganddoing.Manyof the sameneuralregions are activated when we formmental images aswhenweactuallysee.Thesameholdstrueforwhetherwe imaginemovingor are actuallymoving.Thatmeans

that we have the capacity to empathize not only withsomeonepresent,butalsowithsomeonewecanimagine,remember, read about, dream about, and so on. That iswhywecanbedeeplymovedbyanoveloramovie,orevenanewspaperstory.Neuroscientistshavealso shown that,when someone

is in love and they see their loved one in pain, the paincenter in their own brain is activated.Emotional pain isreal.Soundssimple,but therearesometwists to thestory,

someneuralcomplicationsthataffecthowweultimatelyrespond to what we see, hear, and imagine. Theprefrontal cortex has regions particularly active duringtheexerciseofjudgment.Theseregionscontainneuronsthatareactivewhenweareperformingsomeparticularaction and less active when we see someone elseperforming the same action. It is hypothesized that thisgives us the capacity to modulate our empathy—tolessenitorturnitoffincertaincases.Themirrorneuronsystemthusconnectsusemotionallytoothers,butcanincertaincasesalsodistanceusemotionallyfromothers.The prefrontal cortex is active in another neural

system, too—one that I’ll call the well-being/ill-beingsystem. This is the system that releases certainhormonesinyourbrainwhenyouhaveexperiencesthatmake you feel good, and releases others when

experiencesmakeyou feelbad. Inessence, this systemregulateswhetheryouhaveasenseofwell-beingor ill-being at any given time. It is also the system thatpresumablyisinvolvedinmakingjudgmentsonthebasisofyourimaginationofwhatwillorwon’tbringyouwell-being.The well-being system and the empathy system can

interact in complexways.Somepeople feel satisfactionbothwhen theyarepersonally satisfiedandwhen thosetheyempathizewithfeelasenseofwell-being.Otherpeopledonothave the twosystemsconnected

in that way. (1) They may have the well-being systemoverriding the empathy system—with their interestsoverriding thecaresand interestsofothers.Or (2) theycan have a complex interaction in which they maintaintheir ownwell-being and balance it with contributing tothe well-being of others. Or (3) they may be self-sacrificing,alwaysplacingthewell-beingofothersaheadoftheirownwell-being.Or(4)theymaybepartofanin-group, and may place their well-being and that of in-groupmembersfirst,withoutempathizingatallwithout-group members. This can vary, depending on whatcountsasagivenperson’sin-group.Sincemorality is aboutwell-being,yourownand that

of others, these four alternatives define different moralattitudes.

Can themirror neuron system be affected by inbornfactors? Apparently, yes.With certain forms of autism,empathy is lessened or largely absent. In psychopaths,empathy is controlled: Psychopaths can sense whatsomeoneelseisfeeling,notbeaffectedthemselves,andthen manipulate the other for their own benefit orenjoyment.Can the mirror system be affected by how one is

raised, by one’s family life and peer relations? Doesone’s politicalmorality correlatewith one’s capacity forempathy—thatis,withtheoperationofthemirrorneuronandwell-being systems?That is being investigated, andpreliminary results suggest that there is a differencebetween extreme progressives and extremeconservatives,with extreme conservatives showing lessactivationintheirempathysystem.Since all thoughts and feelings are physical, amatter

of brain circuitry, it is not surprising that moralsensibilities should be constituted by physical brainstructureslikethosewehavejustbeendiscussing.Thesebrain structures form the neural basis not only of yourownmoralsensibilities,butalsoofyourviewsonwhatanidealpersonoughttobe.

TheIdealPerson

Whatshouldan idealpersonbe like?Conservativesandprogressives have largely opposite views, given theirdifferentviewsofmorality.Biconceptualshavedifferentviews aswell, depending on how theirmoral views aredivided up: biconceptuals who are largely conservativewill tend to have a conservative view of what peopleshould be like, and biconceptuals who are largelyprogressivewilltendtohaveaprogressiveviewofwhatpeople should be like. Or, biconceptuals that are lessextrememaybelievethatanidealpersonisbiconceptualin the sameway they are,with the samedistributionofconservativeandprogressiveviews.The progressive (nurturant parent) moral system

maintains a delicate balance between the empathy andthepersonalwell-being systems.At its core is empathyfor others and the responsibility to act on that empathy,butitismodulatedbytheprovisothatyoucan’ttakecareofanyoneelseifyou’renottakingcareofyourself.Thatis, itcentersonempathyand includesbothpersonalandsocialresponsibility.The conservative moral system centers on the well-

being system—on personal responsibility alone, onserving your own interests without depending on theempathyofotherstotakecareofyouandwithouthavingempathyandresponsibilityforothers.There are nuances, but this gets at the heart of the

difference.EmpathyversusSympathy

Empathy and sympathy both involve the capacity toknow what others are feeling. But unlike empathy,sympathy involves distancing, overriding personalemotionalfeeling.Someonewhoissympatheticmaywellact to relieve the pain of others but not feel the painthemselves. The word “compassion” can be used foreither empathy or sympathy, depending onwho is usingthe word. For example, George W. Bush, in firstannouncing his run for the presidency, called himself a“compassionate”conservative,citingthebookbyMarvinOlasky,TheTragedyofAmericanCompassion.Olasky and Bush’s take on compassion and

conservatism point to a central difference betweenprogressives and conservatives. Progressives tend tobelievethatsocietyasawholehasaresponsibilitytoaidthose in real material need and that the governmentshould be a major instrument, with support from taxes.Conservatives tend to prefer charity, delivered throughnongovernmental organizations, and tend to believe thatrealhelpformostpeopleinmaterialneedisarefusalofaid,togivethemanincentivetohelpthemselves.Hencethe conservativemotto: It is better to teach someone to

fishthantogivehimafishtoeat.Incidentally,charityforthe“deserving”fewcostsalotlessthantaxestoprovideresourcesforthebenefitofall.This dichotomy leads to two very different ideas of

whatanidealpersonshouldbelike,andhowourpoliticsshould be arranged to produce a version of the idealperson with the “right” moral system, whether purelyconservative,purelyprogressive,ortherightcombinationofthetwo.

ReflexivityandPersonhood

AtthispointwehavetoaskTheReflexivityQuestionforPersonhood: Can linguistic framing change the kind ofpersonsomeoneis?Theanswerseemstobeyes,thoughpossibly not in extreme cases. And of course it maydependonageandcircumstances.Butsuchchangesdoappeartohavehappenedovertheyears—sofarasIcantell, mostly with biconceptuals. Extreme conservatives(estimated at about 25 to 30 percent of the USpopulation), it appears, cannot be changed by reframingand setting up an effective communication system thatoperates full time, not just at elections.Yes, thismeansthat some people cannot be “reached” (an inaccurateprogressive metaphor) or “woken up” (anotherinaccurateprogressivemetaphor).

Consider a moderate progressive who is partlyconservative. She hears conservative language andconservativeargumentsoverandover,dayafterdayforyears—in the media or with friends or both. Theconservative language will activate the conservativemoral system, making it a bit stronger every time thelanguage is heard. As the conservative circuitry in herbrain becomes stronger (the synapses strengthen), themorelikelyitisthatherviewsonissueswillchangefromprogressive to conservative. The result may be a shiftwithinthebrainfromapersonwhoispartlyconservativetoapersonwhoismostlyconservative.Ibelievethatthishasactuallyhappenedinmanycases.That is the power of the conservative messaging

system: It is reflexivity in action.Over time, someone’svery personhood can change, and with it her ideal ofwhat other people should be.And, of course,who theyshouldvotefor.Theotherconservativeuseofreflexivitydependsupon

gettingthosevotes.Onceinoffice,conservativescannotonly say that government cannot work and has to beminimizedandprivatized,butbybeinginthegovernment,theycanalsostop it fromworking, thuscreatinga self-fulfilling prophecy. How? By cutting taxes, by cuttingfunding,bypassing laws, and, in theSupremeCourt,byreinterpretinglaws.

IncontemporaryAmerica,politicsandpersonhoodareinseparable—and apparently moving in a conservativedirection.Tochange thatdirection,progressivesneed tounderstand the role of the brain and of communicationsystemsintheprocess.

PoliticsandPersonhoodattheFounding

When the United States was founded, politics andpersonhood had come together, but in the progressivedirection.Historian Lynn Hunt at UCLA goes through the

historyindetailinherbookInventingHumanRights:AHistory. She starts with the defining passage of theDeclarationofIndependence:

Weholdthesetruthstobeself-evident,thatallmenare created equal, that they are endowed by theirCreatorwithcertainunalienableRights,thatamongthese are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit ofHappiness.

If these rights are self-evident, she asks, why doesJefferson have to say that they are self-evident? Andwhendidtheybecomeself-evident?Hunt, a former president of the American Historical

Society, studied the writing and culture of France,

England,andtheThirteenColonies.Sheshowsthatthoseideas were not there in the 1600s, and came intoexistence in the mid-1700s, mainly after 1760, whenWesternEuropeandtheStatesweresweptupinamajorculturalchange.Thatchangecanbeseenintheperiod’snovels, like Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Julie, the biggestbestseller of the century,with seventy editions between1761 and 1800. Julie was written as a collection ofintimate letters between two lovers. Readers identifieddeeplywiththeemotionallivesofthecharacters,whosepsychological stateswere revealed and developed fromletter to letter, arousing empathy for the plights ofordinary people. Between 1760 and the 1780s, suchnovelsmultiplied,lawswerepassedendingtorturebythestate as being inhuman, portraits showing the individualcharacteristics of their subjects started to be painted,mannerschangedtoincreasepersonalcontroloverone’sbody (e.g., blowing your nose into a handkerchief), andtheideaof individualautonomycameintoexistenceinarush.These changes were propelled by empathy, by

identification with the problems and plights of ordinarypeople, feeling what the characters felt, seeing suchplightaroundthem,andpropellinglegalandgovernmentalchange. By 1776, human rights became “self-evident”viathedevelopmentofempathyforone’sfellowcitizens.

Suchempathyformedthebasisforaunionofstates,andAmericandemocracy.HistorianDanielleAllen,oftheInstituteforAdvanced

Study at Princeton, has taken the study of theDeclarationof Independence one important step furtherinOurDeclaration:AReadingoftheDeclarationofIndependence inDefenseofEquality. It’s a thoroughreading of the declaration, though the central passageagainistheclassiconeonself-evidenttruths.ButAllen,going through the original copies, argues that the periodat the end of that passagewas not there in the originaldocument: Itwas inserted later.Her case is backed upbythegrammarofwhatfollows.Hereisthepassageasawhole,withtheoriginalpunctuation:

Weholdthesetruthstobeself-evident,thatallmenare created equal; that they are endowed by theirCreatorwith certain unalienable rights; that amongthese are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit ofHappiness;that,tosecuretheserights,governmentsareinstitutedamongMen,derivingtheirjustpowersfrom the consent of the governed; that wheneverany form of government becomes destructive oftheseends,itistherightofthepeopletoalterortoabolishit,andtoinstitutenewgovernment,layingitsfoundation on such principles, and organizing its

powers in such form, as to them shall seemmostlikelytoeffecttheirsafetyandhappiness.

Allen argues that, with the period, the self-evidenttruthsendwith life, liberty,and thepursuitofhappiness,what I’ve described above as coming from the well-beingsystem,butlackingtheideaofcitizensestablishingand working through a government on the basis ofempathy for the well-being of all. The passage endingwith life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is aboutfreedom, but what follows is about equality, with thecentralroleofthegovernmenttosecureit.Thegrammar—thesuccessionofthatclausesandthe

plural (“to effect their safety and happiness”)—showsthatthepassagegoesbeyondthepursuitofhappinesstothe role of government in guaranteeing equality in theunalienablerights.Allenisrightthatthisisabigdeal.Herpointisnotjust

about a period. It is about our political division. As IdescribeinmybookWhoseFreedom?,progressivesandconservatives have very different views of freedom.Conservativestalkabouttheirversionoffreedom,whichdoesnotincludeeitherequalityortheroleofgovernmentin securing it. They also attribute their view to theFoundingFathers.Andthoughconservativesseekradicalchange, they use the term “conservative” as if it

conservedthevaluesofthefoundingofournation.At issue iswhat freedom is supposed tomean,what

democracyissupposedtomean,andwhatpersonhoodissupposedtobe.

★6★ThePrivateDependsonthePublic

From the beginning,America providedpublic education,public hospitals, public roads and bridges, an army toprotect the union, a legislature to make laws regulatingandmaintainingtheunion,anexecutivetocarryoutthoselaws, a justice system to enforce those laws, a nationalbank, a patent office, means to promote interstatecommerce, and above all, a system for the public tochoose those who govern us. Without such publicresources there could have been no satisfactory privatelifeandnofunctioningbusinesscommunityinAmerica—andnodemocracy!This tells us something deep and crucial about

American democracy, and Western democracy ingeneral.Americandemocracyhasgrownoutoftheideaofaunion—acomingtogetherofcitizenswhocareabouteach other and therefore care about their nation as awhole. America has worked as a democracy becauseenough Americans have taken responsibility for eachother—that is, for thenation—usingtheirgovernment toprovidepublic resources for all, enoughandof the rightkind to provide decent private lives for most of ourcitizens.

Understanding this requires noticing and appreciatingthose public resources, appreciating the civil servantswhoprovidethem,andunderstandingthatweascitizenstake on the responsibility, both through paying for themandprovidingpoliticalsupport.Itisevenmoretruetodaythattheprivatedependson

the public. We, as citizens working though ourgovernment,haveprovidedmuchmore—anelectricgrid,publicuniversities,aninterstatehighwaysystem,publiclyfundedscientificresearchthathasresultedinthefieldofcomputer science and all computer technology, satellitecommunications that make telecommunications and theInternet possible, modern medicine, airports and an airtrafficcontrolsystem,pilottrainingthroughtheairforce,a center for disease control and a food and drugadministration, an environmental protection agency, anational park and national monument system, a publicresourcemanagement system, a civil service to replacethe corrupt old spoils system, and on and on. Andperhaps the greatest public resource of all is a publicsystemformanagingandguaranteeingthefunctioningofallofthesepublicresources:agovernment—asystemofgoverning—uptothesetasks.Without all of this, theblessingsofmodernAmerican

privatelifeandprivateenterprisewouldnotbehere.Theprivate depends on the public. Public resources make

privatelifepossible.It doesn’t takemuch to see this. The evidence is all

around us every day. There used to be signs on publicprojects: “Your tax money at work!” But such signsappear no more and the most basic truth of ourdemocracygoeslargelyunspoken.Why?Progressivestakeitforgranted,aspartoftheirmoral

and practical assumptions, like breathing or noting thatthe sky is blue. This is an important fact about howbrains work. Some ideas and some knowledge are sodeep that they rarely if ever even come toconsciousness. Nobody goes around saying things like,“Peoplebreathe,”or“Youhaveanose.”But for conservatives, the very idea that the private

depends on the public is anathema—immoral.Conservatives have a different view of responsibility.Whereas progressives believe centrally in empathy(caring about their fellow citizens), both personal andsocialresponsibility,andacommitmenttowarddoingtheirbest toward those ends, conservatives believe only inpersonalresponsibility.Thisyieldsacompletelydifferentviewofdemocracy,

that democracy provides what they call “liberty”—theability to seek one’s own interests without theresponsibility of others to help them, without anyresponsibility to help their fellow citizens, and without

interferencefromthegovernment.Thisisamoralconviction,asdeepintheconservative

brainastheprogressivemoralvisionisintheprogressivebrain.Again, I say“brain”—not“psyche”or“mind”—fora

deepandvitalreason:Allthoughtisphysical,carriedoutbytheneuralcircuitryinone’sbrain.Thoughtsdon’tjustfloat in air. As a result, you can only understand whatyour existing brain circuitry allows you to understand.The fundamental frames throughwhich you understandtheworldarephysical.Yourmoralidentityisasmuchaphysicalpartofyouasyourlungsoryournose.Youcanonlymakesenseofwhatyourbrainallows. If the factsdon’t fit what your brain physically allows, the braincircuitry stays and facts are either ignored, dismissed,ridiculed, or seen as a form of immorality to be foughtagainst.Itisafactthattheprivatedependsonthepublic—perhapsthemostcentralfactofAmericandemocracy—andyetstrictconservativeseithercan’tseeitorseeitas a form of immorality so fundamental that itmust bedefeatedatallcosts.Thisisamajorpartofwhatisdrivingthedivisiveness

of our country and the conservativemove tomake ourgovernment dysfunctional. It is behind the conservativemovestoprivatizeasmuchofgovernmentaspossible:toprivatize education, public health, public safety, water

resources, regulation of business practices, much ofnationaldefense,andonandon.Can brains change? Can the brains of enough

Americans change so that this basic fact of ourdemocracycanbecomprehendedandappreciated?Inmany cases, no.But in theoverwhelmingmajority

ofcases,yes.Whatmakesitpossibleisbiconceptualism.

TheBrainandConstantPublicDiscourse

Biconceptualismisafactabout thebrain.Agreatmanypeople have in their brains versions of both progressiveand conservative moral values in all sorts ofcombinations. And they apply these different moralvaluestodifferentissues.Rememberthatthereisnoideologyofthemoderate—

no set of views held by all moderates. A moderateprogressivehasmostlyprogressiveviews,butalsosomeconservative ones.Amoderate conservative hasmostlyconservativeviews,butalsosomeprogressiveones.Butthereisnosinglesetofpoliciesthatdefinesa“middle.”Progressive and conservative worldviews contradict

eachother.Botharecharacterizedinthebrainvianeuralcircuitry.Howcanyouhavecontradictoryneuralcircuitsinthesamebrain?Easy.Theanswerismutualinhibition,

averycommonkindofbraincircuitry:Whenonecircuitis active, it turns off the other.Which is turned on at agiven time is a matter of context. Someone with bothworldviews applies them to different issues in differentcontexts, resulting in the brain circuits for the differentvalues unconsciously and automatically switching backandforthdependingontheissue.That’swhatitmeanstobeabiconceptual.It isoftenthesebiconceptualswho,asvoters,are the

target of intense campaign attention. But RepublicansunderstandhowtoappealtothembetterthanDemocratsdo. Recall that all politics is moral, and that a voter’simplicitsenseofmoralityisabsolutelycentraltoavoter’sidentity. Since biconceptual voters have both moralsystems—mostlyonebutpartlytheother—conservativesneed to keep their voters and attract the partlyconservative moderate Democrats. Conversely,progressivesneed tokeep theirvotersandattractpartlyprogressive moderate Republicans. There is an honeststrategy for achieving this goal, and also an Orwellianone.Thehoneststrategyistouseonlyyourlanguageandavoidusingtheotherside’slanguage.Thatwillmaximallyactivateyourmoralsysteminthemoderatesontheotherside. The Orwellian strategy involves using the otherside’s language in an attempt to “reach” those withmoderate or opposing views. But if you use Orwellian

language, you will be activating the other side’s moralsystem,making it stronger, and shooting yourself in thefoot.However, some political organizations use Orwellian

language. For instance, an hour before writing this, Ireceived a robocall from the “Center for WorkerFreedom”askingmetosupportameasurethattheysaidwould support worker freedom. They are an anti-unionorganization and the measure is anti-union, though thetelephonemessagedidn’tmentionthat.TheyweretryingtofoolDemocrats intosupportingananti-unionmeasureoutofignorance.It isvital thatprogressivesunderstandwhy just citing

the facts doesn’t work, and why attention to publicdiscoursemustbeconstant,notjustfocusedonelections.Here are the basics that progressives need tounderstand.There is a crucial logic to the way the brain works

withrespecttopublicdiscourse.Herearetenkeypointstothatlogic.

1.Themoreabraincircuitisactivated,thestrongeritssynapsesget.2.Thestrongeritssynapsesget,themorelikelyitistofireandthestrongerthefiringis.3.Whentwocircuitsinhibiteachother,thestronger

onecircuitgets,theweakertheothergets.4.Supposetwomutuallyinhibitorycircuitsapplytodifferentissues.Asonegetsstrongerandtheothergetsweaker,themorelikelyitisthestrongeronewillstartapplyingtomoreissuesandtheweakeronetofewerissues.5.Languagechangesthestrengthofthosecircuits.Conservativelanguageactivatescircuitryfortheconservativeworldview;progressivelanguageactivatescircuitryfortheprogressiveworldview.6.Imageryfittingoneworldviewortheothermattersasmuchormore.7.Frequencyoflanguageuseandimagerymatters.Themorefrequentthelanguageuseorimagery,themorestrengtheningoccurs.8.Journalistsaretrainedtousethemostfrequentlanguageinpublicdiscourse.9.TheconservativeturninAmericahascomefromtheconstantuseofconservativelanguageinpublicdiscourse.Somuchsothatprogressiveshaveoftenadoptedconservativelanguage,thushelpingtheconservativecause.10.Becauseoftheeffectoflanguageandimageryonthebrain,theconstantuseofoneideology’slanguageovertheother’shasanenormouseffectonourpolitics.

Conservativeshavebeendoingabetter jobatgettingtheir language into public discourse. The enormousconservativecommunicationsystemhasdoneitsjobwell,especially on the central issue of our democracy—thatthe private depends on the public. The centralconservative strategy to minimize, or even eliminate,public resources has been to eliminate the money thatfunds public resources—taxes! Taxes for the wealthyhave been cut by conservatives, who have defendedhugetaxloopholes,andhaveevendrasticallycutfundingfortheIRSsothattherearenotenoughIRSworkersormoderncomputersfor theIRStomonitor taxevasion—mostly by thewealthy. Since the 1970s, the concept oftaxationhasshiftedfromthesourceofneeded,andoftenrevered, public resources to the idea that taxation is aburden—anafflictioninneedof“taxrelief.”The constant talk of taxation as an affliction and a

burden has led biconceptuals to “switch” to viewingtaxation as a burden rather than something that makesour private lives possible or that creates a base fromwhich corporations prosper. While conservatives drivethese frames home, progressives don’t realize that theyhave to drive their own frames home—and only laterrealize that the conversation has completely changed.“Suddenly” not just conservatives are talking about the

burden of taxes instead of the value of public services,but soare themedia, soaremoderates, and, eventually,the “tax relief” language works its way into evenprogressivediscourse.The termTeaParty was chosentomakeitsoundpatriotictoopposetaxation.The only progressive who has succeeded in getting

across the idea that theprivatedependson thepublic isElizabethWarren,whohasargued it repeatedly,anddidso with special success when she was running for theSenatein2012.Atonepointinhispresidentialcampaign,President Obama tried the argument, but messed it upwhen he tried ad-libbing in a public talk and said, “Ifyou’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebodyelse made that happen.” Conservatives jumped on hisremarkandattackedhimviciouslyfor it.Hecouldhavefixed it bymaking thepoint correctly theverynext dayandeveryday thereafter,getting the ideaout intopublicdiscourse,andallowingthepresstodoitsjobandpresenttheoverwhelmingevidenceforit.Butthepresidentwastoo timid and dropped it,missing amajor opportunity tochangepublicdiscourse.Can progressives turn this around? Yes, but not

without serious conscious commitment. The presidentandeveryprogressivecandidate,officeholder,andpublicfigure of any kind can start now: say it right, over andover.Connecttheprivate-depends-on-the-publicconcept

tosomethingthatconservativeswillunderstand:freedom.Public resources allow for freedom in case after case,opening up all kinds of opportunities in life. It is thefreedom that public resources afford that make themcentraltodemocracy.Sayingitright—andsayingitoverandover—isadvice

thatcanbeappliedtoissueafterissue.

★★PartIII★★

FramingforSpecificIssues

★7★FreedomIssues

One of the major mistakes made by the DemocraticParty is to focus on election campaigns but not on theconstantframingofpublicdiscourse.Allpoliticsismoral.Voters vote on what they implicitly, automatically, andunconsciouslybelievetoberight.Inshort,electionshaveeverything to do with how biconceptuals have adoptedthemoral vision of one side or the other.And electionsdependonthelanguagevotershearandtheimagestheyseeeveryday—notjustduringthecampaigns.Democrats tend to address interests: kitchen table

economicsandtheobjectivefactsaffectingtheinterestsofmiddleclassandpoorvoters.Yet,poorconservativesand biconceptuals regularly vote against their interests.Many Tea Party voters are poor or made poorer byconservative policies. But the conservative messagemachine is relentless and extends almost everywhere.Conservative messaging dominates everyday publicdiscourse. And the domination of everyday publicdiscourse—at least as much as the domination ofelectoraldiscourse—determinesourpoliticalrealities.Conservativeshavecome toown thewords freedom

and liberty. These words weigh heavily in the

conservative vocabulary. These words are among themostpowerfulinourpoliticsbecauseofthecentralityofthe concept of freedom to democracy. Conservativeshavenorighttothatownership.Words have contestable meanings, and the word

freedommeansverydifferentthingstoprogressivesthantoconservatives.AsIpointedout inWhose Freedom?,freedom is a contested concept. Conservatives andprogressivesusethewordtooppositeeffects.Aswehaveseenfromacarefulreadingoftheoriginal

DeclarationofIndependencedocuments,theprogressivemeaningisattheheartofourdemocracyanditistimetotakeitback.Mostoftheissuesinpublicdiscourse,bothinelectionsandineverydaydecisionmaking,comedowntoissuesoffreedom.

HealthCare

Comedian Jimmy Kimmel sent an associate out onto aLos Angeles street corner with a microphone to askpassersby a simple question: Which do you like better,Obamacare or the Affordable Care Act? Theoverwhelmingmajority said theydidn’t likeObamacare,but thought that the Affordable Care Act was a goodidea.Mostdidnotknowthat theywere thesame thing.After all, different names typically refer to different

things.How did they get the negative impression of

“Obamacare”?AfterObamawaselectedin2008,butbeforehewas

inaugurated, he had a pollster do a survey of whichprovisionsforhishealthcareactwouldbemostpopular.Agroupof thoseprovisionscameinbetween60and80percent in popularity. They were the familiar ones: nopreconditions,nocaps,yourcollege-agechildcanbeonyourplan,andsoon.Thesebecamethemainprovisionsof the plan. The assumption was that if all the mainprovisions were popular, the whole plan would bepopular.Inotherwords,thepopularityoftheplanshoulddependonthepopularityoftheprovisionsoftheplan.No conservatives attacked those popular provisions.

There was no conservative movement in favor ofpreconditionsorcaps,oragainsthavingyourcollege-agechildonyourplan.Instead, conservatives understood that politics is a

matter of morality and decided to attack the plan onmoralgrounds.Theychosetwomoraldomains:FreedomandLife.OnFreedom,theyattackeditasa“governmenttakeover.”OnLife,theysaiditcontained“deathpanels.”And they repeated “government takeover” and “deathpanels” over and over, month after month. And everytimethepresidentsaid“Itisnotagovernmenttakeover,”

he used the words government takeover, whichactivatedtheideaofagovernmenttakeoverinthebrainsoflisteners,thusreinforcingtheconservativeattack.The conservatives also never used the name

Affordable Care Act. Instead, they invented their ownname—Obamacare, taking the emphasis off theaffordability of health care and associatingObamacarewith government takeover and death panels. Thepress,quotingtheattacks,usedthetermObamacareandnot the clunky name Affordable Care Act. Obamaeventually tried, in vain, to turn this to his advantage—sayingitmeant“ObamaCares.”Butitwastoolate.Theconservatives had given the name the meaning theywantedbyfrequentenoughrepetition.The president and members of the administration

counterattackedwith lists of facts: theprovisionsof theplan. It didn’t help. The president went on TV with alaundry list of provisions. It didn’t help. His adviser,DavidAxelrod,sentamemotoOrganizingforAmerica’semail list, roughly 13 million supporters strong, askingthemtospeaktotheirfriendsandneighborsinsupportofthe president’s plans. He said there were twenty-fourthings to remember, but just to make it “easier,” hedividedthelistoffactsintothreegroupsofeight!Anycognitivescientistcouldhavetoldhimnoonewas

goingtorememberthethreegroupsofeight,andIhave

nevermetanyonewhohas.Theconservativeswontheframingwarof2009,andit

helped strengthen the nascent Tea Party movement asTea Partiers were deployed to go to town meetingsaroundthecountrythatsummerandrepeatgovernmenttakeover,deathpanels,andObamacare.If the president had understood the conservative

framingtactic,hecouldhaveundercutitinasimpleway.He could have adopted the same two moral issues,FreedomandLife,fromaprogressiveperspective.If you have cancer and you don’t have health care,

you are not free.You are probably going to suffer anddie(aLifeissue).Ifyouareinacaraccidentandsuffermultiple injuriesanddon’thavehealthcare,youarenotfree—youmay be disabled for life, or die. Even if youbreak your leg, do not have access to health care, andcannotget itset,youarenotfree.Youmayneverwalkorrunfreelyagain.Ill health enslaves you. Disease enslaves you. Even

cataractsthatrobyourvisionandcaneasilybehealedbymodern medicine will enslave you to blindness withouthealthcare.Healthy food is also a freedom issue. Much of big

agricultureproducesunhealthyfood,especiallyprocessedfood, sugary food, foodwith unhealthy additives,meatswith hormones and antibiotics from animals raised on

pesticide-treatedfeed,andsoon.Accesstohealthyfoodisafreedomissue.Andwhen conservatively run states turn down funds

for Medicaid, that is a freedom issue—both for thepeople who are being denied health care, and foreveryone else to whom a curable disease can spreadwhenhealthcareisdeniedtoasignificantnumberofthepeopletheyinteractwitheveryday.Freedomissuesarepowerfulissues.

Education

Conservatives want to eliminate public resources as amoral issue. In their view, they are given for free andtherefore take away personal responsibility and theincentive to work. Education is a main example. Inconservatively run states, like Wisconsin, funding forpubliceducationhasbeenseverelycut.The conservative movement against public school

education offers the alternative of charter schools,religious schools, and private schools. Charter schoolsare schools paid for publicly but run privately—veryoftenbyfor-profitcorporations.The CREDO study at Stanford in 2013 found that

about75percentofcharterschoolshaveresultsthatareworse than, or no different from, traditional public

schools.A small percentageof charter schools dohavebetter results. But since funds for charter schools aretakenfrompublicschoolbudgets,charterschoolstendtodrain money from public schools and make publiceducationworse on thewhole, even for the best publicschools.Moreover, charter schools have no accountability to

local school districts or the public. A consequence inTexas, for example, is that charter schools tend todebunk evolution and science and teach creationism. InMichigan,80percentofschoolsarenowcharterschools,and they are doing no better at educating children inpovertythanpublicschools.The conservative framing is that public schools are

“failing”andthatvouchersforreligiousorprivateschoolsgive parents “choice.” Those vouchers tend not to payforhigh-qualityschools,sothatpoorfamiliesthatreceivethem tend not to get high-quality education for theirchildren.Butforwealthyparents,thevouchersrepresentpublic support for the wealthy and a cut in support forthosewholackwealth.The conservative attack on public education is being

feltdrasticallyinhighereducation.Conservativesinstatelegislaturesarecuttingfundingforhighereducation,withtwo horrendous consequences. State-run colleges anduniversities used to be the gateways to education for

poor and lower-middle-class students.As conservativescut state university budgets, the schools, to stay inbusiness, have had to raise their tuition, pricing highereducation out of reach for a great many of thesestudents. Students’ only alternative has been to borrowmoney, which raises the second problem: student debt.At a timewhen banks can borrowmoney at 1 percentinterest, studentshave topay8percent intereston theirloans, which burdens them with many years of loanpayments after theygraduate.Thatmakes it harder forthem to afford getting a post-graduate education orstarting a family. Present calculations are that if thegovernment forgaveall student loans, itwouldboost thenation’s economy far more than the cost of the loans.Nonetheless, conservatives are against both loanforgivenessanddroppingtheinterestonstudentloanstothesameratethatbankspay.Whether at the level of pre-school, K–12, or higher

education, the conservative move is to reduce or endpublic education—as part of the move to end publicresourcesingeneral.Education is a freedom issue. But that is not now

beingsaidinpublicdiscourse.Withouteducationyouarenot free inmany,manyways.Education tellsyouabouttheworld and thepossibilities in life. If youdon’t knowwhat is possible, you cannot even set goals. Education

isn’t just about filling your head with facts; it’s aboutteaching you to think, to notice, to be critical, to actrationally, tobepractical, and toget access to facts foryourself. Education gives you skills, the ability to dothings you couldn’t do otherwise.Yes, educated peoplehave more economic potential—and money can makeyou free in many ways—but the freedom educationoffersgoeswellbeyondmoney.Itopensthepossibilitiesforconnectionstothenaturalworld,foranaestheticlife,fora lifeof ideas,foranunderstandingofwhat isgoingonaroundyou,andforanunderstandingofyourself.Andit gives you the knowledge and the opportunity to be aproductivecitizen,tocontributetoyourownfreedomandthe freedom of others via political and socialengagement.If education in general is a freedom issue, public

education, on the whole, is an even more powerfulfreedomissue,withtwoimportantcomponents:

• Public education is publicly accessible. Itgives educational access to more people, and soincreases their freedoms. It also allows individualstounderstandthefullrangeofpeople,andthereforeopens up human relationships and the possibility ofempathizingwithandunderstandingmorepeople.• Public education is publicly accountable

education. It prevents the narrowing of what istaught when private interests determine what istaught.

Moreover,systemiccausationfurthermakeseducationafreedomissue,becausemanyofourmajoreducationalissuesareduetopoverty.Povertyall toooftenmeans thatparentswhohave to

hold down multiple jobs cannot properly raise theirchildren—notreadingtothem,notraisingthemtorespecteducation, not being able to get them out of unhealthyenvironments. Poverty means children going to schoolhungry in the morning and not able to concentrate onclasses. And poverty and lack of education replicatethemselves. In a large range of cases, the failure ofstudents to learn has mainly to do with a nationaleconomic failure and not with inadequate teachers orschools.

Poverty

Povertyisafreedomissue.Itisobvious.Peoplewhoarepoorhavealotlessfreedomthanpeoplewhoarerich.As we have seen, people who are poor have less

accesstohealthcareandeducationthanpeoplewhoarerich.

But there are many more freedoms eroded, oraltogether lost, due topoverty.Housing isbetter for therich than thepoor.There isnohomelessnessamong therich.Neighborhoodsarebetterfortherichthanthepoor.Theability to relocateor travel is fareasier for the richthan the poor. Food is better for the rich than the poor.Social connections arebetter for the rich than thepoor.Betterjobsareavailablefortherichthanthepoor.All of these are freedom issues: If you are homeless

orcannotfindadecentplacetoliveforyourselfandyourfamily,youareoppressedandlimited,youarenotfree.Ifyoucannotrelocateortravelwhenyouneedto,orwantto, you are limited in your freedom. If you cannot eatproperly,youarenotfree.Ifyouarenotabletoconnectwithpeople,youarenotfree.Ifyouarenotfreetofindajobandwork,youarenotfree.In virtually every dimension of life, being in poverty

withoutbeingabletoescapeitisafreedomissue.Yetmany people in poverty often vote formeasures

thatmaketheirlivesworse,notbetter,becausecontinualconservative framing has activated a conservativeworldvieweveninthosewhoselivescouldbeessentiallyruinedbyit.Conservatives seebeingpoor as a personal failure, a

failure of individual responsibility. But the reality is thatpovertycurtails freedom.There is a reasonwhypeople

speakofbeing“trapped”inpoverty.Theyare.Again, in our democracy, the private depends on the

public.Dowecareaboutwhetherourfellowcitizensarefree,ornot?

Discrimination:Race,Gender,andSexualOrientation

By now, our history has made clear that racism is afreedomissue. Itcan imposepoverty, lackofeducation,ill-health,andworse.AswesawwithTrayvonMartin,itcangetyoukilledinsomestates.Ourrecenthistoryhasmade itclear thathomophobia

isafreedomissue.Itisasnormaltobegayasitistobeleft-handed.Freedomtomarryforpeoplewhohappentobegayisasmuchamatterofloveandcommitmentasitis forpeoplewhohappen tobe straight, andadenialofmarriageorotherrightsonthebasisofwhetheryouarestraight or gay is a freedom issue. That is becomingcleareralloverAmerica.The first edition of this book played a role in the

adequate framing of the deepest reality of gay rights.Thepriorargumentswereaboutrightsofinheritance,ofhospitalvisitation—discrimination inmonetaryandsocialmatters. These were practical issues. What this bookmadeclearwas that the issuewas fundamentallymoral

—amatterofloveandcommitment.Allpeopleshouldbefree to marry whoever they love and want to becommitted to for life. Progressives began using thatmessagemore andmore frequently beginning a decadeago, and we have seen the right to marry progress byleapsandbounds.Framingthetruthatthedeepestmorallevelmatters.What have been called “women’s issues” are also

freedom issues, and these have not been adequatelyframedassuch.Ingeneral:

• Body control. The right of human beings tocontroltheirownbodiesisafreedomissue.•Respect.Therightofhumanbeingstobetreatedinstitutionally with respect as a human being is afreedomissue.

Womenarehumanbeingsandhavea right tocontroltheirownbodies.Whenthatisdenied,theyarenotfree.Controloverawoman’sbodyarisesinawidevarietyofcases:

• Sex education. For women especially, sexeducation is required for control over one’s body,since women need education about menstruation,sexually transmitteddiseases thatcanaffect futurechildbirth,howsexcanleadtopregnancy,andhow

reproductioncanbecontrolled.•Control of reproduction. Reproduction occursthroughwomen’sbodiesandaffectsthosebodiesinagreatmanyways.Womenneedtobeincontrolofwhether or when they reproduce. Thus access tofamily planning advice, birth control methods, andabortionareissuesofcontrolofawomanoverherbody.• Forced ultrasounds and attacks on familyplanning.Forcingawoman toundergohumiliationin order to exert control over her own body is afreedomissue.Forexample,forcingawoman,asinTexas, to have a mostly male-administeredultrasoundtwenty-fourhoursbeforeanabortion,orallowinganti-abortionadvocatestohoundheronherway to a clinic, is a freedom issue for women.Passinglawsthatmakeitimpossibletokeepfamilyplanningclinicsopen isalsoaviolationofwomen’sfreedom.• Humiliating victims of sex crimes. A freewoman has control over her own body. Sex thatviolates that control includes rape, drugging awoman in order to have sex, exerting physical orpsychological force to have sex, and so on. Policeand courts who humiliate a womanwho has beenrapedareviolatingherfreedom.

These are all freedom issues. They are rooted incircumstancesthatapplytowomen,buttheyarespecialcasesofthefreedomofallhumanbeingstocontroltheirownbodies.There are also circumstances where women are not

being treated likeother humanbeingson an institutionallevel—insignificantways:

•Equal pay for equal work. This is not just anequalityissue.It isanissueofwhetherwomenarebeing treated likeanyotherhumanbeingwould,orshould,betreated.•Equality in theratingofability forapositioninan institution. In a free society, gender shouldmakenodifferenceinwhetherornotapersongetsa job, a promotion, admission to an academicprogram,nominationforpoliticaloffice,andsoon.

These,too,arefreedomissues.Youarenotfreewhenyouarenottreatedlikeotherhumanbeingswithrespecttohowyoufunctioninaninstitution.Equality and freedom are not separate issues.

Discrimination is a denial of freedom.Freedom ismoregeneral.Ithastodowithaclearpath(noonestandinginyourway or placing obstacles) orwith possessions you

have a right to. It is freedom that is at the heart ofdemocracy. And it is freedom that concerns everyonewhohasneeds,dreams,andgoals.The present Democratic framing is the War on

Women.Idon’tknowifitisagoodmoney-raisingtactic.But it is not effective framing beyond strong feministprogressives. Strict father morality is partly aboutpreserving male authority over women by claimingprotectiveness and support of women—anything but awaragainstthem.Conservativewomen,too,tendtoseemale authority as protectiveness, or support formotherhoodasthebasicfemalefunction.The War on Women works for feminist progressive

women,whocorrectly see theirvalues asunder attack.But it doesn’t work so well for conservative orbiconceptualwomen.Freedom,ontheotherhand,allowswomen to decide for themselves, whatever their viewsonabortion,contraception,andsexeducation.

UnionsandPensions

Workersareprofitcreators.Conservatives like to speak of wealthy company

ownersand investorsas“jobcreators,” that they“give”peoplejobs,asiftheyjustcreatejobsasgiftsforpeoplewhoareoutofwork.Thatisnonsense.Thetruthisthat

workers are profit creators, and that no one gets hiredunless they contribute to the profit of owners andinvestors.Itisbasictruth.Workersareprofitcreators.Butwho

says it? How many times, if any, have you heard thattruth? It is an important truth; it reframes the issue ofjobs from the perspective of the contributions of thosewhowork.As we discussed earlier, a pension is a delayed

paymentforworkalreadydone.Thisisthemostfundamentaltruthaboutpensions,and

itisalmostneversaid.Itisanunframedtruth.Whenyoutakeajobandapensioncomeswithit,that

pension is part of your pay, part of your conditions ofemployment. It iscommonforworkers to foregohighercurrent pay if there is a significant pension, since thepension is money to live on when you can no longerwork.Itispartoftheemploymentcontract.The idea behind pensions is that a company can pay

less in salary, take the remaining money and invest it,assuming it can invest it at a higher return than theworker could, then make a profit on the investmentreturnwhenthepensionislaterpaid.An additional idea behind pensions is that they keep

employeesloyal to theemployer,andsoemployerssavemoney on having to train newworkers, and in addition

they can retainworkerswhoknow the business and socanbemoreefficientthannewworkers.In short, a pension is anything but a gift to an

employee. It is earned. And it is set up to profit theemployeraswellastheemployee.Unfortunately, money for pensions is often

misappropriatedormishandledbytheinstitutions.Itmaybe badly invested or used for some other purpose, likepaying dividends to stockholders or salaries tomanagement.Sowhenacompany(say,GeneralMotors)or a city or state says to its employees that it cannot“afford” topaypensions, theyareengaging in theftandthethievesshouldbeprosecuted.Themoney has been earned. If it has been used for

some other purpose, it has been stolen. If it has beenbadlyinvested,thentheinvestmentlossisthecompany’s,andthepensionersshouldhaveaclaimonthecompany’sassets.Unfortunately, framing enters in here. Pensions and

healthcarearecalled“benefits,”asiftheyaregenerousgifts toemployees.Theyarenotgifts.Theyareearnedasdeferredpayments forworkdone.Whenacompanytells its employees that they can no longer afford such“generous benefits” and will have to cut them, it is aframinglie.Eithertherehasbeentheftormisinvestmentormismanagement.“Benefits”areearnings,period.

Pensions and benefits are freedom issues. In a freesociety, there is a justice system that punishes thefts,adjudicatescontracts,andinthecaseofmisappropriationof funds, permits lawsuits tomake a claimon assets tomake up for losses and the costs of the lawsuit—emotional and monetary. To the extent that there is nosuch justice system, people with pensions and benefitsthathavebeentakenfromthemarenotfree.Large companies—and some small ones—have two

kindsofemployees:theassetsandtheresources.The “assets” include major management and

especially creative or skilled people whose specialcreativity and skills are necessary to the company’ssuccess. They are part of the stock value of thecompany. They are hired by “headhunters” andcommand high salaries and golden parachutes—highpensionsandcompensationpackages.The“resources”areinterchangeableworkersthatcan

be hired from an employment pool. They are hired andmanagedbytheHumanResourcesDepartment.Justasresources like gas or oil or steel are purchased ascheaply as possible, so, too, are human resourcespurchasedascheaplyaspossible.Sincepayscalesoftenmatch skill level, they tend to be hired at the lowestpossible skill level and at the lowest cost. Whenunemployment ishighand theemploymentpool is large,

companiescanofferlessinsalaryand“benefits”andstillget appropriate human resources, while maximizingprofitsandpaymentsto“assets.”Unionizationisafreedomissue.Companiesthatarehiringhumanresources,ingeneral,

havemuchmore power than individuals seeking such ajob.Whenthecompanyislargeandthereisabighumanresourcepool,workersseekingjobshavetotakewhatisoffered—orthejobwillgotothenextpersoninthepool.This includes not just salary and benefits, but alsoworkingconditions—jobsafety,workinghours,overtime,and so on. The employee is serving on the company’sterms,andoftenatthecompany’swhims.In capitalist economic theory, employment is a

transaction inwhich the employer buys the labor of theemployees and the employees sell their labor to theemployer.Hence the term labormarket. It is assumedineconomictransactionsthatbothwillseekthebestdeal.Unionscreatethebestdealfortheresource-employees.Unionsfunctiontoequalizethepowerofthecompany

over the employee. Short of outsourcing, companiescannot function without any resource-workers at all. Ifthecompanyisunionized,thenalltheworkersasagrouphave bargaining power that a solitary worker does nothave.Thealternative—takingwhatever thecompanyoffers

to the individual—might well be called corporateservitude orwage slavery.As the power of unions hasdeclined, thewagesof resource-workershavenot goneup in thirty years. Over the same time, the wealth ofwealthy investors and corporations has skyrocketedwithoutmorebeingproduced.The decline of unions has meant a decline for most

citizensintheirshareoftheirnation’swealth,andwithitadeclineinallthefreedomsthatwealthbrings.Unionization is a freedom issue, and needs to be

understoodassuch.Butthefailuretosayitoutloudandrepeat it as often as possible allows conservatives toformorganizations like theCenter forWorkerFreedom,asifunionsweretakingawayfreedom,andtospeakof“Right to Work” laws, as if unions were taking rightsaway instead of granting you freedom from corporateservitudeandwageslavery.

Immigration

Americaisacountryofimmigrants.Manyofthemhavebeen refugees, either refugees fleeing from brutaloppression or economic refugees fleeing from equallybrutalizingpoverty.Theyhavecomehereforfreedom.My own grandparents were such refugees—and if

youarenotNativeAmerican,yourancestorsmostlikely

were too. Upon arriving in America, my grandparentsbecameAmericans in thebestsenseof theword:hard-working, raising their families, highly ethical, and lovingand appreciating this country. I suspect that yourancestorswerelikethataswell.The issueof“immigration” isaboutanewgeneration

ofsuchrefugees.PresidentObama,inaspeechonJune22, 2012, at theNational Association of Latino ElectedandAppointedOfficialsconferenceinFloridaclearlyandbeautifully stated his moral understanding of the issue.His words showed that the current wave of refugees,referred toas“undocumented immigrants,”are inmanyways already citizens—they contribute enormously toAmerican society and the American economy throughhard work, they love the country they live in, they arepatriots, they share their lives with other Americansevery day, they take on individual and socialresponsibility. The president offered more than justfreedom;heofferedappreciation.Theyhaveearnednotjust recognition asAmericans, but our gratitude aswellfor all that they have contributed through hard work,oftenatlowpay.They are fine Americans already and, through the

lives they have been living as Americans, have earnedthedocumentationthatotherAmericanshavegottenjustby being born, without earning it. This is a moral

narrativethattellsatruthandneedstoberepeated.Butitrarelyis.There are two metaphors, one liberal and one

conservative, that do not do the refugees justice. Theliberal metaphor is the Path to Citizenship, as ifcitizenshipshouldbetheendofalong,hardjourney,withlittlegrantedalongtheway,withlongyearsinlimbo,andlegalresidencyonlytothosewhoactasidealcitizensandeithergotocollegeorserveinthemilitary.TheDREAMAct, which would allow such access to the AmericanDream,doesn’thave the rightname. Itmakes thesedefactocitizens into thosewhocanonlydream,as if theyare not acting every day just as citizens—the “best” ofourcitizens—act.Attheveryleasttheyareearning,anddeserve, aminimum along theway: health care, decenthousing, decent working conditions, a living wage, andaccess to education for themselves and their children—andtherighttoadriver’slicense.Theydeservenotjustfreedom,butgratitude.The conservative metaphor shows anything but

gratitude. It is the Criminal metaphor. In fleeing toAmerica,oftenriskingtheirlivestocome,theserefugeestrespassed; they did not have documents, which is notwithin the law. Conservatives have therefore brandedthem as “criminals”—“illegals”—as if they arecommitting crimes every day when they are actually

mowing lawns, cleaning houses, taking care of children,picking vegetables and fruits, cooking your meals,working on construction sites, and, whenever possible,using all the skills they have to their advantage and toours. Their children are studying in schools and helpingoutathome.But because they often have brown skins, are

impoverished,andspeakSpanish, theyarediscriminatedagainst.Conservativeswanttojailthemanddeportthem.Being brown-skinned, Spanish-speaking, and poor, andnot being born American, they fall low on theconservative moral hierarchy: They are seen as lessmoral.Theyarediscriminatedagainstfortheircolorandlanguageandblamedfortheirpoverty.The issueforAmericans isempathy:Dowecarefor

those fellow human beings who are functioning as ourfellowcitizens?Ordowetreatthemaslesserbeings,notworthyofthefreedomtheyareearningdaybyday?Theissue for those who have come here to escape thebrutalityofoppressionandpovertyisfreedom.This is especially true for the tens of thousands of

childrenwhohavecrossedtheborder,sentbyparentsorfleeingon theirownfromhuman traffickers,gangs,anddeath squads in Guatemala, Honduras, and parts ofMexico who are murdering, harming, or kidnappingchildren.UnderanexecutiveordersignedbyGeorgeW.

Bush before he left office, these children have to betaken care of reasonably well by the US government,processed,givenacourthearing,andtheneithersent tolive with family in the United States or deported toanothercountry—MexicoiftheyarefromMexico.Itwas never expected that therewould be somany.

Conservatives are blaming the situation on Obama, fornotjustimmediatelydeportingthem—thoughitwouldbeillegal,aswellasinhuman,forhimtodoso.Theyarenotcalled“Bush’srefugeechildren,”thoughtheycouldbeiftheissuewerejustpinningtheproblemonaconservativerather than treating them humanely—and according tolaw.Meanwhile, southern conservatives living near the

border are rebelling against treating these refugeeshumanelyandnotjustdeportingthem.Therearemassiveconservative-organizedprotests—people lining the roadswavingAmerican flags—shouting racist slogans. ThoseinterviewedinthemediasaythingslikeSendthemback.They’redirty.Theycarrydiseases.They’recriminals.WhyisObamaspendingourtaxpayerdollarstogivethemcleanroomsandclothesand foodandmedicalcare?Soonthey’llbeinourschools.Wherearetheirparents? How could their parents have been soirresponsible tohave sent theirchildrenherealone?Don’ttheylovetheirchildren?

This is a major humanitarian issue, and it calls forempathy. Parentswho love their children don’twant tosee themmaimed ormurdered or kidnapped by humantraffickers.Manyofthesechildrenareheroic,somehowtravelingover1,000milestogettosafetyandfreedom.The issue is empathy and respect for these refugees

ashumanbeings.

★8★ThePikettyInsightontheAccelerating

WealthGap

Systemiccausationappliestotheeconomyaswellastoglobalwarming,and ithaseffectseverybitasdramaticand crucial. There is an accelerating gap—not justwidening but accelerating—between the ultra rich andeveryoneelse.Why?Whatarethesystemiccausesandthe systemiceffects?And is there anythingwrongwithsome people getting that rich and progressively richerovertime?The answers to these questions were sharpened in

2014byan insightofeconomistThomasPikettyandhiscolleagues—aninsightthathasnotyetbecomeframedinpublicdiscourse.ThePikettyinsightshowedusthatourcurrentconcept

of Rich is not adequate to understand the wealth-gapphenomenon.OneneedstoalsocomprehendthenotionsofWealth and Proportion ofWealth.Wealth correlateswith certain forms of freedom, like the freedom toacquire goods, or to travel, or freedom of access tocertainculturalevents,andsoon.Wealthalsocorrelateswithcertainformsofpower.Forexample,payingpeopletodothingsisaformofpower.Contributingsignificantly

toanelectioncampaigncanbeaformofpower,too.Workersareprofitcreators,thatis,theycreatewealth

forothers.Theymayacquirewealth for theirwork,buttheirvalue to theiremployers typically lies in thewealththeycreateforthoseemployers.Anaturalquestionis:Ofthewealthcreatedbyproductivework,howmuchgoestothosewhodotheworkandhowmuchgoestoothers?Andbywhatmeans?Whatisthestructureofthesystemthatresultsinthedistributionofwealthandthewaythatdistributionchanges?Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century is a

work of scholarship of the highest order: It changes, oroughttochange,notjustourunderstandingofeconomics,but our understanding of many things. And he haspublisheditjustasweneeditmost.Here is his basic insight. He studied the history, not

justofincome,butofwealth.Andheobservedthattherearetwofundamentallydifferentkindsofwealth:

•Productivewealth. This iswealth generated bywork, by producing and selling things or services.ThekindofwealthAdamSmith talked about.Theprototypical case concerns individuals, for examplea baker and a furniture maker. Each makes andsellsthings,andeachneedsandbuyswhattheothersells.Thebaker’sincomepaysthefurnituremaker,

and the furniture maker’s income pays the baker.Eachworks for himself, produces things, gets paidfor it, and in a much oversimplified market, eachproduceswealthforhimselfandfor theother.Thisis the kind ofwealth, productivewealth,measuredbytheGDP.Pikettycallsit“G.”•Reinvestmentwealth.This iswealth generatedby receiving returns on investments and thenreinvestingthosereturnsoverandover.Thiskindofwealthgrowsexponentially, likecompoundinterest.Themorehave, themoreyou invest,and themoreyouinvest,themoreyouhave.Hecallsit“R.”

Here’s where the concept of proportion comes in.Pikettylooksattheproportionofthekindsofwealth,thatis,theratiobetweenRandGoverapopulation.Thenheasks,howdoesitchangeandwhy?His research was done by studying tax records in

many countries, dating back to the eighteenth century.Whathediscoveredwasthat,upuntil1913,mostwealthwas reinvestmentwealth.Evenduring theperiodof theindustrial revolution,which isusually thoughtof in termsof productive wealth, R was much greater than G. Inotherwords,Pikettyshowedthatthecommonwisdomisfalse. Even in capitalist democracies, where individualliberty and the market were supposed to allow for

productive wealth through work, it turns out thatreinvestmentwealthwasoverwhelming.For instance, inFrance,acapitalistdemocracyconcernedwithégalité,in1910,70percentofthewealthwasreinvestmentwealth,held by the very wealthy—not productive wealth,distributedovermostofthepopulation.Starting in1913, therewasamajor shift.Becauseof

WorldWarI,theGreatDepression,andWorldWarII,asignificantportionofreinvestmentwealthwasdestroyed.Productive wealth became greater, more G than R.Between 1913 and 1980, most of modern economictheorywasdeveloped,whetherliberalorconservative.Itwasprimarilybasedonproductivewealth,onGDP—onG,notR.Thenin1980,somethingchanged—duringtheReagan

erainAmerica.Reagangreatlycuttaxesonthewealthy,started a major attack on unions and thereby on thewages of ordinaryworkers, cut regulations on business,and soon.MargaretThatcherdid the same inEngland.And those economic ideas spread. Around 1980, therewas a historic shift. R became greater than G again.Reinvestmentwealth took over the reins of themoderneconomies.Beingexponential,reinvestmentwealthgrewexponentially—likecompoundinterest.In the United States, in 1976 the top 1 percent had

19.9 percent of the wealth. In 2010, the top 1 percent

had 35.4 percent of the wealth. In 2010, the top 5percent had 63 percent of the wealth; and the top 20percent had 88.9 percent of the wealth. That left thebottom80percentwith11.1percentofthewealth.That is what the exponential growth of reinvestment

wealthleadsto.Anditgetsworseasonegoesdownthewealth scale, so that six individual members of theWalton family together have more net worth than 41percentofthefamiliesinAmerica(countingfamilieswithnegativenetworth,whoarefamiliestoo).As the share of the nation’s wealth going to the

wealthy rises, the share going to everyone else falls.What else falls? The freedom that wealth can buy, thequalityoflifethatwealthcanbuy,thepowerthatwealthcanbuy,andtheelectoralinfluencethatwealthcanbuy.Technically,wemaystillhaveoneperson,onevote.Butthe effect of one person on elections has gone waydown.Is this trend reversible?Piketty saysyes, but it takes

politicalchange.TheSystemicEffectsforPolitics

PikettyhimselfisnotpessimisticaboutthefactthatRisaboveG.Hepointsoutthatpoliticalchangecanbringtherunaway accumulation under control, say, via a wealth

tax.Healso suggests that traditional liberalmeasures—like raising lower- and middle-class wages, loweringcorporate management wages, closing tax loopholes,increasing access to education, and so on—can helpbringaboutsuchareversal.But there are systemic effects that act against a

political solution. Greater wealth leads to many things,including:

•Greaterpoliticalleverage.Wealthypeopleandcorporationshavegreat lobbyingpowerwithpublicofficials,anditisgettinggreaterallthetime.• Greater control over public discourse.Wealthypeopleandcorporationscancontrolpublicdiscourse inmanyways—byowningmediaoutlets,sponsoring shows, massive advertising, and so on.This control works via the brain. Language andimagery that activate conservative frameswill alsoactivate conservative morality—strict fathermorality in general. As conservative morality getsstronger, progressive morality gets weaker in thebrains of the public. This mightily affects whatpeoplebelieveunconsciouslyaswellasconsciously,andthereforeaffectshowpeoplevote.• Greater control over the rights of others.Through state control of legislatures, the wealthy

can control the voting rights of poorer populations,andstatecontrolischeaperthannationalcontrol.

What is needed is government payment for electionsand serious regulation of political control of the media.But given the present distribution of wealth and thepresent distribution of strict father morality in thepopulation in the United States, as well as othercountries, the necessary political change seems unlikely—unless there are other important changes brought onbyprogressiveswillingtobuild thegroundingframesforsystemic issues, and to keep the focus on these issuessharpandstrongthroughcontinualpublicdiscourse.

TheEffectonSatisfyingProductiveWork

Oneofthemajorsystemiceffectsoftheascendanceofreinvestment wealth concerns the nature of productiveworkitself.Ithasbecomelesssatisfyinginmanyways.Themostobviousisthattheproductiveeconomicsystemproduces less wealth—it doesn’t pay enough for asatisfying life formany of our citizens. It also provideslesswork—fewer jobs.And thework itdoesprovide islesssatisfying.Satisfying work is about pay and working conditions

butalsoaboutskilledworkthatisusefulandthatpeople

feel good about doing.Thisworkneedn’t be very high-paying or glamorous, just satisfying. Here are someprofessions of people I knowwho have foundways tohave satisfying work lives: carpenter, gardener, barber,cheese salesperson, baker, mechanic, office manager,tailor,housepainter,chef,tearoomserver,schoolteacher,house cleaner, and so on. They are not professionals—not lawyers, doctors, computer scientists, chemists,biologists,or financeprofessionals,normusicians,movieactors, or professional athletes. Just folks.They can bewell-educated, functioning citizens, good parents.However,fewerandfewerpeoplemanagetohavesuchsatisfying work lives, and fewer and fewer people aremanaging to get a real education and function well ascommunity members and parents because of harsherworkingconditions.There is a structural reason for this. Remember that

companies tend to have two kinds of employees—theassets and the resources. The assets are seniormanagersandnecessarycreativepeople.Theresourcesarepeoplewhoareinterchangeable;whoarehiredatthelowest possible skill level; the lowest pay and benefitlevel; andminimally acceptableworking conditions suchas employment guarantees, pensions, medical care, apleasant work environment, few if any sick leaves andparental leaves, little choice in work times, few if any

raises or bonuses, and so on. This makes for“efficiency,” which is defined as the maximization ofprofit. Workers treated as resources, not assets, aresubjecttolayoffs,buybacksascontractworkers,andjoblosswhenoutsourcing ismoreprofitable.Thecorporatemovement against unionization not only allows suchconditionstooccur,butacceleratesthem.Computerizationandmechanizationleadstomoreand

morejobsbecominglow-skill, low-payresourcejobs.Atthe same time, it leads to even greater wealth forcorporatemanagersand investors, since theycaneitherlay off workers or downgrade their skill level and payscaleoroutsourcetoplaceswherelaborischeap.That tendency is driven by investors’ demand for

greater and greater reinvestment returns and the driveformanagerstobecomepartofthereinvestmentwealthclass by increasing their wealth. Since corporatemanagers manage corporate wealth, they can get agreatershareofthatwealth.Thoseinacorporationwhocontrolwhere the corporation’smoney goes can gatherto themselves more and more of the corporation’swealth,leavinglessforworkerswhocreatethatwealth.

AreOrdinaryLiberalEconomicSolutionsInadequate?

Liberals regularly proposemeasures setwithin classicalliberal economic theory: raising the minimum wage,massive programs for rebuilding infrastructure, bettersafety nets, early childhood education and bettereducationingeneral,betterhealthcare,andsoon.Thesewouldhelpeasethepainonthenonwealthy—andthatisavitally important thing todo.But can liberal economicmeasuresaloneovercomerunawayaccumulationfortherichandrunawaylossforthenonrich?Even to get these easing-the-pain measures, the

political climatewouldhave to change radically.Andaswe have seen, just telling people the Piketty economicfactscannothelp,becausethePikettyfactswillnothaverealeffectswithoutradicalframingchange.

What’sWrongwithRunawayAccumulation?

The major thus-far-unframed effect is that runawayexponentialaccumulationofwealthsharetendstokillofftheprovisionofpublicresources thatmakesasatisfyingand healthy private life possible. The political effect ofrunaway wealth is, for example, to cut taxes on thewealthy, taking away funding for the public resourcesthatmadethatwealthpossibleinthefirstplace.Takeuniversityeducation.Thereareonlysomanytop

research universities.A number of them are public.By

cuttingfundingtosuch“public”universities, thesepublicresources have to raise tuition and other costs and somove away from really being public toward beingprivate.Thesamegoesforeducationatalllevels.At the same time, real education is being lost. The

point of a classic liberal education was manyfold: todevelop one’s mind and critical faculties in general, toteach about the world so as to open a world ofpossibilitiesinlife,toprovideskillsforlearningwhateveroneneedstolearn,andtocreatecitizenswhocontributetoademocraticsociety.Becauseoftherunawaylossofsatisfying work, education has radically changed.Moreand more students see education as a direct route toeitherwealthorasatisfyingworklife—andarethereforegetting“educated”fortoday’sjobs,withouttheintangiblebut vitally important personal riches of a liberaleducation.That iseducational robbery,becausea liberaleducation opens up possibilities for one’s entire life thatan orientation toward today’s jobs does not—especiallywhentoday’sjobsmaynotbethereinthefuture.

TheRunawayLossofValuableExperiences

If those of great wealth own the beaches, it means allothers are deprived of the experience of them.Accessfor most people is cut off. The loss is a loss of

experience.This is truenot onlyof beachesbut alsoofmany things that the ultra rich can experience but thatthe lower-middle class and poor cannot. Excellentschools, pleasant surroundings, summer camps, trips tolovelyorinterestingplaces,theabilitytovisitfamily,timeoff from work, expensive art or music events, niceclothes, great food and wine, healthy food, first-ratemedicalcare,majorathleticevents,worldcultures,greatcities, film festivals, and on and on. Money buysexperiences of personal value—what a lot of life isabout. A single wealthy person can only experience somuch.Therunawayaccumulationofwealthfor therichandtherunawaylossofwealthforothersmeanformostpeople a runaway lossof experiencesofpersonalvalue—thelossofameaningfullife.

PikettyandGlobalWarming

The rise of runaway wealth accumulation at the sametime as intensifying global warming has created theperfect storm, and these concepts need to be linked inpoliticaldiscourse.Wealthy corporations and individuals keep reinvesting

and getting wealthier. The current framing of globalwarming in the conservative and often the mainstreammedia uses both denial and scare tactics like claiming

that addressing global warming is too expensive, wouldruin the economy, cost massive job layoffs, increaseenergydependency,andsoon.Theseareallfalseclaims,as independent studies have shown. But when thewealthy control what appears in the public media, theycan control public discourse and public thoughtmechanisms through the control of language andimagery.And theworseglobalwarmingeffectsget, thegreater the pain on themiddle and lower classes,whilethe effects of global warming can be more easilywithstoodbythosewithgreatwealth.Globalwarming is thegreatestmoral issuefacingour

generation. Accelerating wealth accumulation by thewealthy is a close runner-up. Together, they present aclear and present danger, not just to the United States,buttotheworld.

Growth

There is amajor systemic effect of framing thePikettyinsightintermsofinequalityalone,andnotthinkingabouthowit relates toglobalwarmingandothermajor issues,likethepressureforcontinuedeconomicgrowth.Pikettyis arguing within traditional economic theory. Heestimates thatRcan inprinciple (with the rightpolitics)bekeptlessthanG(economicgrowthmeasuredinterms

ofGDP) ifeconomicgrowthG iskeptbelow2percentperyear.But growth is compounded and therefore exponential

too.Economicgrowthmeanspopulationgrowth,growthintheuseofresources,growthinglobalwarming,growthinweather disasters, and growth in the diminishment ofthe natural world. Over fifty years, even 2 percentgrowthishuge!Onceonestarts talkingaboutglobalwarming,growth

itself becomes an issue—population growth, growth inworldwideproductionforandby thatpopulation,growthinfoodneeds,growthinenergyneeds,growthinnaturalresource needs, and so on. Fossil fuel use has to bereversedtoavoidglobalwarmingdisasters.Aneconomybasedongrowth—evenaslowas2percent—inalltheseareaswouldnotpreventaglobalwarmingdisaster.Modelsforanew“sustainable”—thatis,nongrowth—

economics are being developed. How does the Pikettyinsight squarewithsucheconomicmodels—if itdoesatall?Thatisasystemiccausationquestionthatneedstobe

asked.Forexample,themainfactorinpopulationgrowthappearstobewomen’seducationandtheavailabilityanduseofcontraception.Women’seducation isaffectedbypoverty,buteverybitasmuchbyreligion.Religions likeCatholicism and Islamism promote population growth,

whichmakesithardertocontrolglobalwarming.Itisn’tjustwhetherRishigherthanG.

TheIntertwinedSystemicEffects

One of the main take-home points of this book is thatframingcanhavemassivesystemiceffects.Theabsenceofadequateframingcanhavejustasmassiveeffects.Framing the Piketty insight as just about inequality

missesmost ofwhatwe have just discussed. Itmissesthesystemiceffects.Framing is about thought, about understanding at the

deepest levels, about circuitry in your brainwith strongsynapses that last, about changing unconscious,automatic, effortless understanding—in other words,aboutchangingcommonsense.Framechangeitself isasystemiceffect.Therearealotofframestobechanged.Howcansuchoverallchangebeeffected?It begins by strengthening the framing for the

progressivemoralsystemandfortheprogressiveviewofdemocracybasedaroundempathyand the responsibilityflowing from that empathy. In otherwords,we have tocareaboutothers—fellowcitizensoftheworldwehavenevermet andneverwillmeet—and recognize the factthattheprivatedependsonthepublic.That in turndependsonanothersystemiceffect—the

effectoflanguageandthebrainonpublicdiscourse,andthefailureinuniversitiestoteachthateffect.

★9★GovernmentbyCorporation

Aswehaveseen,thereismuchthatisunframedbythegeneralpublicthatneedstobeframed,mostnotably:

• Runaway wealth to the wealthy. The wealthshareof themostwealthyisgrowingexponentially,and the wealth share of others is correspondinglydeclining.Intheabsenceofadequateframing,mostpeople feel the effects but don’t comprehend thesystemiccauses.• Runaway climate disasters. The earth iswarmingdangerouslyandquickly,andthatwarmingis systemically causing climate disasters, includingextreme cold. Without understanding systemiceffects, extreme cold leads to the denial of globalwarming.• Runaway privatization of public resources.Theprivatedependsonthepublic,butconservativesare drastically cutting funds for public resourceswhilesuccessfullypromotingprivatization.Theysaythatgovernmentdoesn’twork,andbycuttingfundstheycanmakegovernmentceasetowork.Andbycuttinggovernmentresourcesforall,theycanmake

democracyceasetowork.

But there is an important framing that is beginning tocatchon:

•TheConstitutionappliesonlytohumanbeings.

Conceptual metaphors have no legal standing. Wenormallythinkusingthousandsofthem,butthelawdoesnotovertlygivethemanyofficialroleinthelawitself.Sofarasthelawisconcerned,metaphoricalthought,whichis ubiquitous, does not exist. But in reality, unconsciousconceptualmetaphorsdoexist,theyareeverywhere,andtheyhaveconsequences.Thisdisparitybetweenthelawand thehumanbrainandmind isunframed—notpartofmost people’s everyday consciousness or discourse. Atthe same time, a major metaphor has entered into thenational consciousness because of certain SupremeCourt decisions—that Corporations Are Persons withConstitutionalRights.Reflexivityentershere.Decisionsmadebyourcourts

have the power to turn metaphors into facts-on-the-ground, as in this example. Those metaphors taken asfactsgiverise tofurthercourtdecisionsextendingthosemetaphors.The power to turn metaphors into facts can be an

awesome power—a power with enormous politicalimpact.TheCorporationsArePersonsmetaphorhassogreat a political impact that it isworth some discussionhere. Let’s begin, though, by looking at two powerfulmetaphorsthatformitsroots.Cognitive scientists who study metaphorical thought

have recognized two common metaphors, which weadopt unconsciously and automatically, that are relevanthere.

Metaphor 1: Pluralities Are Groups. ThePluralities Are Groups metaphor attributes groupproperties to separate individuals—whetherwarranted or not. The result is that the group isperceivedasanentitywithdifferentpropertiesthantheindividualsinit.Takealookatthetwooperativewords:

•Aplurality consistsofpeople, animals,plants,orother things considered separately—ungrouped. Anumberofpeoplemayberidingonthesubway,forinstance;butasidefrombeingonthesamesubway,they are not necessarily part of any particulargroup.Theyareaplurality—buttheyneednothavecommoncharacteristics,goals,orfunctions.• A group is an entity, conceptualizedmetaphoricallyasacontainerforotherentities.The

group can, and usually does, have properties,resources, goals, and functions that are separatefromtheindividualentitiesinthegroup.

Oncewecombinethetwometaphorically,webeingtothink about pluralities differently.For example, a club, achurch, an association (e.g., theAARP—theAmericanAssociation of Retired Persons), can have money, ahome, legal responsibilities, and liabilities (they can besuedora liencanbeplacedagainst theirproperty) thatdon’t apply to any individual members. Similarlycorporationscanbesued,whiletheirstockholderscanbeimmunetosuchlawsuitsasindividuals.

Metaphor 2: Institutions Are Persons. Askmost people if institutions are people, and theywillsayno.Infact,ourdefinitionsofthetwowordsarequitedistinct.

•Aninstitutionisanabstractentityconceptualizedmetaphorically as a container for people. Aninstitutionistypicallydefinedbyitsgoals,resources,and by various functions, responsibilities, andprivilegesforwhateverpeopleareintheinstitution.Theinstitutionisdefinedindependentlyofthepeoplewhohappentobeinit,servingitsfunctions.•Aperson is ahumanbeing.Humanbeingshave

goals and resources, and typically haveresponsibilities, privileges, and carry out functions.Humanbeings also haveproperties that institutionsdonothave:humanbodiesandbrains, feelingsandemotions,desiresandbeliefs,physicalfunctionsandneeds,aswellassocialrolesandtheabilitytothinkandcommunicate.

But this conceptual metaphor has long been in ourbrains. We use this metaphorical mode of thoughtconstantly when we are comprehending and discussinginstitutions,asin:TheEPAwasdisappointedbythecourtruling;MajorLeagueBaseballwantstowipeouttheuseof performance-enhancing drugs; Stanford thinks thatonline courses are a good idea;Berkeley is troubled byrape on campus; Planned Parenthoodwas disgusted bytherecentcourtdecision;andsoon.

These two conceptual metaphors—Pluralities AreGroups and Institutions Are Persons—exist in manyparts of theworld andhave formillennia.And inmanycases they have been recognized in law. Roman lawrecognized certain business and religious groups asinstitutions with the properties of human beings: goals,resources, functions, responsibilities, and privileges.Today,westillattributethesepropertiesofhumanbeings

metaphoricallytoinstitutions.There is a long history of just what properties of

humanbeingsareattributedmetaphoricallytoinstitutions.For example, theMedieval Church sawmonasteries asinstitutions with goals, finances, responsibilities, andprivileges—butdiffering frompeople in that they lackeda soul. In England, “companies” were institutions givenexclusive rights or “charters” to do business for thefinancial benefit of their shareholders and the BritishCrown.Oneof themost successfulwas theEast IndiaCompany.TheMassachusetts Bay Colonywas founded by the

ownersof theMassachusettsBayCompany,whichhada charter to dobusiness in theNewEngland area.Themetaphorical idea that A Government Is a Businesscame to America in 1623 with theMassachusetts BayCompany, and has been part of American political lifeeversince.Before 1819, the commonplace conceptual metaphor

that Institutions Are Persons began to be applied tocorporations and was limited to such matters as goals,finances,responsibilities,privileges,andsoon.But thereis a difference between this very common and limitedview of corporate personhood and a view that gavecorporations constitutional rights! That took theCorporations Are Persons metaphor out of range of

normal conceptual metaphor and into the power of thecourts.In1819,theSupremeCourtmadeafatefuldecisionin

Trustees ofDartmouthCollege v.Woodward. Beforethe American Revolution, King George III granted acorporatecharter toDartmouthCollege,giving it land inNew Hampshire and giving the trustees the right toadministerthecollege.In1819,thetrusteesdeposedthecollege president. The New Hampshire legislature wasoutragedandpassedlegislationtakingawaythecollege’scharter from King George, putting the state in charge,and in effect, making Dartmouth a state college. Thetrustees brought a case against the state, with DanielWebster arguing their case passionately before theSupreme Court and Chief Justice John Marshall. Thecourt ruled that, even though all political ties had beenseveredwithKingGeorge, thecharterstillconstituteda“contract”withKingGeorge,theperson.Thecourtheldthat this contract fell under theContractsClauseof theConstitution, which forbids a state to pass lawsoverturning contracts. Though the provision in theConstitution applied to contracts among persons, thecourt held that it applied to corporations as well.Dartmouthremainedprivateandunderthecontrolofthetrustees. Meanwhile, a line had been crossed. Aconstitutional clause granting rights of contract and

propertytopersonsnowappliedtocorporations.Andaninstitution,theBritishmonarchy,calledmetonymicallytheBritish Crown, was now taken literally to be a person,KingGeorge.In 1868, the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth

Amendments were passed, making slaves free, givingthem equal protection under the law, and guaranteeingthemtherighttovote.ThefirstclauseoftheFourteenthAmendmentreads:

AllpersonsbornornaturalizedintheUnitedStates,andsubjecttothejurisdictionthereof,arecitizensofthe United States and of the state wherein theyreside. No state shall make or enforce any lawwhich shall abridge the privileges or immunities ofcitizens of the United States; nor shall any statedeprive any person of life, liberty, or property,withoutdueprocessoflaw;nordenytoanypersonwithin its jurisdiction the equal protection of thelaws.

In the years leading up to these amendments, largeindustries,banks,andrailroads tookcorporate form,andbecame rich and powerful. Many states set aboutregulating them and restricting their powers. With thepassage of the Fourteenth Amendment intended as

protectionforformerslaves,railroadssawawayaroundtheserestrictions.They assumed the opposite of the Pluralities Are

Groups metaphor, which separated the properties ofgroup entities from the individual properties of theirmembers. The new Groups Are Pluralities metaphoridentified the properties of the groupwith properties ofthemembers.Theybeganarguingthatcorporationswerepersons and had as one of their properties the sameconstitutional protections as persons had. They arguedthisfornearlytwentyyearsandkeptlosing.Buttheygotthe idea into public discourse, especially among peopleemployedbytherailroads.Then, in 1886, they got a break. The railroads had

brought four cases concerning taxes to the SupremeCourt, including Santa Clara County v. SouthernPacific Railroad. In Santa Clara County, there was atax provision that allowed persons payingmortgages ontheir property to deduct the amount of their mortgagesfrom their taxes. Southern Pacific Railroad had a hugemortgageandwanted itsmortgagecostsdeducted fromitstaxes,whichwouldmakealotofprofitfortherailroadandcostSantaClaraCountyalotoftaxmoney.The case was argued in the Supreme Court, with

ChiefJusticeMorrisonWaitepresiding.Waitehadearlierbeen a railroad lawyer. The court recorder was J. C.

BancroftDavis,formerlypresidentofasmallrailroad.The precedent of corporate personhood came out of

this case. But the precedent did not come from anyargument in the case or anything written in favor oragainstbyanyofthejustices.Theprecedentcamefroman oral remark by Chief Justice Waite that was takendown by court reporter J. C. Bancroft Davis. Theremark appeared in the headnotes for the case andnowhereelse.TheheadnotequotedWaiteassaying:

The court does not wish to hear argument on thequestion whether the provision in the FourteenthAmendment to the Constitution, which forbids anystate to deny any person within its jurisdiction theequal protection of the laws, applies to thesecorporations.Weareoftheopinionthatitdoes.

That set the precedent, which was then cited insucceedingcases.Bear inmind,aswego through the listofcases, that

British common law defined corporations and theirshareholders in such a way as to legally separate thepropertiesoftheshareholdersfromthepropertiesofthecorporation,sothattheshareholderswerefreeofcertainliabilitiesofthecorporations—hencetheLLC,thelimitedliabilitycorporation.Eachofthefollowingcourtdecisions

violated this essential property of corporations, byautomatically attributing to corporations certain of theconstitutional rights held by shareholders—namely,constitutionalrightsofdueprocess,freespeech(seenasmoney contributed to political campaigns and spent onthe media), freedom of religion, and freedom fromunreasonablesearchandseizureanddoublejeopardy.Bear in mind theMitt Romney quote from the 2012

presidentialelection:“Corporationsarepeople,myfriend.. . . Everything corporations earn eventually goes topeople.”Heneglectedtosaywhichpeople.In 1889, the court overtly granted due process

protections of the Fourteenth Amendment tocorporations; in 1893, it was Fifth Amendmentprotections of double jeopardy; in 1906, FourthAmendment protections from unreasonable search andseizure;andin1978,theFirstAmendmentrighttomakecontributionstoballotinitiativecampaigns.Inthelattercase,themetaphorwasextended:Though

a corporation could not go to the polls and vote, as a“person” it has the right of free speech since itsshareholders have the right of free speech. Then afurthermetaphor:SpeechasMoneygoing tocampaigns—not for candidates (real people) but for policiesaffecting corporations. It was a step toward CitizensUnited.

Interestingly, Citizens United is not directly aboutcorporate personhood and does not depend on thatgeneral metaphor. It depends instead on two othermetaphors.

•MoneyIsSpeech•NonpersonsHavetheRighttoSpeech

Thesetwometaphorsformalogic:Peoplehavearighttoasmuchspeechastheywant.Sincemoneyisspeechandnonpersons have the right to speech, it follows thatnonpersons have the right to spend asmuchmoney astheywantonelections.This5-to-4votebyaconservativecourtwaspolitically

motivated. Corporations have much more money tospendonpolitical campaigns thandounions.This rulinggives a huge amount of money to conservatives andhardlyany toprogressives.Speech,aswehaveseen, isnot just sounding off. If framed and targeted carefully,CitizensUnitedallowsconservativestochangethebrainsof biconceptuals, and win a lot of elections forconservativesandmovethecountryradicallytotheright.The Hobby Lobby and Wheaton cases were

conservativevictoriesaswell.TheHobbyLobbyverdictgranted First Amendment freedom of religion rights tocorporations that are tightly held and operated by a

family or small group (more than half controlled by atmost five persons). The right given is a new right: toignore a provision of a law applying to a corporation ifthe small group of individuals owning or controlling thecorporation feel that the law violates their religiousprinciples.This is a new, and very different, metaphorical

extension of Corporations Are Persons to FirstAmendmentrightsanditopensthefloodgates toahugerangeofclaimstobeexemptfromprovisionsofthelawongroundsofreligiousprincipleasself-defined.Inshort,it puts corporations above the law. It is a step towardlegalizinggovernmentbycorporations.This isa radicalconservativepoliticaldecision.Why?

Because radical conservatives want to eliminate publicresources and public aspects of government—that is,government by laws passed by human legislators. Atonce,thisshiftsgovernmentfromthepublictotheprivatesphereandfromthehumantothenonhumansphere.This brings us to another truth unframed in public

discourse.•Corporationsgovernourlives.

There have been many great innovations made bycorporationswhentheyhaveinvestedtheirexponentially

accumulatedwealth in innovations that improvepeople’slives—in useful computer technology,telecommunications, pharmaceuticals and medicalequipment,transportation—inareaafterarea.Tomyknowledge, in all cases, these innovations that

have improved our lives were ultimately made possiblebypublicresources:Government-sponsoredresearchanduniversity training made possible computer science,satellites, medical research and training, and so on incase after case. Every great corporate innovation storysimplyburnishesthetruththattheprivatedependsonthepublic.Butwhat is left conceptuallyunframedand therefore

unspoken are the negative effects of the runawayaccumulationofcorporatewealth.Hereisashortlist.

• Increasing corporate lobbying and politicalcontributions. These effectswork largely againstthepublicinterestonahugerangeofissues—eventotheextentthatcorporationswritelawsintroducedby the legislators they contribute to. The CitizensUniteddecisiongreatlyexacerbatedthiseffect.• Increasing externalization of costs. Thewealthier corporations get, the more power theyhave to use their political influence to avoidregulations. As a result, they can pass along to

others the costs of doing business—and thusincreaseprofitsevenmore.Thefancynameforthisis“externalizationofcosts.”A prime example is the dumping of hazardous

waste that taxpayerswill pay to clean up—orwillsufferwith.Considerwhathappenswhen frackingcompanies dump pools of polluted water on thelandscape, or tear up the land in the frackingprocess and then leave it torn up, or inject vastamountsofpoisonouschemicalsintheporousshalerocknext to thewater table, thus creatingpolluteddrinking and agricultural water. The burden isshifted away from the private corporations and tothe public. The prime example, of course, is ofcorporations emitting the greenhouse gas pollutionthat has caused global warming. The costs getdumped onto you—whether you’re paying moretaxestomitigateclimatechangeortocleanupafterseverestormsoryou’repayingmoreforvegetablesduringseveredroughts.But even when you have to spend your time

searching a company website or waiting on thephone to talk to a customer service representative,costs are being externalized: Your time is beingspent while the company profits by hiring too fewpeople incustomerservice.Variousformsof“self-

service”atgas stations, supermarkets, andbigboxstoresaremadetosoundlikeconveniencesforyou,buttheyarereallywaysofmakingyouworkforthecompanyforfree.• Increasing costs to consumers due tomonopolyownership.Forexample,someInternetproviderswith no competitionmayovercharge andprovide minimal service, leaving the customer tobear the burden of exorbitant costs and poorservice.• Limitations of size options by clothingmanufacturers.Many clothingmanufacturers willonly make sizes that fit the most normally sizedpeople because it ismore profitable than providingsizesforthefullrangeofcustomers.•Increasinglyunethicalbusinesspractices.Forexample, General Motors sold cars with knowndefects that caused deaths, while people in thecompanyknewofthedangersandkeptsilent.•Increasingcorporateinefficiency.Anyonewhohas worked in a large company is familiar withcorporateinefficiency(seetheDilbertcomicstrip).Health insurance companies, for example, haveinefficiencycoststhatareveryhighcomparedwithMedicare.Those inefficiency costs are transferredtoconsumerswheneverpossible.

• Increasing corporate management pay andthe pressure for short-term profits. When theveryrichgetexponentiallyricherandeveryoneelseexponentially loses access to wealth, there is aninevitable pressure for short-term profits. Whencorporate managers are in charge of managingcorporatewealth, there is an incentive for them toacquireexponentiallygrowingwealth.

Toa largeextent,corporationsgovernusandrunourlives—for theirprofit,notours.The listcouldgoonandon.Toalargeextent,therunawayexpropriationofwealth

pointedoutbyThomasPikettyisaresultofgovernmentbycorporation.Pikettypointsout thatapoliticalsolutionis necessary, but when our politics is governedsignificantlythroughlobbyingbycorporationsratherthanthepublic,thepossibilityofthisisgreatlyreduced.Conservatives like to rail against “government” as

takingawaytheirliberty.Butgovernmentbycorporationsprobablydoesfarmoretotakeawaysuch“liberty.”Government by corporation is a major unframed

reality. It is systemically linked to the runawayaccumulation of our wealth by the very wealthy.Becauseofthesystemiceffectofrunawaypersonalandcorporate wealth on our politics, both are systemically

linkedtothethreatofglobalwarmingtothefutureofourplanet,and to the fundamental split inourpolitics that issystemicallythreateningdemocracyinwaysthatarenotobvious, and are therefore also unframed in publicdiscourse.

★★PartIV★★

Framing:LookingBackaDecade

★10★What’sinaWord?Plenty,IfIt’sMarriage—February18,2004,withsomeupdatesin

2014—

Theoriginalversionofthischapterwaswrittenovera decade ago, before the major advances in theacceptanceofgaymarriage.Thesuccessfulstrategyused what was recommended in this chapter in thefirst edition of this book: the stress on love andcommitment and the generalization to everyone, notjustgays.More than half of Americans now support gay

marriage. It is legal in nineteen states. But there isstill a long way to go in the other thirty-one states.The conservative framing has not changed: It’sagainst the Bible; it threatens the very definition ofmarriage;it’salifestylechoice;childrenwillbeluredinto it; it’s all about sex. Conservatives these daysrepeatthewordhomosexual,whichcontainsthewordsexandtheslurhomo.For example, Texas Governor Rick Perry was

reported as saying, “Whether or not you feelcompelled to followaparticular lifestyleornot,youhave the ability to decide not to do that . . . I may

have the genetic coding that I’m inclined to be analcoholic,but Ihave thedesirenot todo that,andIlookatthehomosexualissuethesameway.”Forallof that,conservativesarefightingalosing

battle against love and commitment, family andcommunity. The younger generation isoverwhelminglyaccepting.PresidentObamaenteredthepresidencynotbeing

in favor of gay marriage but being open to“evolving”ontheissue.Hehasnow“evolved.”Theevolution metaphor suggests an adaptation to thechangingpoliticalcontext.

What’sinaword?Plenty,ifthewordismarriage.Marriage is central to our culture. Marriage legally

confers many hundreds of benefits, but that is only itsmaterial aspect. Marriage is an institution, the publicexpressionoflifelongcommitmentbasedonlove.Itistheculminationofaperiodofseekingamate,and,formany,the realization of a major goal, often with a buildup ofdreams, dates, gossip, anxiety, engagement, a shower,wedding plans, rituals, invitations, a bridal gown,bridesmaids, families coming together, vows, and ahoneymoon. Marriage is the beginning of family life,commonly with the expectation of children and

grandchildren, family gatherings, in-laws, Little Leaguegames,graduations,andalltherest.Marriageisalsounderstoodintermsofdozensofdeep

andabidingmetaphors:a journeythroughlife together,apartnership, a union, a bond, a single object ofcomplementary parts, a haven, a means for growth, asacrament,ahome.Marriageconfersasocialstatus—amarried couple with new social roles. And for a greatmanypeople,marriagelegitimizessex.Inshort,marriageisabigdeal.In arguing against same-sex marriage, the

conservatives are using two powerful ideas: definitionandsanctity.Wemusttakethemback.Wehavetofightdefinition with definition and sanctity with sanctity. Asanthropological studies of American marriage haveshown, they got the definition wrong. Marriage, as anideal, is defined as “the realization of love through alifelongpubliccommitment.”LoveissacredinAmerica.Soiscommitment.Thereissanctityinmarriage:Itisthesanctityofloveandcommitment.Like most important concepts, marriage also comes

withavarietyofprototypicalcases:Theidealmarriageishappy, lasting, prosperous, and with children, a nicehome, and friendships with other married couples. Thetypical marriage has its ups and downs, its joys anddifficulties, typical problems with children and in-laws.

Thenightmaremarriageends indivorce,dueperhaps toincompatibility,abuse,orbetrayal.Itisarichconcept.Noneof therichnesswehave justdiscussedrequires

marriage to be heterosexual—not its definition, itssanctity, its rituals, its family life, its hopes and dreams.Thelocusoftheideathatmarriageisheterosexualisinawidespreadculturalstereotype.Inevoking thisstereotype, language is important.The

radical right used to use gay marriage; now it’shomosexual marriage. One reason, I believe, is thatmarriageevokestheideaofsex,andmostAmericansdonot favor sex that isn’t heterosexual.The stereotype ofmarriage is heterosexual.Gay for the right connotes awild,deviant,sexuallyirresponsiblelifestyle.Butgaymarriageisadouble-edgedsword.President

Bush chose not to use the words gay marriage in aState of theUnion address. I suspect that the omissionoccurred for a good reason. His position was thatmarriage is defined as being between a man and awoman, and so the term gay marriage should be anoxymoron, as meaningless as gay apple or gaytelephone. The more gaymarriage is used, the morenormaltheideaofsame-sexmarriagebecomes,andtheclearer it becomes that marriage is not defined toexclude the very possibility. The grammar is important.Gay is grammatically a modifier specifying a kind of

marriage.Ifyouunderstandtheexpression,thenitisnotacontradictionintermsandmarriageisnot“defined”toexcludegays.Because marriage is central to family life, it has a

politicaldimension.AsIdiscussedearlier,andatgreaterlength in my book Moral Politics, conservative andprogressive politics are organized around two verydifferentmodelsofmarriedlife:astrictfatherfamilyandanurturantparentfamily.The strict father ismoral authority andmasterof the

household, dominating the mother and children andimposing needed discipline. Contemporary conservativepolitics turns these family values into political values:hierarchicalauthority, individualdiscipline,militarymight.Marriageinthestrictfatherfamilymustbeheterosexualmarriage: The father is manly, strong, decisive,dominating—a rolemodel for sons, and for daughters amodelofamantolookupto.The nurturant parent model has two equal parents,

whose job is to nurture their children and teach theirchildren to nurture others. Nurturance has twodimensions: empathy and responsibility, for oneself andothers.Responsibilityrequiresstrengthandcompetence.The strong nurturing parent is protective and caring,builds trust and connection, promotes family happinessandfulfillment,fairness,freedom,openness,cooperation,

and community development. These are the values ofstrong progressive politics. Though the stereotype isagain heterosexual, there is nothing in the nurturantfamilymodeltoruleoutsame-sexmarriage.In a society divided down the middle by these two

family models and their politics, we can see why theissue of same-sex marriage is so volatile. What is atstakeismorethanthematerialbenefitsofmarriageandtheuseoftheword.Atstakeareone’sidentityandmostcentralvalues.Thisisnotjustaboutsame-sexcouples.Itisaboutwhichvalueswilldominateinoursociety.When conservatives speak of the “defense of

marriage,” liberals are baffled. After all, no individual’smarriage is being threatened. It’s just that moremarriages are being allowed.But conservatives see thestrict father family, and with it their political values, asunderattack.Theyareright.Thisisaseriousmatterfortheir politics and moral values as a whole. Even civilunions are threatening, since they create families thatcannotbetraditionalstrictfatherfamilies.Progressivesareoftwominds.Pragmaticliberalssee

the issue as one of benefits—inheritance, health care,adoption, and so forth. If that’s all that is involved, civilunions shouldbe sufficient—and they certainlywere anadvance.Civil unions provided equalmaterial protectionunderthelaw.Whynotleavecivilunionstothestateand

marriagetothechurches,asinVermont,thefirststateofmanytoadoptcivilunionsandlatersame-sexmarriages?Idealistic progressives saw beyond the material

benefits, important as theyare.Mostgayactivistswantfull-blown marriage, with all its cultural meanings—apublic commitment based on love, all themetaphors, allthe rituals, joys, heartaches, family experiences—and asenseofnormality,onparwithallotherpeople.Theissueisoneofpersonal freedom:Thestateshouldnotdictatewho shouldmarrywhom. It is alsoamatterof fairnessandhumandignity.Equalityunderthelawincludessocialandculturalaswellasmaterialbenefits.Thesloganhereis“freedomtomarry.”Backin2004,whenthefirsteditionofDon’tThinkof

an Elephant! was published, a number of prominentDemocrats claimed thatmarriagewas amatter for thechurch, while the proper role for the state was civilunions and a guarantee of material benefits. Thisargumenthasalwaysmadelittlesensetome.Theabilityof ministers, priests, and rabbis to perform marriageceremonies is granted by governments, not by religions.Andcivilmarriageisnormalandwidespread.Besides,itwill only satisfy the pragmatic liberals. Idealisticconservatives will see civil unions as tantamount tomarriage, and idealistic progressives will see them asfallingfarshortofequalprotection.

And what of the constitutional amendment to legallydefine marriage as between a man and a woman?Conservatives will be for it, and many others with aheterosexualstereotypeofmarriagemaysupport it.Butwith nineteen states legalizing gay marriage and amajorityofAmericansforit,suchanamendmentisnowdeadinthewater.Progressiveshavereclaimedthemoralhighground—

of the grand American tradition of freedom, fairness,humandignity,andfullequalityunderthelaw.Thereisnolonger a need to talk about civil unions and just thematerial benefits. The job of ordinary citizens in theremaining thirty-one states is to reframe the debate, ineverything we say and write, in terms of our moralprinciples.With the divorce rate for heterosexual marriage

skyrocketing, the sanctityofmarriage ismore importantthanever.Talksanctity.Withloveandcommitment,youhave the very definition of the marital ideal—of whatmarriage is fundamentally about. Any couple willing tofight for apublic recognitionof their loveanda lifetimecommitmenthassanctityontheirside.Weallhavetoputourideasouttheresothatpolitical

candidatescanreadilyrefertothem.Forexample,whenthere is a discussion in your office, church, or othergroup,thereisasimpleresponseforsomeonewhosays,

“I don’t think gays should be able to marry. Do you?”Theresponseis:“Ibelieveinequalrights,period.Idon’tthinkthestateshouldbeinthebusinessoftellingpeoplewhotheycanorcan’tmarry.Marriageisaboutloveandcommitment,anddenyingtheright tomarrytopeople inlovewhowantapubliclifetimecommitmentisaviolationofhumandignity.”The media does not have to accept the right wing’s

frames,andinstateafterstatetheyhavenot.Whatcana reporter askbesides “Doyou supportgaymarriage?”Trythis:“Doyouthinkthegovernmentshouldtellpeoplewho they can and can’tmarry?”Or “Do you think thefreedomtomarrywhoyouwant to isamatterofequalrightsunder the law?”Or“Doyouseemarriageas therealizationof love ina lifetimecommitment?”Or“Doesitbenefitsocietywhentwopeoplewhoareinlovewanttomakeapubliclifetimecommitmenttoeachother?”Morally based framing is everybody’s job. Especially

reporters’.Ithaslongbeenright-wingstrategytorepeatoverand

over phrases that evoke their frames and define issuestheirway. Such repetitionmakes their language normal,everyday language and their frames normal, everydaywaystothinkaboutissues.Reportershaveanobligationtonoticewhentheyarebeingtakenforaride,andtheyshouldrefusetogoalong.Itisadutyofreportersnotto

accept sucha situationandnot to simplyuse right-wingframes that have come to seem natural. And it is thespecialdutyofreporterstostudyframingandtolearntosee through politically motivated frames, even whenthoseframeshavecometobeacceptedaseverydayandcommonplace.

★11★MetaphorsofTerror

—September16,2001,editedJuly2014—OurBrainsHadtoChange

Everything we know is physically instantiated in theneuralsystemsofourbrains.WhatweknewbeforeSeptember11 aboutAmerica,

Manhattan, theWorld Trade Center, air travel, and thePentagonwere intimately tiedupwithour identities andwith a vast amount ofwhatwe took for granted abouteveryday life. It was all there physically in our neuralsynapses. Manhattan: the gateway to America forgenerations of immigrants—the chance to live free ofwar,pogroms,religiousandpoliticaloppression!TheManhattan skyline hadmeaning inmy life, even

morethanIknew.WhenIthoughtofit,Ithoughtofmymother.BorninPoland,shearrivedasaninfant;grewupinManhattan;workedinfactoriesfortwenty-fiveyears;and had family, friends, a life, a child. She didn’t die inconcentrationcamps.Shedidn’tfearforherlife.Forher,Americawasnotallthatshemighthavewantedittobe,butitwasplenty.I grew up in Bayonne, New Jersey, across the bay

fromthatskyline.TheWorldTradeCenterwasn’tthere

then, but over the years, as the major feature of theskyline, it became forme, as for others, the symbol ofNewYork—notonlythebusinesscenterofAmericabutalso the cultural center and the communications center.Assuch,itbecameasymbolforAmericaitself,asymbolforwhat itmeant tobe able togo aboutyour everydaylife freeofoppression, and just able to liveanddoyourjob,whetherasasecretaryoranartist,amanagerorafireman,asalesmanorateacheroraTVstar.Iwasn’tconsciouslyawareofit,butthoseimageswereintimatelytied to my identity, both as an individual and as anAmerican. And all that and so much more were therephysically as part of my brain on the morning ofSeptember11,2001.Thedevastation thathit those towers thatmorninghit

me. Buildings are metaphorically people. We seefeatures—eyes, nose, and mouth—in their windows. Inowrealize that the imageof theplanegoing intoSouthTower was for me an image of a bullet going throughsomeone’shead, the flamespouring from theother sidelike blood spurting out. It was an assassination. Thetowerfallingwasabodyfalling.Thebodiesfallingwereme, relatives, friends.Strangerswhohadsmiledas theyhadpassedmeon the street screamedas they fellpastme. The image afterward was hell: ashes, smoke andsteam rising, the building skeleton, darkness, suffering,

death.Thepeoplewhoattackedthetowersgotintomybrain,

eventhreethousandmilesaway.Allthosesymbolswereconnected to more of my identity than I could haverealized. To make sense of this, my very brain had tochange.Andchange itdid,painfully.Dayandnight.Byday the consequences flooded my mind; by night theimageshadmebreathingheavily,nightmareskeepingmeawake.Those symbols lived in theemotional centersofmy brain. As their meanings changed, I felt emotionalpain.Itwasnotjustme.Itwaseveryoneinthiscountry,and

manyinothercountries.Theassassinsmanagednotonlyto kill thousands of people but also to reach in andchangethebrainsofpeoplealloverAmerica.It is remarkable to know that two hundredmillion of

mycountrymenfeelaswrenchedasIdo.ThePoweroftheImages

Asametaphoranalyst,Iwanttobeginwiththepoweroftheimagesandwherethatpowercomesfrom.There are a number of metaphors for buildings. A

commonvisualmetaphoristhatbuildingsareheads,withwindowsaseyes.Themetaphorisdormant,thereinourbrains,waiting tobeawakened.The imageof theplane

going into South Tower of the World Trade Centeractivatedit.Thetowerbecameahead,withwindowsaseyes,theedgeofthetowerthetemple.Theplanegoingthroughitbecameabulletgoingthroughsomeone’shead,theflamespouringfromtheothersidethebloodspurtingout.Metaphorically,tallbuildingsarepeoplestandingerect.

Aseachtowerfell,itbecameabodyfalling.Wearenotconsciously aware of themetaphorical images, but theyare part of the power and the horror we experiencewhenweseethem.Eachof us, in thepremotor cortexof ourbrains, has

whatarecalledmirrorneuronsconnectedtovisualareas.Suchneurons fire eitherwhenweperforman actionorwhen we see the same action performed by someoneelse.Thereareconnectionsfromthatpartofthebraintothe emotional centers. Such neural circuits are believedtobethebasisofempathy.This works literally: When we see a plane coming

towardthebuildingandimaginepeopleinthebuilding,wefeel the plane coming toward us; when we see thebuilding toppling toward others, we feel the buildingtoppling toward us. It alsoworksmetaphorically: If wesee the plane going through the building, andunconsciouslyweevoke themetaphorof thebuildingasaheadwith theplanegoing through its temple, thenwe

sense—unconsciously but powerfully—being shotthrough the temple. If we evoke the metaphor of thebuilding as a person and see the building fall to theground in pieces, then we sense—again unconsciouslybut powerfully—that we are falling to the ground inpieces.Oursystemsofmetaphorical thought, interactingwith our mirror neuron systems, turn external literalhorrorsintofeltmetaphoricalhorrors.Here are some other metaphorical and symbolic

effects:

• Control is up. You have control over thesituation; you’re on top of things. This has alwaysbeen an important basis of towers as symbols ofpower. In this case, the toppling of the towersmeantlossofcontrol,lossofpower.•Phallic imagery. Towers are symbols of phallicpower,andtheircollapsereinforcestheideaoflossofpower.Anotherkindofphallicimagerywasmorecentralhere:theplanespenetratingthetowerswithaplumeofheat,andthePentagon,avaginalimagefrom the air, penetrated by the plane as missile.These phallic interpretations came from womenwhofeltviolatedbothbytheattackandtheimagesonTV.•A society is a building. A society can have a

“foundation,”whichmayormaynotbesolid,anditcan“crumble”and“fall.”TheWorldTradeCenterwas symbolic of American society. When itcrumbled and fell, the threat was to more than abuilding.•Standing.We thinkmetaphorically of things thatperpetuateovertimeas“standing.”DuringtheGulfWar,GeorgeH.W.Bushkeptsaying,“Thiswillnotstand,” meaning that the situation would not beperpetuated over time. The World Trade Centerwas built to last ten thousand years. When itcrumbled, it metaphorically raised the question ofwhether American power and American societywouldlast.Andthatwaswhyitwasattacked.•Buildingastemple.Herewehadthedestructionof the templeof capitalist commerce,which lies attheheartofoursociety.•Ourmindsplaytricksonus.TheimageoftheManhattan skyline became unbalanced. We wereused to seeing itwith the towers there.Ourmindsimposedourold imageof the towers,and thesightofthemgonegaveonetheillusionofimbalance,asifManhattanweresinking.GiventhesymbolismofManhattan as thepromiseofAmerica, it appearedmetaphoricallyasifthatpromiseweresinking.The Freedom Tower now stands at 1 World

TradeCenter.It’snotasdistinctiveanditsmeaningisnotthesame.ItdoesnotrepresentthestabilityofnormallifeinAmerica.•Hell.Wehadthepersistentimage,dayafterday,ofthecharredandsmokingremains:hell.

TheWorldTradeCenterwasapotentsymbol,tiedintoourunderstandingofourcountryandourselvesinmyriadways.Allofwhatweknowisphysicallyembodiedinourbrains. To incorporate the new knowledge requires aphysicalchangeinthesynapsesofourbrains,aphysicalreshapingofourneuralsystem.Thephysicalviolencewasnotonly inNewYorkand

Washington.Physicalchanges—violentones—havebeenmadetothebrainsofallAmericans.

HowtheAdministrationFramedtheEvent

TheBush administration’s framings and reframings andits search for metaphors should be noted. The initialframingwasasacrimewithvictims,andperpetratorstobe“broughttojustice”and“punished.”Thecrimeframeentails law, courts, lawyers, trials, sentencing, appeals,and so on. It was hours before crime changed to war,withcasualties,enemies,militaryaction,warpowers,andsoon.

Donald Rumsfeld and other Bush administrationofficials pointed out that this situation did not fit ourunderstanding of a war. There were enemies andcasualtiesallright,butnoenemyarmy,noregiments,notanks,no ships,noair force,nobattlefields,no strategictargets, and no clear victory.Thewar frame just didn’tfit.ColinPowellhadalwaysarguedthatnotroopsshouldbe committed without specific objectives, a clear andachievabledefinitionofvictory,andaclearexitstrategy,and that open-ended commitments should not be used.Buthealsopointedoutthatnoneofthesewaspresentinthis“war.”Because the concept of war didn’t fit, there was a

frantic search for metaphors. First, Bush called theterroristscowards—butthisdidn’tseemtoworktoowellfor martyrs who willingly sacrificed their lives for theirmoral and religious ideals. Then he spoke of “smokingthem out of their holes,” as if they were rodents, andRumsfeldspokeof“dryinguptheswamptheylivein,”asif they were snakes or lowly swamp creatures. Theconceptualmetaphorshereweremoral isup, immoral isdown (they are lowly), and immoral people are animals(thatlivecloseto,orin,theground).Bush speechwriter David Frum created the phrase

AxisofEvilwhichwasusedinBush’s2002StateoftheUnion address to refer to Iran, Iraq, and North Korea

andwasusedoverandoverby theBushadministrationinjustifyingthewarinIraq.Axiswasareferencetotheenemy Axis powers of WorldWar II—Germany, Italy,and Japan—which spanned the Western and Easternhemispheres and represented the global distribution ofAmerica’s deadly enemies.Lumping Iraqwith Iran andNorthKoreasuggestedthatIraqwasdevelopingnuclearweapons (the nonexistent “weapons of massdestruction”)andgaveapretextfor invadingIraq.Axis,becauseitincludedJapan,evokedthe“sneakattack”onPearlHarbor,andsymbolicallyequatedtheSeptember11attack with Pearl Harbor, again as a justification forgoing towar.On the assumption thatAmerica containstheessenceofmoralityanddemocracy—theshiningcityon the hill—anyone attacking America was evil. AndwhathappenedonSeptember11certainlyfeltevil.Theuseof thewordevilin theBushadministration’s

discourseworked in the followingway. In conservative,strictfathermorality(seeMoralPolitics,chapter5),evilis a palpable thing, a force in theworld.To standup toevilyouhave tobemorally strong. Ifyou’reweak,youlet evil triumph, so that weakness in itself is a form ofevil, as is promoting weakness. Evil is inherent, anessential trait, that determines how you will act in theworld.Evilpeopledoevil things.No furtherexplanationis necessary. There can be no social causes of evil, no

religious rationale for evil, no reasons or arguments forevil.Theenemyofevilisgood.Ifourenemyisevil,weare inherently good. Good is our essential nature, andwhatwedo in thebattle against evil is good.Goodandevil are locked in a battle, which is conceptualizedmetaphorically as a physical fight inwhich the strongerwins.Only superior strength candefeat evil, andonly ashow of strength can keep evil at bay. Not to showoverwhelming strength is immoral, since it will induceevildoers to perform more evil deeds, because they’llthink they can get away with it. To oppose a show ofsuperior strength is therefore immoral. Nothing ismoreimportant in the battle of good against evil, and if someinnocentnoncombatantsgetinthewayandgethurt,itisashame,butitistobeexpectedandnothingcanbedoneabout it. Indeed, performing lesser evils in the name ofgood is justified—“lesser evils” like curtailing individualliberties,sanctioningpoliticalassassinations,overthrowinggovernments, torturing, hiring criminals, and creating“collateraldamage.”Then there is thebasicsecuritymetaphor,securityas

containment—keeping the evildoers out. Secure ourborders,keepthemandtheirweaponsoutofourairports,havemarshalson theplanes.Most security experts saythatthereisnosurewaytokeepterroristsoutortodenythem the use of some weapon or other; a determined,

well-financed terrorist organization can penetrate anysecuritysystem.Ortheycanchooseothertargets—say,oiltankers.Yet the Security as Containment metaphor is

powerful. It is what lies behind the missile shieldproposal. Rationality might say that the September 11attacks showed the missile shield is pointless. But itstrengthened the use of the Security as Containmentmetaphor. As soon as you say “national security,” theSecurityasContainmentmetaphorwillbeactivated,andwithitamissileshield.

TheConservativeAdvantage

The reaction of the Bush administration was just whatyouwouldexpectaconservativereactionwouldbe:purestrictfathermorality.Thereisevillooseintheworld.Wemustshowourstrengthandwipe itout.Retributionandvengeance are called for. If there are casualties orcollateraldamage,sobeit.The reaction from liberals and progressives was far

different: Justice is called for, not vengeance.Understanding and restraint are what is needed. Themodel forouractionsshouldbe therescueworkersanddoctors—thehealers—notthebombers.We should not be like them. We should not take

innocent lives in bringing the perpetrators to justice.Massive bombing of Afghanistan and Iraq—with thekillingofinnocents—willshowthatwearenobetter.But the Bush administration’s conservative message

dominated the media. The event was framed in theirterms. As Newt Gingrich put it on the Fox network,“Retributionisjustice.”Itisvitaltounderstandthehistoryofthisframingnow,

because it is coming up again, with the conservativeattack on Obama’s call for the use of “soft power”—diplomacy and economic leverage—and theconservatives’callforamilitarybuildupandinterventionintheworld’stroublespots.I have been reminded, over and over, of Gandhi’s

words: “Be the change you wish to see in the world.”The words apply to governments as well as toindividuals.

Causes

There are (at least) three kinds of causes of radicalIslamicterrorism:

•Worldview:thereligiousrationale•Socialandpoliticalconditions:culturesofdespair•Means:theenablingconditions

TheBush administration discussed only the third: themeans that enable attacks to be carried out. Theseinclude leadership (for example, bin Laden), hostcountries, training facilities and bases, financial backing,cellorganization,informationnetworks,andsoon.Thesedonotincludethefirstandsecondonthelist.

Worldview:TheReligiousRationale

Afterthebombingoccurred,thequestionthatkeptbeingasked in the media was, “Why do they hate us somuch?”It is important at the outset to separatemoderate-to-

liberal Islam from radical Islamic fundamentalists, whodonotrepresentmostMuslims.RadicalIslamicfundamentalistshateourculture.They

haveaworldviewthat is incompatiblewiththewaythatAmericans—andotherWesterners—livetheirlives.Onepartofthisworldviewconcernswomen,whoare

tohidetheirbodies,shouldhavenorighttoproperty,andso on. Western sexuality, mores, music, and women’sequality all violate their values, and the ubiquity ofAmerican cultural products, like movies and music,throughouttheworldoffendsthem.A second part concerns theocracy:They believe that

governmentsshouldberunbyclericsaccording tostrict

Islamiclaw.A third concerns holy sites, like those in Jerusalem,

which theybelieve shouldbeunder Islamicpolitical andmilitarycontrol.A fourth concerns the commercial and military

incursionsbyWesternersonIslamicsoil,whichtheylikentotheinvasionofthehatedcrusaders.Thewaytheyseeit,ourculturespitsinthefaceoftheirs.A fifth concerns jihad—a holy war to protect and

defendthefaith.A sixth is the idea of a martyr, a man willing to

sacrifice himself for the cause. His reward is eternalglory—aneternityinheavensurroundedbywillingyoungvirgins. Insomecases there isapromise thathis familywillbetakencareofbythecommunity.SocialandPoliticalConditions:CulturesofDespair

Most Islamic would-be martyrs not only share thesebeliefs but also have grown up in a culture of despair;theyhavenothingtolose.Eliminatesuchpovertyandyoueliminatethebreedinggroundformostterrorists—thoughthe September 11 terrorists were relatively well-to-do.WhentheBushadministrationspokeofeliminatingterror,it did not appear to be talking about eliminating culturesofdespairandthesocialconditionsthatleadonetowant

togiveuplifetomartyrdom.Princeton Lyman of the Aspen Institute made an

important proposal—that the worldwide antiterroristcoalition being formed should address the causal real-worldconditions.Countrybycountry,theconditions(bothmaterial and political) leading to despair need to beaddressed, with a worldwide commitment to endingthem.Itshouldbedonebecauseitisanecessarypartofaddressing the causes of terrorism—and because it isright!Itneverhappened.What about the first cause—the radical Islamic

worldview itself?Militaryactionwon’t change it.Socialactionwon’t change it.Worldviews live in theminds ofpeople. How can one change those minds—and if notpresent minds, then future minds? The West cannot!Those minds can only be changed by moderate andliberal Muslims—clerics, teachers, elders, respectedcommunity members. There is no shortage of them. Idoubt that they arewell organized, but theworld needsthem to bewell organized and effective. It is vital thatmoderate and liberal Muslims form a unified voiceagainsthateand,withit, terror.RememberthatTalibanmeans “student.” Those who teach hate in Islamicschools must be replaced—and we in theWest cannotreplace them. This can only be done by an organizedmoderate, nonviolent Islam. The West can make the

suggestion and offer extensive resources, but we alonearepowerlesstocarryitout.WedependonthegoodwillandcourageofmoderateIslamicleaders.Togainit,wemustshowourgoodwillbybeginninginaseriouswaytoaddress the social and political conditions that lead todespair.Thinking of the enemy as evil means not taking the

primarycausesseriously.PublicDiscourse

TheHonorableBarbaraLee(D-Calif.),whoIamproudto acknowledge as my representative in Congress, incasting the lone vote against giving President Bush fullCongressional approval for carrying out his War onTerrorismashesawfit,saidthefollowing:

Iamconvinced thatmilitaryactionwillnotpreventfurther acts of international terrorism against theUnited States. This is a very complex andcomplicatedmatter.. . .Howeverdifficultthisvotemaybe,someof

usmusturgetheuseofrestraint.Ourcountryisinastateofmourning.Someofusmustsay,letusstepbackforamoment.Letus justpause foraminuteand think through the implications of our actionstodaysothatthisdoesnotspiraloutofcontrol.

I have agonized over this vote, but I came togripswithittodayandIcametogripswithopposingthis resolution during the very painful yet verybeautiful memorial service. As a member of theclergy so eloquently said, “As we act, let us notbecometheevilthatwedeplore.”

Iagree.Butwhat isstrikingtomeasa linguist is theuse of negatives in the statement: “not prevent,”“restraint” (inherently negative), “not spiral out ofcontrol,” “not become the evil that we deplore.” Apetition was circulated calling for “justice withoutvengeance.”Without has another implicit negative. It isnot that these negative statements are wrong (threenegatives!). What is needed is a positive form ofdiscourse.Thereisone.Thecentralconceptisthatofresponsibility,whichisat

the heart of progressive/liberal morality. (See MoralPolitics.) Progressive/liberal morality begins withempathy, the ability to understand others and feel whatthey feel. That is presupposed in responsibility—responsibility for oneself, for protection, for the care ofthose who need care, and for the community. Thosewerethevaluesthatwesawinactionamongtherescueworkers in New York right after the September 11

attack.Responsibilityrequirescompetenceandeffectiveness.

If you are to deal responsibly with terrorism, youmustdeal effectivelywith all its causes: religious, social, andenabling. The enabling causes must be dealt witheffectively.Bombinginnocentciviliansandharmingthembydestroyingtheircountry’sdomestic infrastructurewillbecounterproductive—aswellasimmoral.Responsibilityrequires care in the place of blundering, overwhelmingforce.Massive bombing would be irresponsible. Failure to

address the religious and social causes would beirresponsible.The responsible responsebeginswith jointinternational action to address all three: the social andpolitical conditions and the religious worldview and themeans,withallduecare.

ForeignPolicy

At a time when terrorist threats come from groups ofindividuals rather than states, when wars occur withinnations, when “free markets” exist without freedom,when overpopulation threatens stability and disastrousglobal warming, when intolerant cultures limit freedomand promote violence, when transnational corporationsact like oppressive governments, and when the oil

economy threatens the planet’s future, the centralproblemsintoday’sworldcannotbesolvedbystate-levelapproaches.The state-level part of the answer is to recognize

global interdependence and focus foreign policy ondiplomacy, alliances, international institutions, and strongdefensive and peacekeeping forces, with war as a lastresort.But what is needed even more is a moral foreign

policy,onethatrealizesthatAmericacanonlybeabetterAmerica if the world is a better world. America mustbecomeamoralleaderusingfundamentalhumanvalues:caring and responsibility carried out with strength torespondtotheworld’sproblems.Inavalues-based foreignpolicy, issues thatwerenot

previouslyseenaspartofforeignpolicybecomecentral.Women’s education is the best way to alleviateoverpopulation and promote development. Renewableenergy could make the world oil-independent. Food,water,health, ecology,andcorporate reformare foreignpolicy issues, as are rights: rights of women, children,workers,prisoners,refugees,andpoliticalminorities.These issues were previously left to international

advocacy groups, andmany have done excellent work.But these issues need an integrated approach thatrequiresaforeignpolicythat isseriousaboutaddressing

them.The Obama administration is making moves in this

direction, with the understanding that these are foreignpolicyissues.Thepresidentisbeingattackedforit.Andthemediahasnotyet recognized themasforeignpolicyissues.Why?The metaphors that foreign policy experts have

traditionally used to define what foreign policy is haveruled out these important concerns. The metaphorsinvolve self-interest (for example, the rational actormodel), stability (a physics metaphor), industrialization(unindustrialized nations are “underdeveloped”), growth(ourcurrenteconomicsdependsongrowth—ofmarketsand access to cheap labor and abundant cheapresources)andtrade(freedomisfreetrade).There is an alternativeway of thinking about foreign

policy under which all these humanistic issues wouldbecome a natural part of what foreign policy is about.The premise is that when international relations worksmoothly, it is because certain moral norms of theinternational community are being followed.Thismostlygoes unnoticed, since those norms are commonlyfollowed. We notice problems when those norms arebreached.Given this, itmakes sense that foreign policyshouldbecenteredaroundthosenorms.ThemoralnormsIsuggestcomeoutofwhatinMoral

PoliticsIcallednurturantmorality.Itisaviewofethicalbehavior that centerson empathy and responsibility (foryourself and others needing your help). Many thingsfollow from these central principles: fairness, minimalviolence (for example, justice without vengeance), anethicofcare,protectionofthoseneedingit,arecognitionof interdependence, cooperation for the common good,the building of community, mutual respect, and so on.When applied to foreign policy, nurturant moral normswouldleadtheAmericangovernmenttoupholdtheAnti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, sign and upholdinternationalenvironmentalaccords,engageinaformofglobalizationgovernedbyanethicsofcare—anditwouldautomaticallymakealltheconcernslistedabove(suchastheenvironmentandwomen’srights)partofourforeignpolicy.This, of course, implies (1) multilateralism, (2)

interdependence, and (3) international cooperation. Butthese three principles, without nurturant norms, couldequally well apply to a radically conservative foreignpolicy. Bush’s foreign policy was one of self-interest(“what’s in the best interest of the United States”)—ifnot outright hegemony (the Cheney/Rumsfeld position).The Democratic leaders incorrectly criticized Bush forbeingisolationistandunilateralistonissuesliketheKyotoaccordsandtheABMTreaty.Hewasneitherisolationist

nor unilateralist.Hewas just following his stated policyofself-interest,usingstrictfathermoralityashisguide.Imagine if Bush had happened to receive the full

support of France, Germany, and the United Nationswhenheannouncedhispolicy.Thenhewouldhavebeencalledaninternationalistandmultilateralist.WhenitwasinAmerica’sinterest(ashesawit),hewouldworkwiththose nations willing to go along, “the coalition of thewilling.” Whether Bush looked like a multilateralistdepended onwhowaswilling. Self-interest crosses theboundaries between unilateralism and multilateralism.The Bush foreign policy was one of unyielding self-interest.There is, interestingly, an apparent overlap between

thenurturantnormspolicyandan idealisticvisionof thewar started by theBush administration. The overlap is,simply, that it is amoralnorm to refuse to engage inorsupportterrorism.Fromthisperspective,itlooked,attheonset,likeleftandrightwereunited.Itwasanillusion.In nurturant norms policy, antiterrorism arises from

anothermoralnorm:Violenceagainstinnocentpartiesisimmoral.Within a year of the end of the Gulf War, the CIA

reportedthataboutamillionIraqicivilianshaddiedfromthe effects of the war and the embargo—many fromdisease and malnutrition due to the US destruction of

water treatment plants, hospitals, electric generationplants, and so on, togetherwith the inability to get foodandmedical supplies.Manymore innocents have sincediedfromtheeffectsofthewar.Inconservativemorality,thereisafightbetweengood

and evil, in which “lesser evils” are tolerated and evenseenasnecessaryandexpected.The argument that killing innocent civilians in

retaliationwouldmakeusasbadasthemmayworkforprogressives,butnotforconservatives.Bethechangeyouwish tosee in theworld! If the

UnitedStateswantsterrortoend,theUnitedStatesmustenditsowncontributiontoterror.Theforeignpolicyofmoralnorms—ofdiplomacyand

economic leverage,minimizing the use of force—is theonlysaneandhumaneforeignpolicy.

DomesticPolicy

AfterSeptember11,Ihadarationalfear:afearthattheattackhadgiven theBushadministration a freehand inpursuingaconservativedomesticagenda.Itcouldnotbesaidby themediaat the time,but itwas true.No taxesfromthewealthywereraisedtopayforthewar.Indeed,they were cut! The social security surplus was takenfrom the “lockbox” to pay for the war, with every

DemocratinCongressexceptonevotingforit.Itwassupposedtocostfortybilliondollars.Itactually

cost three trillion so far—andcounting, if you count thecontinuingcostoftreatingveteransinjuredinthewarandof propping up governments in Iraq andAfghanistan. Itruined the economy of our country—our educationalsystem,ourinfrastructure—andithastakenawayavastrange of needed public resources.The poor andmiddleclassgotpoorer,buttherichgotricher.Andtheearthgotwarmer.Andtheconservativemovementgrew.It was another lesson in systemic causation. Foreign

policy and domestic policy are inextricably linked.Gunsmadeforwarwillbesoldatgunshowsandused tokillchildren.Dronesandcomputertechnologydevelopedforthe surveillance of enemies abroad will be used forsurveillance of civilians at home. And money spent onwar abroad will be drained from public resources athome.

★12★MetaphorsThatKill

—March18,2003,editedJuly2014—

The 2003 version of this chapter appeared justbeforethestartoftheIraqWar.Itisreprintedheretoprovideasenseofwhatthestudyofframingbroughttoanunderstandingofthatwarbeforeithappened.

Metaphorscankill.That’show Ibeganapieceon theGulfWarback in

1990, just before the war began. (Seegeorgelakoff.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/metaphor-and-war-the-metaphor-system-used-to-justify-war-in-the-gulf-lakoff-1991.pdf.)Manyof thosemetaphorical ideasareback,butwithinaverydifferentandmoredangerouscontext. Since the Iraq War is due to start any day,perhapseventomorrow,itmightbeusefultotakealookbefore theactionbeginsat themetaphorical ideasbeingusedtojustifytheIraqWar.One of the centralmetaphors in our foreign policy is

thatanation isaperson. It isusedhundredsof timesaday, every time the nation of Iraq is conceptualized intermsofasingleperson,SaddamHussein.Thewar,we

aretold, isnotbeingwagedagainst theIraqipeople,butonlyagainstthisoneperson.OrdinaryAmericancitizensare using this metaphor when they say things like“Saddam is a tyrant. He must be stopped.” What themetaphor hides, of course, is that the three thousandbombs to be dropped in the first two days will not bedropped on that one person. They will kill manythousandsofpeoplehiddenbythemetaphor,people thatwe are, according to the metaphor, not going to waragainst.The Nation as a Person metaphor is pervasive,

powerful,andpartofanelaboratemetaphorsystem.Itispart of an international community metaphor in whichthere are friendly nations, hostile nations, rogue states,and so on. This metaphor comes with a notion of thenationalinterest:Justasitisintheinterestofapersontobehealthyandstrong,soit is intheinterestofanation-person to be economically healthy andmilitarily strong.Thatiswhatismeantbythe“nationalinterest.”In the international community, peopled by nation-

persons,therearenation-adultsandnation-children,withmaturity metaphorically understood as industrialization.The children are the “developing” nations of the thirdworld, in the process of industrializing, who need to betaught how to develop properly andmust be disciplined(say,bytheInternationalMonetaryFund)whentheyfail

tofollowinstructions.“Backward”nationsarethosethatare “underdeveloped.” Iraq, despite being the cradle ofcivilization,isseenviathismetaphorasakindofdefiant,armed teenage hoodlum who refuses to abide by therulesandmustbetaughtalesson.The international relations community adds to the

NationasaPersonmetaphorwhat iscalled the rationalactormodel. The idea here is that it is irrational to actagainst your interests, and that nations act as if theywere rational actors—individual people trying tomaximizetheirgainsandassetsandminimizetheircostsandlosses.IntheGulfWar,themetaphorwasappliedsothat a country’s “assets” included its soldiers, matériel,and money. Since the United States lost few of those“assets” in the Gulf War, the war was reported, justafterward in theNew York Times business section, ashaving been a “bargain.” Because Iraqi civilians werenot our assets they could not be counted among the“losses,” and so therewasno careful public accountingofcivilianliveslost,peoplemaimed,andchildrenstarvedor made seriously ill by the war or the sanctions thatfollowedit.Estimatesvaryfromhalfamilliontoamillionormore.However,publicrelationswasseentobeaUSasset:Excessiveslaughterreportedinthepresswouldbebad PR, a possible loss. These metaphors are with usagain. A short war with few US casualties would

minimizecosts.Butthelongeritgoeson,themoreIraqiresistance and the more US casualties, the less theUnited States would appear invulnerable and the morethewarwouldappearasawaragainsttheIraqipeople.Thatwouldbeahigh“cost.”According to the rational actor model, countries act

naturally in their own best interests—preserving theirassets,thatis,theirownpopulations,theirinfrastructures,theirwealth,theirweaponry,andsoon.ThatiswhattheUnited States did in the GulfWar and what it is doingnow.ButSaddamHussein,intheGulfWar,didnotfitourgovernment’s rational actor model. He had goals likepreservinghispowerinIraqandbeinganArabherojustfor standing up to the Great Satan. Though such goalsmight have their own rationality, they are “irrational”fromthemodel’sperspective.One of the most frequent uses of the Nation as a

Personmetaphor comes in the almost daily attempts tojustifythewarmetaphoricallyasa“justwar.”ThebasicideaofajustwarusestheNationasaPersonmetaphor,plus two narratives that have the structure of classicalfairytales:theself-defensestoryandtherescuestory.Ineachstorythereisahero,acrime,avictim,anda

villain. In the self-defense story thehero and thevictimare thesame.Inbothstories thevillain is inherentlyeviland irrational:Theherocan’t reasonwith thevillain;he

hastofighthimanddefeatorkillhim.Inboth,thevictimmustbe innocentandbeyondreproach. Inboth, there isan initial crimeby the villain, and the hero balances themoral books by defeating him. If all the parties arenation-persons, then self-defense and rescue storiesbecomeformsofajustwarforthehero-nation.In theGulfWar,GeorgeH.W.Bushtriedoutaself-

defensestory:Saddamwas“threateningouroillifeline.”The American people didn’t buy it. Then he found awinning story, a rescue story: the “rape” of Kuwait. Itsold well, and is still the most popular account of thatwar.In theIraqWar,GeorgeW.Bush ispushingdifferent

versionsofthesametwostorytypes,andthisexplainsagreatdealofwhatisgoingonintheAmericanpressandinspeechesbyBushandPowell. If theycanshow thatSaddamHusseinequalsAl-Qaeda—thatheishelpingorharboringAl-Qaeda—thentheycanmakeacasefortheself-defense scenario, and hence for a just war. Or ifweapons ofmass destruction ready to be deployed arefound, the self-defense scenario can be justified inanotherway.Indeed, despite the lackof anypositive evidence and

thefact that thesecularSaddamand thefundamentalistbin Laden despise each other, the Bush administrationhas managed to convince 40 percent of the American

public of the link just by asserting it.The administrationhas told its soldiers the same thing, and so ourmilitarypersonnel see themselvesasgoing to Iraq indefenseoftheir country. In the rescue scenario thevictims are (1)the Iraqi people and (2) Saddam’s neighbors, whom hehasnotattackedbut isseenasthreatening.That iswhyBushandPowellkeeponlistingSaddam’scrimesagainstthe Iraqi people and theweaponshe coulduse toharmhisneighbors.Again,mostoftheAmericanpeoplehaveaccepted the idea that the IraqWar is a rescue of theIraqipeopleandasafeguardingofneighboringcountries.Actually, thewar threatens thesafetyandwell-beingoftheIraqipeople.Andwhy such enmity toward France andGermany?

ViatheNationasaPersonmetaphor,theyaresupposedto be our “friends,” and friends are supposed to besupportiveand jump inandhelpuswhenweneedhelp.Friendsaresupposedtobeloyal.ThatmakesFranceandGermanyfair-weatherfriends!Nottherewhenyouneedthem.ThisishowthewarisbeingframedfortheAmerican

people by the administration and themedia.Millions ofpeoplearoundtheworldcanseethatthemetaphorsandfairytalesdon’tfitthecurrentsituation,thattheIraqWardoesnotqualifyasajustwar—a“legal”war.Butifyouacceptallthesemetaphors,asAmericanshavebeenled

todobytheadministration,thepress,andthelackofaneffective Democratic opposition, then the Iraq Warwouldindeedseemlikeajustwar.ButsurelymostAmericanshavebeenexposedtothe

facts—the lack of a credible link between Saddam andAl-Qaeda, no WMDs (weapons of mass destruction)found,and the idea that largenumbersof innocent Iraqicivilians will be killed or maimed by our bombs. Whydon’ttheyreachtherationalconclusion?Oneofthefundamentalfindingsofcognitivescienceis

that people think in terms of frames and metaphors—conceptual structures like those we have beendescribing.Theframesareinthesynapsesofourbrains,physically present in the formof neural circuitry.Whenthe facts don’t fit the frames, the frames are kept andthefactsignored.It is a common folk theory of progressives that “the

factswillsetyoufree.”Ifonlyyoucangetall thefactsoutthereinthepubliceye,theneveryrationalpersonwillreach the right conclusion. It is a vain hope. Humanbrains just don’t work that way. Framing matters.Framesonceentrenchedarehardtodispel.In the Gulf War, Colin Powell began the testimony

beforeCongress.He explained the rational actormodeltoCongressandgaveabriefexpositionof theviewsonwarofClausewitz,thePrussiangeneral:Warisbusiness

andpoliticscarriedoutbyothermeans.Nationsnaturallyseek their self-interest, and when necessary they usemilitaryforce in theserviceof theirself-interest.This isbothnaturalandlegitimate.TotheBushadministration,thiswarfurthersourself-

interest in controlling the flow of oil from the world’ssecond-largest known reserve, and in being in thepositiontocontroltheflowofoilfromcentralAsia.Thiswould guarantee energy domination over a significantpart of the world. The United States could control oilsalesaroundtheworld.Andintheabsenceofalternativefuel development, whoever controls the worldwidedistributionofoilcontrolspoliticsandeconomics.My1990paperdidnotstop theGulfWar.Thispaper

willnotstoptheIraqWar.Sowhybother?I think it is crucially important to understand the

cognitivedimensionsofpolitics—especiallywhenmostofour conceptual framing is unconscious andwemay notbeawareofourownmetaphorical thought.Ihavebeenreferredtoasa“cognitiveactivist,”andIthinkthelabelfits mewell. As a professor I do analyses of linguisticand conceptual issues in politics, and I do them asaccuratelyasIcan.Butthatanalyticactisapoliticalact.Awareness matters. Being able to articulate what isgoing on can change what is going on—at least in thelongrun.

★★PartV★★

FromTheorytoAction

★13★WhatConservativesWant

Liberals tend not to understand conservatives, and theirconfusion is showing. On the one hand liberals seeconservatives in disarray and react with glee at thefragmentation: the Tea Party vs. Libertarians vs.Neocons vs. Wall Street. Eric Cantor, the RepublicanMajorityLeader,broughtdownbyaTeaPartyunknown.JohnBoehnerunabletocontrolhismajorityintheHouse.Republicanprimarychallengeseverywhere.Ontheotherhand,liberalsarescaredstiffoftheKoch

brothers and other wealthy Republicans bankrollingRepublicancandidatesateverylevelalloverthecountry.They are scared of a Republican takeover. And theyshouldbe.Whichisit?There are real splits, disputes, dislikes, even hatreds

amongconservatives.Isittearingconservatismapart?Many say yes. The tearing-apart theory is easy to

understandandconstantlydiscussed.Ontheotherhand,it isalsopossiblethatthedivisions

formasystemthatweldsthediversepartstogether.Andthismaybemakingconservatives stronger at thenexuspoints,whereviewsareshared,notweaker.

Thewelding-together theoryhasnotbeenconsidered,but it is quite possible that this is what is happeningamongconservatives,at thesystems level.Consider theuniformityofopinionamongconservativesoneverythingfrom Obamacare to abortion to the Supreme Court’sHobbyLobbydecision. It is strong, and there aremanyinstanceswhereconservativesofallstripesareferventlyagainst all liberals and all liberal positions. Where theyhave foundcommonground fits consistentlywithin theiroverridingmoralframework,andwheretheyhavefoundcommonground,theirresolvestrengthens.Andifitistruethatthedivisionsamongconservatives

make them stronger, notweaker, then progressives hadbetterbeawareofit.No matter what progressives believe about

conservative fragmentation, though, they need tounderstandwho conservatives are andwhat theywant,bothgroupbygroupandonthewhole.At the heart of conservatism is strict fathermorality,

as we have seen. But strict father morality hascomplexities and natural variations. What liberals don’tseeisthatthediversitycangiveconservatismasawholeconsiderablestrength.Different versions of conservatisms are defined by

particular domains of interest. Strict father moralityapplies to all the domains—individual liberty and self-

interest, world power, business, and society. Thesedomains of interest characterize libertarian, neocon,financial,andTeaPartyconservatives.

DomainofInterest

TypeofConservative

Individualliberty Libertarian

WorldPower NeoconBusiness WallStreetSocietyandReligion TeaParty

Theyhavethesamegeneralstrictfathermorality,butapply it to the domains that they care about most indifferentways.Thesplitisnotinthemoraltheory,butinthedomainsofinterest.Withcomplementarydifferences,theystandtogetherasone.A focus on unimpeded pursuit of self-interest—and

withit,extremelimitsonstatepowerover theindividual—definesthelibertarianstrainofright-wingthought.

Neocons believe in the unbridled use of power(includingstatepower)toextendthereignofstrictfathervalues and ideas into every domain, domestic andespecially international. They are concernedwith globalfinancial and military power, and the use of power athome. They sometimes run up against libertarians,whoobject to the use of governmental power and to globalinvolvements that require the buildup and use of statepower.WallStreetconservativesareprimarilyconcernedwith

the acquisition ofwealth via the corporateworld. Theyinclude CEOs and upper management of wealthycorporations, investment bankers, venture capitalists,private asset managers, hedge fund managers, andanyonewhoseincomeprimarilycomesfrominvestments.Such conservatives have many political concerns: taxpolicy,economictreaties,import-exportpolicy,protectionof foreign investments, government contracts, access tomineralsongovernment lands,protectionofpatentsandcopyrights, property rights versus environmental rights,energysupplies,controlofmarkets,privatizationofpublicresources, and so on. They tend to work throughlobbyists,advertising,andcontrolofthemediaandpublicdiscourse.Finally,thereareTeaPartyconservatives—socialand

religious culturewarriors,whowant to act aggressively

on every front in the culture war against liberals andprogressives.Onthewhole,therightwingisattemptingtoimposea

strictfatherideologyonAmericaand,ultimately,therestoftheworld.Althoughthedetailsvarywithconservativeareas of concern, there are general tendencies. Manyprogressives underestimate just how radical an ideologythisis.Hereisanaccountofwhattheradicalrightseemsto

haveinmind.God.ManyconservativesstartwithaviewofGodthatmakesconservativeideologyseembothnaturalandgood.Godistheultimatestrictfather—allgoodandallpowerful,atthetopofanaturalhierarchyinwhich morality is linked with power. God wantsgood people to be in charge. Virtue is to berewarded—with power. God therefore wants ahierarchical society in which there are moralauthorities who should be obeyed in each domain:individual power, global power, financial power,socialpower.God makes laws—commandments—defining

rightandwrong.OnemusthavedisciplinetofollowGod’scommandments.Godispunitive:Hepunishesthose who do not follow his commandments, andrewards thosewhodo.FollowingGod’s lawstakes

discipline. Thosewho are disciplined enough to bemoralaredisciplinedenoughtobecomeprosperousandpowerful.Christ, as savior, gives sinners a second chance

—a chance to be born again and be obedient toGod’scommandmentsthistimearound.Themoral order. Traditional power relations aretakenasdefininganaturalmoralorder:Godaboveman, man above nature, adults above children,Western culture above non-Western culture,Americaaboveothernations.Themoralorderisalltoo often extended to men above women, whitesabove nonwhites, Christians above non-Christians,straightsabovegays.Morality. Preserving and extending theconservativemoralsystem(strictfathermorality)isthehighestpriority.Morality comes in the form of rules, or

commandments,made by amoral authority. To bemoral is tobeobedient to thatauthority. It requiresinternal discipline to control one’s natural desiresand instead follow a moral authority. What thatauthorityisdependsonyourdomainofinterest:theindividual, governing institutions—both public andprivate,WallStreet,conservativesociety.Discipline is learned in childhood primarily

through punishment for wrongdoing. Morality canbemaintainedonlythroughasystemofrewardsandpunishments.Economics.Competitionforscarceresourcesalsoimposes discipline, and hence servesmorality. Thedisciplinerequiredtobemoralisthesamedisciplinerequiredtowincompetitionsandprosper.Thewealthypeopletendtobethegoodpeople,a

natural elite. The poor remain poor because theylack the discipline needed to prosper. The poor,therefore,deservetobepoorandservethewealthy.Thewealthyneedanddeservepoorpeopletoservethem.Thevastandincreasinggapbetweenrichandpooristhusseentobebothnaturalandgood.Totheextentthatmarketsare“free,”theyarea

mechanismforthedisciplined(stereotypicallygood)people touse theirdiscipline toaccumulatewealth.Free markets are moral: If everyone pursues hisown profit, the profit of all will be maximized.Competition is good; it produces optimal use ofresources anddisciplinedpeople, andhence servesmorality.Regulationisbad;itgetsinthewayofthefreepursuitofprofit.Wealthypeopleservesocietybyinvestingandgivingjobstopoorerpeople.Suchadivisionofwealthultimatelyservesthepublicgood,which is to reward the disciplined and let the

undisciplined be forced to learn discipline orstruggle.Government. Social programs are immoral. Bygiving people things they haven’t earned, socialprograms remove the incentive to be disciplined,whichisnecessaryforbothmoralityandprosperity.Socialprogramsshouldbeeliminated.Anythingthatcould be done by the private sphere should be.Government does have certain proper roles: toprotect the lives and the private property ofAmericans, to make profit-seeking as easy aspossible for worthy Americans (the disciplinedones), and to promote conservativemorality (strictfather morality), along with conservative socialcultureandreligion.Education. Since preserving and extendingconservativemorality is the highest goal, educationshould serve that goal. Schools should teachconservative values. Conservatives should gaincontrolofschoolboardstoguaranteethis.Teachersshould be strict, not nurturant, in the example theyset for students and in the content they teach.Education should therefore promote discipline, andundisciplined students should face punishment.Unruly students should face physical punishment(for instance, paddling), and intellectually

undisciplined students should not be coddled butshould be shamed and punished by not beingpromoted. Uniform testing should test the level ofdiscipline.Thereare rightandwronganswers, andthey should be tested for. Testing defines fairness:Thosewhopassarerewarded;thosenotdisciplinedenoughtopassarepunished.Becauseimmoral,undisciplinedchildrencanlead

moral,disciplinedchildrenastray,parentsshouldbeable to choose to which schools they send theirchildren.Governmentfundingshouldbetakenfrompublic schools and given to parents in the form ofvouchers.Thiswillhelpwealthier(moredisciplinedandmoral)citizenssend theirchildren toprivateorreligiousschoolsthatteachconservativevaluesandimposeappropriatediscipline.Thevouchersgiventopoorer(lessdisciplinedandlessworthy)peoplewillnotbesufficient toallow them toget theirchildrenintothebetterprivateandreligiousschools.Schoolswill thus come to reflect the natural divisions ofwealth in society. Of course, students who showexceptional discipline and talent should be givenscholarships to the better schools. This will helpmaintainthesocialeliteasanaturalelite.Health care. It is the responsibility of parents totake care of their children.To the extent that they

cannot, they are not living up to their individualresponsibility.Noonehastheresponsibilityofdoingother people’s jobs for them. Thus prenatal care,postnatalcare,healthcareforchildren,andcareforthe aged and infirm are matters of individualresponsibility. They are not the responsibility oftaxpayers.Same-sex marriage and abortion. Same-sexmarriagedoesnot fit the strict fathermodelof thefamily; it goes squarely against it. A lesbianmarriage has no father. A gay marriage has“fathers”who are taken to be less than realmen.Since preserving and extending the strict fathermodel is thehighestmoral value for conservatives,same-sex marriage constitutes an attack on theconservativevaluesystemasawhole,andonthosewhose very identity depends on their having strictfathervalues.Abortion works similarly. There are two

stereotypical cases where women need abortions:unmarried teenagerswhohavebeenhaving“illicit”sex, and older women who want to delay childrearing topursueacareer.Bothof these fly in thefaceof thestrict fathermodel.Pregnant teenagershave violated the commandments of the strictfather. Career women challenge the power and

authority of the strict father. Both should bepunishedbybearingthechild;neithershouldbeableto avoid the consequences of their actions, whichwould violate the strict father model’s idea thatmoralitydependsonpunishment.Sinceconservativevaluesingeneralareversionsofstrictfathervalues,abortion stands as a threat to conservative valuesandtoone’sidentityasaconservative.Conservatives who are “pro-life” aremostly, as

wehaveseen,againstprenatalcare,postnatalcare,andhealthcareforchildren,allofwhichhavemajorcausal effectson the lifeof a child.Thus theyarenotreallypro-lifeinanybroadsense.Conservativesforthemostpartareusingtheideaofterminatingapregnancyaspartofacultural-warstrategytogainandmaintainpoliticalpower.Bothsame-sexmarriageandabortionarestand-

insforthegeneralstrictfathervaluesthatdefineformillions of people their identities as conservatives.That is the reason why these are such hot-buttonissuesforconservatives.To understand this is not to ignore the real pain

and difficulty involved in decisions made byindividual women to terminate a pregnancy. Forthose truly concerned with the lives and health ofchildren, the decision to end a pregnancy for

whateverreasonisalwayspainfulandanythingbutsimple. It is this pain that conservatives areexploiting when they use ending pregnancy as awedgeissueintheculturalcivilwartheyhavebeenpromoting.There are also thosewhoaregenuinelypro-life,

whobelievethatlifebeginswithconception,thatlifeis the ultimate value, and who therefore supportprenatal care, postnatal care, health insurance forpoor children, and early childhood education, andwhoopposethedeathpenalty,war,andsoon.Theyalso recognize that any woman choosing to end apregnancy is making a painful decision, andempathizewithsuchwomenandtreatthemwithouta negative judgment. These are pro-lifeprogressives—often liberalCatholics.They arenotconservatives who use the question of endingpregnancyasapoliticalwedgetogainsupportforabroadermoralandpoliticalagenda.Nature.Godhasgivenmandominionovernature.Natureisaresourceforprosperity.Itistheretobeusedforhumanprofit.Corporations.Corporationsexisttoprovidepeoplewithgoodsandservices,andtomaximizeprofitsforinvestors anduppermanagement.Theyworkmost“efficiently” when they do maximize their profits.

Whencorporationsprofit,societyprofits.Regulation. Government regulation stands in thewayoffreeenterprise,andshouldbeminimized.Rights. Rights must be consistent with morality.Strictfathermoralitydefinesthelimitsofwhatistocountasa“right.”Thus there is no right to an abortion, no right to

same-sexmarriage, no right to health care (or anyothergovernmentassistance),norighttoknowhowtheadministrationdecidespolicy,norighttoalivingwage, and so on. However, there is a right toowningguns—especiallyconservativesowningguns—since guns provide a form of authority to thosewhopossessthem.Democracy. A strict father democracy is aninstitutionaldemocracyoperatingunderstrictfathervalues. It counts as a democracy in that it haselections,a tripartitegovernment,civiliancontrolofthe military, free markets, basic civil liberties, andwidelyaccessiblemedia.Butstrictfathervaluesareseen as central to democracy—to theempowerment of individuals to change their livesand their society by pursuing their individualinterests.Foreign policy. America is the world’s moralauthority.It isasuperpowerbecauseitdeservesto

be. Its values—the right values—are defined bystrictfathermorality.Ifthereistobeamoralorderin theworld,American sovereignty,wealth, power,and hegemony must be maintained and Americanvalues—conservative family values, the freemarket,privatization,eliminationofsocialprograms,dominationofmanovernature, andsoon—spreadthroughouttheworld.The culture war. Strict father morality defineswhat a good society is. The very idea of aconservativelydefinedgoodsocietyisthreatenedbyliberal and progressive ideas and programs. Thatthreatmustbefoughtatallcosts.Theveryfabricofsocietyisatstake.

Thoseare thebasics.Thoseare the ideasandvaluesthattherightwingwantstoestablish,nothinglessthanaradical revolution in how America and the rest of theworldfunctions.That thevehemenceof theculturewaris provoked and maintained by conservatives is noaccident. For strict fathermorality to gain andmaintainpolitical power, disunity is required. First, there iseconomic disunity, the two-tier economy with the“unworthy” poor remaining poor and serving the“deserving” rich. But to stay in power, conservativesneed the support of the conservativepoor.That is, theyneed a significant percentage of the poor and middle

class to vote against their economic interests and fortheirindividual,social,andreligiousinterests.Thismeansthatwhat appears to be a division among conservativeson the basis of domains of interest actually constitutesstrengthforconservatismonthewhole.Conservatisminallthosedomainsofinterestisrequiredforconservatismtoreign.This has been achieved through the recognition that

manyworkingpeopleandevangelicalProtestantshaveastrict father morality in their families or religious lives.Conservativeintellectualshaverealizedthatthesearethesamevaluesthatdrivepoliticalconservatism.Theyhavealso realized that people vote their values and theiridentitiesmore than their economic self-interests.Whattheyhavedoneistocreate,viaframingandlanguage,alink between strict father morality in the family andreligion on the one hand and conservative politics andbusiness on the other. This conceptual link must be soemotionally strong in those who are not wealthy that itcanovercomeeconomicself-interest.Theirmethod for achieving this has been the cultural

civilwar—acivilwarcarriedoutwitheverythingshortoflive ammunition—pitting Americans with strict fathermorality (called conservatives) against Americans withnurturant parent morality (the hated liberals), who areportrayedasthreateningthewayoflifeandthecultural,

religious,andpersonalidentitiesofconservatives.Conservative political and intellectual leaders faced a

challengeincarryingouttheirgoals.Theyrepresentedaneconomic and political elite, but they were seeking thevotes ofmiddle- and lower-class working people. Theyneeded, therefore, to identify conservative ideas aspopulist and liberal or progressive ideas as elitist—eventhough the reverse was true. They faced a massiveframing problem, a problem that required a change ineverydaylanguageandthought.Butstrictfathermoralitygave them an important advantage: It suggests that thewealthy have earned their wealth, that they are goodpeoplewhodeserveit—andthatthosewhogovern,bothinthepublicandprivatesphere,shouldmaintaintherightmoralorderinsociety.It isakindofconservativesocialcontract.Throughtheworkoftheirthinktankintellectuals,their

languageprofessionals,theirwritersandadagencies,andtheir media specialists, conservatives have worked arevolution in thought and language over forty to fiftyyears. Through language they have branded liberals(whosepoliciesarepopulist)aseffeteelitists,unpatrioticspendthrifts—using terms like limousine liberals, latteliberals, tax-and-spend liberals, Hollywood liberals, EastCoast liberals, the liberalelite,wishy-washyliberals,andsoon.Atthesametimetheyhavebrandedconservatives

(whosepolicies favor theeconomicelite)aspopulists—again through language, including body language. FromRonald Reagan’s down-home folksiness to George W.Bush’s John Wayne–style “Bubbaisms,” the language,dialects, body language, and narrative forms have beenthose of rural populists. Their radio talk show hosts—warriors all—have adopted the style of hellfirepreachers. But the message is the same: The hatedliberalsarethreateningAmericancultureandvalues,andhave to be fought vigorously and continuously on everyfront. It isa threat to theverysecurityof thenation,aswell asmorality, religion, the family, and everything realAmericansholddear.Theirpositionsonwedgeissues—guns, babies, taxes, same-sexmarriage, the flag, schoolprayer—reveal the “treachery” of liberals. The wedgeissues are not important in themselves, but are vital inwhattheyrepresent:astrictfatherattitudetotheworld.Without the mutually supportive relationships among

the domains of interest—individual, governing, business,and social—conservatism as an overarching moralsystem cannot flourish. What appears to liberals to befragmentation and disunity could be a mutuallyreinforcing structure that is powerful and threatening toprogressivevaluesandAmericandemocracy.The prevailing wisdom of progressives, on the other

hand,isthatideologicaldivisionsaretearingconservatism

apart.Butwehadbetterconsiderbothpossibilities.

★14★WhatUnitesProgressives

Toapproachwhatunitesprogressives,wemustfirstaskwhat divides them. Here are some of the commonparametersthatdivideprogressivesfromoneanother:

• Local interests. For example, you might comefromafarmingcommunity,orahigh-techregion,ora citywith amilitary base, or a homebasewith alarge racial or ethnicminority population—and youplace the concerns of that region high on yourpriorities.• Idealismversuspragmatism.Asapragmatist,youarewillingtocompromiseandgetthebestdealyou can; as an idealist, you may be unwilling tocompromise.Idealiststendtoaccusepragmatistsofnot having ideals (when they do, but can’t realizethem); pragmatists criticize idealists, saying “theperfectistheenemyofthegood.”•Biconceptualism. If you aremostlyprogressivebut have some conservative views, totalprogressives will accuse you of being aconservative; biconceptuals tend to accuse totalprogressivesofbeingdogmaticorextremists.

• Radical change versus gradual change.Radicals accuse gradualists of not being trulyprogressive; gradualists accuse radicals of beingimpracticalandhurtingtheirowncausebynotusingslipperyslopetactics.•Militant versusmoderate advocacy.Militantsare loud, aggressive, and punitive, and sometimesuse strict fathermeans to nurturant ends, and seemoderatesasbeingcowardsorinsufficientlycaring;moderate advocates think that militancy offendspeopleandcausesareactionagainsttheircause.• Types of thought processes. Progressivevalues can be weighted toward different areas ofconcern: socioeconomic, identity politics,environmentalist, civil libertarian, spiritual, andantiauthoritarian (see Moral Politics for details).Eachthoughtprocesshasconsequencesinchoosingwhat causes topursue,how to rankpriorities,howto use political capital, where and how to raisemoney and what to spend it on, who your friendsand acquaintances are, what to read, who to payattentionto,andsoon.

A great many progressives have been critical ofPresident Obama. If you were to make a list of thecriticisms, theywouldmostlybedefinedbyoneormore

of these parameters: too pragmatic, not a realprogressive, going too slow, too timid or cowardly, notmilitantenough,notdoingenoughformymajorinterest.When you consider that each progressive has some

distinct combinationof theseparameters, thenumberoftypesofprogressivesbecomesastronomical.WhenWillRogers said, “I am not a member of any organizedpoliticalparty.IamaDemocrat,”thisisthekindofthinghemeant.This makes it all the more important to understand

whatunitesprogressivesandhowtoopenlydiscuss thatunity—despite the differences defined by theseparameters.Programs are amajor problem for attempts at unity.

As soon as a policy is made specific, the differencesmust be addressed. Progressives tend to talk aboutpolicies and programs. But policy details are not whatmostAmericanswant to know about.MostAmericanswant to knowwhat you stand for,whether your valuesaretheirvalues,whatyourprinciplesare,whatdirectionyou want to take the country in. In public discourse,values trump policies, principles trump policies, policydirectionstrumpspecificprograms.Ibelievethatvalues,principles,andpolicydirectionsareexactlythethingsthatcanuniteprogressives, if theyarecraftedproperly.Thereason that they can unite us is that they stand

conceptuallyaboveallthethingsthatdivideus.IdeasThatMakeUsProgressives

What follows is a detailed explication of each of thoseunifyingideas:

• First, values coming out of a basic progressivevision•Second,principlesthatrealizeprogressivevalues• Third, policy directions that fit the values andprinciples

TheBasicProgressiveVisionThe basic progressive vision is of community—ofAmerica as family, a caring, responsible family. Weenvision an America where people care about eachother, not just themselves, and act responsibly both forthemselves and their fellow citizens with strength andeffectiveness.Democracy means acting on that care and

responsibility through the government to provide publicresourcesforall—fromtheneedytotheaveragecitizento those runningbusinesses,greator small. Inshort, theprivate depends on the public. And if you used thosepublicresourcestobecomewealthyonthebasisoftaxespaidbyothers for the resourcesyouused, then fairnessrequires that you pay a higher share of your wealth in

taxessothatothersmaybenefitaswell.Weare all in the sameboat—that’swhatdemocracy

means. Red states and blue states, progressives andconservatives, Republicans and Democrats. United, aswewereforabriefmomentjustafterSeptember11,notdividedbyadespicableculturewar.So far as I know, every progressive shares those

valuesandthatviewofdemocracy.TheLogicofProgressiveValuesTheprogressivecorevaluesarefamilyvalues—thoseofthe responsible, caring family. You could characterizethem as caring and responsibility, carried out withstrength of commitment and effort. These corevalues imply the full range of progressive values, listedbelow,togetherwiththelogicthatlinksthemtothecorevalues.

• Protection, fulfillment in life, fairness. Whenyou care about someone, you want them to beprotected from harm, you want their dreams tocometrue,andyouwantthemtobetreatedfairly.•Freedom,opportunity,prosperity.There isnofulfillment without freedom, no freedom withoutopportunity, and no opportunity withoutprosperity.•Community,service,cooperation.Childrenare

shaped by their communities. Responsibilityrequires serving and helping to shape yourcommunity.Thatrequirescooperation.•Trust,honesty,opencommunication.Thereisno cooperation without trust, no trust withouthonesty, and no cooperation without opencommunication.

Just as these values follow from caring andresponsibility, so every other progressive value followsfrom these. Equality follows from fairness, empathy ispart of caring, diversity comes from empathy andequality.ProgressivePrinciplesProgressives not only share these values but also sharepoliticalprinciplesthatarisefromthesevalues.

Equity. What citizens and the nation owe eachother.Ifyouworkhard,playbytherules,andserveyour family, community, andnation, then thenationshouldprovideadecentstandardoflivingaswellasfreedom,security,andopportunity.Equality. Do everything possible to guaranteepoliticalandsocialequalityandavoidimbalancesofpoliticalpower.Democracy. Maximize citizen participation;

minimize concentrations of political, corporate, andmedia power. Maximize journalistic standards.Establishpubliclyfinancedelections.Investinpubliceducation. Bring corporations under stakeholdercontrol,notjuststockholdercontrol.Government for a better future. GovernmentdoeswhatAmerica’s future requires andwhat theprivate sector cannot do—or is not doing—effectively, ethically, or at all. It is the job ofgovernment to promote and, if possible, providesufficient protection, greater democracy, morefreedom, a better environment, broader prosperity,betterhealth,greaterfulfillmentinlife,lessviolence,and the building and maintaining of publicinfrastructure.Ethicalbusiness.Ourvaluesapplytobusiness.Inthe courseofmakingmoneybyprovidingproductsandservices,businessesshouldnotadverselyaffectthe public good, as defined by the above values.They should refuse to impose wage slavery andcorporateservitudeandsoshouldworkwithunions,notagainstthem.Theyshouldpaythetruecostsofdoing business—not externalize, or offload, thosecostsontothepublic(forinstance,theyshouldcleanup their pollution). They should make sure theirproductsdonoharmtothepublic.Andrather than

treat their employees as mere “resources,” theyshouldseethemascommunitymembersandassetstothebusiness.Values-based foreign policy. The same valuesgoverning domestic policy should apply to foreignpolicywheneverpossible.Here are a few examples where progressive

domesticpolicytranslatesintoforeignpolicy:

•Protection translates intoaneffectivemilitary fordefenseandpeacekeeping.• Building and maintaining a strong communitytranslates into building and maintaining strongalliancesandengagingineffectivediplomacy.• Caring and responsibility translate into caringaboutandactingresponsiblyfortheworld’speople;helping to deal with problems of health, hunger,poverty, and environmental degradation; populationcontrol (and the bestmethod,women’s education);andrightsforwomen,children,prisoners, refugees,andethnicminorities.

All of these are concerns of a values-based foreignpolicy.PolicyDirectionsGivenprogressivevaluesandprinciples,progressivescan

agree on basic policy directions, if not on the details.Policy directions are at a higher level than specificpolicies. Progressives usually divide on specific policydetails while agreeing on directions. Here are some ofthemanypolicydirectionstheyagreeon.

The economy. Investing in an economy centeredon innovation that creates millions of good-payingjobsandprovideseveryAmericanafairopportunitytoprosper.Theeconomyshouldbesustainableandnot contribute to climate change, environmentaldegradation,andsoon.Security. Through military strength, strongdiplomaticalliances,andwise foreignanddomesticpolicy, every American should be safeguarded athome, and America’s role in the world should bestrengthened by helping people around the worldlivebetterlives.Health. EveryAmerican should have access to astate-of-the-art,affordablehealthcaresystem.Education. A vibrant, well-funded, and expandingpubliceducationsystem,with thehighest standardsfor every child and school,where teachersnurturechildren’smindsandoften thechildren themselves,andwherechildrenare taught the truthabout theirnation—itswondersanditsblemishes.

Early childhood. Every child’s brain is shapedcrucially by early experiences. We support high-qualityearlychildhoodeducation.Environment. A clean, healthy, and safeenvironment for ourselves and our children: wateryoucandrink,airyoucanbreathe,andfoodthatishealthyandsafe.Polluterspayforthedamagetheycause.Nature.Thenaturalwondersofourcountryaretobe preserved for future generations, and enhancedwheretheyhavebeendegraded.Energy. We need to make a major investment inrenewable energy, for the sake of millions of jobsthat pay well, improvements in public health,preservation of our environment, and the effort tohaltglobalwarming.Openness.Anopen,efficient,andfairgovernmentthattellsthetruthtoourcitizensandearnsthetrustofeveryAmerican.Equalrights.Wesupportequalrightsineveryareainvolving race, ethnicity, gender, and sexualorientation.Protections. We support keeping and extendingprotections for consumers, workers, retirees, andinvestors.

AstrongerAmericaisnotjustaboutdefense,butaboutevery dimension of strength: our effectiveness in theworld, our economy, our educational system, our healthcare system, our families, our communities, ourenvironment,andsoforth.Broad prosperity is the effect that markets are

supposedtobringabout.Butallmarketsareconstructedfor someone’s benefit; nomarkets are completely free.Marketsshouldbeconstructed for thebroadestpossibleprosperity, as opposed to the exponential accumulationofwealthbythewealthycoupledwiththecorrespondingloss ofwealth bymost citizens—andwith it the loss offreedomandfulfillmentinlife.Americans want and deserve a better future—

economically, educationally, environmentally, and in allother areas of life—for themselves and their children.Loweringtaxes,primarilyforthesuper-richelite,hashadthe effect of defunding programs that would make abetterfuturepossible inall theseareas.Thepropergoalis a better future for all Americans. This includesbringingglobalwarmingundercontrol.Smaller government is, in conservative propaganda,

supposedtoeliminatewaste.Itisreallyabouteliminatingsocial programs. Effective government is what weneed our government to accomplish to create a betterfuture.

Weshouldbegovernednotby corporations, butby agovernmentof,by,andforthepeople.Conservativefamilyvaluesarethoseofastrictfather

family—authoritarian, hierarchical, every man forhimself, based around discipline and punishment.Progressiveslivebythebestvaluesofbothfamiliesandcommunities: mutual responsibility, which isauthoritative, equal, and based around caring,responsibility (both individual and social), andcommitment.

The remarkable thing is just howmuch progressives doagree on. These are just the things that voters tend tocare about most: our values, our principles, and thedirectioninwhichwewanttotakethenation.I believe that progressive values are traditional

American values, that progressive principles arefundamental American principles, and that progressivepolicydirectionspointthewaytowheremostAmericansreally want our country to go. The job of unifyingprogressives is really the job of bringing our countrytogetherarounditsfinesttraditionalvalues.But having those shared values, largely unconscious

andunspoken,isnotgoodenough.Theyhavetobeoutinthe open, named, said, discussed, publicized, and madepart of everyday public discourse. If they go unspoken,

whileconservativevaluesdominatepublicdiscourse,thenthosevaluescanbelost—sweptoutofourbrainsbytheconservativecommunicationjuggernaut.Don’t just readabout thesevalueshereandnod.Get

out and say themout loud.Discuss themwhereveryoucan.Volunteer for campaigns thatgiveyouachance todiscussthesevaluesloudandclearandoutinpublic.

★15★FrequentlyAskedQuestions

Any brief discussion of framing and moral politics willleavemanyquestionsunanswered.HerearesomeofthemostcommonquestionsI’vebeenasked.Thereisanasymmetrybetweenstrictfatherandnurturantparent.Whyisthefirstmasculineandthesecondgender-neutral?In the strict father model, the masculine and feminineroles are very different, and the father is the centralfigure. The strict father is the moral authority of thefamily,thepersoninchargeofthefamily,whilemothersare seenasbeing“mommies”—theymaybe loving,butthey are unable to protect and support the family andaren’tstrictenoughtopunishtheirchildrenwhentheydowrong. Think of the expression “Wait till Daddy getshome,”whichreferstoastrictdaddy.Inthisstrictfathermodel,“mommies”aresupposedto

uphold theauthorityof thestrict father,but theyarenotable to do the job themselves. In the nurturant parentmodel, there just isn’t a gender distinction of this sort.Both parents are there to nurture their children and toraise them to be nurturers. That doesn’t mean there

won’t be gender-based divisions of labor around thehouse in real life, but they are not within the nurturantparentmodel.These models are, of course, stereotypes—idealized,

incomplete,oversimplifiedmentalmodels.Mentalmodelsofthissortnecessarilydifferfromreal-worldcases:strictmothers, single-parent households, gay parents, and soon.ConservativecommentatorslikeDavidBrookshavereferredtotheRepublicansasthe“daddyparty”andtheDemocratsasthe“mommyparty.”Wouldyouagree?Brooks and others have acknowledged the Nation asFamilymetaphor, andhaveacknowledged that the strictfathermodel is behind conservativeRepublican politics.However, their characterization of a “mommy party” isbased on “mommy” in their own conservative, strictfathermodel.Whattheymeanby“mommyparty”isthatalthoughDemocratsmaycareandbelovingpeople,theyjustaren’ttoughandrealisticenoughtodothejob.This is, of course, completely inaccurate from the

Democrats’ownprogressiveperspective. Inanurturantfamily, both parents are not just caring but alsoresponsible and strong enough to carry out thoseresponsibilities. This is far frommommy in theway theconservatives scornfully use the term. Democrats have

beenabletosuccessfullyprovidebothprotectionforandprosperitytothenation.Conservativesseemnot tounderstandwhatnurturant

morality is about, both in the family and in the nation.Theyfindanyview that isnotstrict tobe“permissive.”Nurturant parenting is, of course, anything butpermissive, with its stress on teaching children to beresponsible for themselves and empathetic andresponsible towardothers,andraising themtobestrongand well-educated enough to carry out theirresponsibilities. The conservatives parody liberals aspermissive, as supporting a feel-good morality—doingwhateverfeelsgood.Theconservativesjustdon’tgetit.They seem ignorant of the vast difference betweenresponsibilityandpermissiveness.Howoldaretheideasofstrictnessandnurturance?Theyseemtogobackvery,veryfarinhistory.Weknow,forexample,thatinEnglandbeforetheBritishcameovertocolonizeAmerica therewerereligiousgroups like theQuakers,whohadanurturantviewofGod, andgroupslike the Puritans, who had a strict father view of God.TheNewEnglandcoloniesweremainlyPuritan, thoughJohnWinthrophadanurturantviewofthecolonyhewasestablishing, and the nurturant view of God has existedsidebysidewiththestrictoneinthiscountryeversince.In the nineteenth century,HoraceBushnellwrote about

“Christian nurture.” From the period of the abolitioniststhrough the 1920s there was a lively discussion of thenurturant view of God. Moreover, students of religionhave shown that there are strict andnurturantviewsofreligion that go back as far as biblical and prebiblicaltimes.Thesedistinctionshavebeenthereforavery,verylongtime.Doesthestrictfathermodelimplythatconservativesdon’tlovetheirkids,anddoesthenurturantparentmodelimplythatprogressivesdon’tbelieveindiscipline?Not at all. In the strict father model, physicallydisciplining a child who has done wrong, by inflictingsufficient pain, is a form of love—“tough love.” Giventhedutytoimpose“lovingdiscipline,”lotsofhuggingandother loving behavior are permissible, and oftenrecommended,afterward.It’sjustamatteroffirstthingsfirst.In the nurturant parent model, discipline arises not

through painful physical punishment but through thepromotion of responsible behavior via empatheticconnection, the example of responsible behavior set bythe parents, the open discussion of what the parentsexpect(andwhy),and,inthecaseofnoncooperation,theremoval of some of the good things that go withcooperation.Achild raised throughnurturance isachild

who has achieved positive internal discipline withoutpainfulphysicalpunishment.Itisachievedthroughpraiseforcooperation,understandingtheprivilegesthatgowithcooperation, clear guidelines, open discussion, and theexampleofparentswholivebytheirnurturantvalues.Whatarethecomplexitiesofthemodels?Themodels (discussed in detail in chapter 17 ofMoralPolitics),havebuilt-incomplexities.First, just about everybody in American culture has

bothmodels,eitheractivelyorpassively.Forexample,tounderstandaJohnWaynemovie,youmusthaveastrictfathermodel in your brain, at least passively. Youmaynotlivebythemodel,butyoucanuseittounderstandthestrict father narratives that permeate our culture.Nurturantnarrativespermeateourcultureaswell.Second,manypeopleusebothmodels,butindifferent

partsoftheirlives.Forexample,alawyermightbestrictinthecourtroombutnurturantathome.Third, youmayhavebeenbroughtupbadlywithone

model, and may have rejected it. Many liberals hadmiserablestrictfatherupbringings.Fourth,therearethreenaturaldimensionsofvariation

for applying a given model: an ideological/pragmaticdimension, a radical/moderate dimension, and ameans/endsdimension.Both a progressive and a conservative can be

unyieldingideologues,ortheymaybepragmatic—willingto compromiseonaproposal either for reasonsof real-worldworkabilityorpoliticalviability.In addition, both progressives and conservatives can

vary on the two radical/moderate scales: the amount ofchange and the speed of change. Thus radicalconservativeideologuesareunwillingtocompromise,andinsistonthemostrapidandcompletechangepossible.Incidentally, thewordconservative is not necessarily

about conserving anything. It is about strict fathermorality. There is no contradiction in talking about“radical conservatives.” Indeed, Robert Reich, in hisbookReason,usesthetermradcontotalkaboutradicalconservatives. From this perspective a “moderate” canbe either a progressive or a conservative who ispragmatic or wants slow change, a bit at a time. It issometimessaidthatthereisathirdmoderatemodel,verydifferentfromtheothertwo,butIhavenotyetseensuchamodelproposedexplicitly.Another common variation occurs in distinguishing

ends and means. There are people with progressivepolitics (nurturant ends) who have strict father means.These are the militant progressives. The most extremecase is the authoritarian antiauthoritarians: those withantiauthoritarianprogressive endsbut authoritarian strictfatherorganizations.

Last, there are the types—the special cases—ofprogressives and conservatives that we discussed inchapter 1: the socioeconomic, identity politics,environmentalist, civil libertarian, antiauthoritarian, andspiritualprogressives;andthefinancial,social,libertarian,neocon (see chapter 13), and religious conservatives.Theyareallinstancesofthenurturantandstrictmodels,buteachrestrictstheformofreasoningused.Thenotionofreframingsoundsmanipulative.Howisframingdifferentfromspinorpropaganda?Framing isnormal.Every sentencewesay is framed insomeway.Whenwesaywhatwebelieve,weareusingframes that we think are relatively accurate. When aconservative uses the “tax relief” frame, chances arethatheorshereallybelievesthattaxationisanaffliction.However, frames can also be usedmanipulatively. Theuse, for example, of “Clear SkiesAct” to name an actthat increasesairpollution isamanipulative frame.Andit’susedtocoverupaweaknessthatconservativeshave,namely that the public doesn’t like legislation thatincreases air pollution, and so they give it a name thatconveystheoppositeframe.That’spuremanipulation.Spin is themanipulative use of a frame.Spin is used

whensomethingembarrassinghashappenedorhasbeensaid,andit’sanattempttoputaninnocentframeonit—that is, to make the embarrassing occurrence sound

normalorgood.Propaganda is another manipulative use of framing.

Propaganda is an attempt to get the public to adopt aframethatisnottrueandisknownnottobetrue,forthepurposeofgainingormaintainingpoliticalcontrol.The reframing I am suggesting is neither spin nor

propaganda.Progressivesneed to learn tocommunicateusingframesthattheyreallybelieve,framesthatexpresswhattheirmoralviewsreallyare.Istronglyrecommendagainst any deceptive framing. I think it is not justmorally reprehensible, but also impractical, becausedeceptiveframingusuallybackfiressoonerorlater.Whydon’tprogressivestakeadvantageofwedgeissues?Conservativeshavebeenthinkingaboutthestrategicuseof ideas; progressives haven’t, butwe could.We couldperfectlywell usewedge issues.They’re all aroundus.Take something like clean air and clean water.Conservativeswantcleanairandcleanwater.Thatcanbemadeintoawedgeissue.Imagine a campaign for poison-free communities,

startingwithmercuryasthepoisonofchoice,thengoingon to other kinds of poison in our air and in ourwater,aroundus invarious forms.Thatcouldbemade intoaneffective wedge issue, splitting the conservatives whocare about their own and their children’s health from

thosewhoaresimplyagainstgovernmentregulation.Thevery issue would create a frame in which regulationfavors health, and being against regulation endangershealth.Thisisalsoaslipperyslopeissue.Onceyougetpeople

looking at how and where mercury enters theenvironment—for example, from the processing of coalandmanyotherkindsofchemicals—andyougetpeoplethinking about cleaning upmercury, and about mercurypoisoning,andhowitworksintheenvironment,youcanmove to the next poison in the environment, and thepoisonafterthat,andthepoisonafterthat.Thisisanissuethatisnotjustaboutmercuryorabout

poisons in the environment, but about nurturantmoralityingeneral.Wedgeissuesarestand-insforthewholeofamoral system. Abortion is an issue that serves as astand-inforthecontrolofwomen’slivesandforamoralhierarchy that conservatives want to impose. Abortion,aswehaveseen,isastand-inforstrictfathermoralityingeneral.Similarly,thereareallsortsofwedgeissuesthatcanbestand-insforprogressivemoralityingeneral.Isreligioninherentlyconservative?Areprogressiveidealsinconsistentwithreligiousbeliefs?Conservatives would have us believe that religions areconservative,butthey’renot.MillionsofChristiansinthis

country are liberal Christians. Most Jews are liberalJews.And I suspect thatmostMuslims inAmericaareprogressive, liberal Muslims, not radically conservativeMuslims.However, the progressive religious communityin this country is not well organized, while theconservative religious community is extremely wellorganized. One of the problems is that the progressivereligiouscommunity,particularlyprogressiveChristianity,doesn’treallyknowhowtoexpressitsowntheologyinaway thatmakes its politics clear, whereas conservativeChristiansdoknowthedirectlinkbetweentheirtheologyand their politics. Conservative Christianity is a strictfather religion.Here’show the strict fatherviewof theworldismappedontoconservativeChristianity.First,Godisunderstoodaspunitive—thatis,ifyousin

youaregoing togo tohell, and ifyoudon’t sinyouaregoingtoberewardedandgotoheaven.Butsincepeopletendtosinatonepointoranotherintheirlives,howisitpossible for themtoeverget toheaven?Theanswer inconservative Christianity is Christ. What Jesus does isofferconservativeChristiansachancetogettoheaven.The idea is this: Christ suffered on the cross so muchthat he built up moral credit sufficient for all people,forever.Hethenofferedachancetogettoheaven—thatis, redemption—on the following terms, strict fatherterms:IfyouacceptJesusasyoursavior,thatis,asyour

moral authority, and agree to follow themoral authorityof your minister and your church, then you can get toheaven.But that isgoingtorequirediscipline.Youneedto be disciplined enough to follow the rules, and if youdon’t,thenyouaregoingtogotohell.SoJesus,withhismoral credit that he gained from suffering, can pay offyourdebts—thatis,yoursins—andallowyoutogetintoheaven,butonlyifyoutoetheline.Liberal Christianity is very, very different. Liberal

Christianity sees God as essentially beneficent, aswanting to help people. The central idea in liberalChristianityisgrace,wheregraceisunderstoodasakindof metaphorical nurturance. In liberal Christianity, youcan’tearngrace—youaregivengraceunconditionallybyGod.Butyouhavetoacceptgrace,youhavetobenearGod to get his grace, you can be filledwith grace, youcanbehealedbygrace,andyouaremade intoamoralpersonthroughGod’sgrace.Inotherwords,graceismetaphoricalnurturance.That

is,justasnurturancefeedsyou,healsyou,takescareofyou, just as a nurturant parent teaches you to benurturantandallowsyoutobeamoralbeing,justasyoucan’tgetnurturanceunlessyouareclosetoyourparents,justasyoumustacceptnurturance inorder toget it, soallof these thingsaboutnurturanceare trueofgrace inliberalChristianity.Nurturancecomeswithunconditional

love—inthecaseofgrace,theunconditionalloveofGod.Whatmakesareligionnurturant is that itmetaphoricallyviewsGodasanurturantparent. Inanurturant formofreligion, your spiritual experience has to do with yourconnection to other people and the world, and yourspiritual practice has to do with your service to otherpeople and to your community. This is why nurturantChristians are progressives: because they have anurturantmorality,justasprogressiveshave.But at present nurturant Christians, Jews, Muslims,

Buddhists, and others in this country are not organized.They are not seen as a singlemovement, a progressivereligiousmovement.Worse, secular progressives do notsee those with a nurturant form of religion as naturalmembers of the same political movement. Not only dospiritualprogressivesneedtounitewitheachother, theyneed to unite with secular progressives, who share thesamemoralsystemandpoliticalobjectives.Whatisastrategicinitiative,andhowisitdifferentfromregularpolicymaking?There are two kinds of strategic initiatives: The first iswhat I call a slippery slope initiative. The idea of aslippery slope initiative is to takea first step that seemsfairly straightforward, but gets into the public eye anadditional frame that youwant to be there. The idea isthatoncethefirststepistaken,thenitiseasierandoften

inevitabletotakethenextstepandthenextstepandthenextstep.The conservative Supreme Court works by slippery

slope decisions, one step at a time. Consider thefollowing progression. First, the court allowedcorporationstocontribute toballot initiativesasa limitedformoftheFirstAmendmentrightoffreespeech.Then,their Citizens United decision gave corporations theabilitytocontributeasmuchastheywantinelections,asaformoffreespeech.ThentheirHobbyLobbydecisionextended the First Amendment freedom of religion tocorporations so that they do not have to providecontraception to women employees as specified by theAffordableCareAct,openingthedoortoawideruseoffreedomof religionbycorporations toavoidvarious fairtreatmentlaws.Let’stakeanotherexample.Itusedtobethecasethat

conservatives tried to cut social programs one by one,andthentheyfiguredouthowtheycouldcutthemallatonce: through tax cuts. Cutting taxes is a strategicinitiative,notoftheslipperyslopevarietybutofadeepervariety, one that has wide effects across many, manyareas. If you cut taxes and create a large deficit, thenwhen any social program comes up—it could be healthcare for poor children, or services for paraplegics, orwhatever—therewon’tbeenoughmoney for it.Soyou

endupcuttingsocialprogramsacrosstheboardinhealth,in education, in the enforcement of environmentalregulations, and so on. At the same time you rewardthose who you see as the good people, namely thewealthy people—those who were disciplined enough tobecomewealthy.There are other kinds of strategic initiatives as well.

Take the example of same-sex marriage. Same-sexmarriage contradicts large parts of the strict fathermodel. If it’sa lesbianmarriage, there’snofatheratall,and in a gay marriage, where there are two fathers,neitherofthemfitsthetraditionalviewofthemalestrictfather. Opposing same-sex marriage is thus reinforcingand extending strict father morality itself, which is thehighestcallingof theconservativemoral system.Same-sexmarriageisthereforeastand-in;itevokesthelargerissue, namely what moral system is to govern ourcountry.The same is true of the issue of abortion. Allowing

women to decide for themselves on whether to end apregnancy flies in the faceof thewhole ideaofa strictfather familymodel. In the strict fathermodel, it is thefatherwhodecideswhetherhiswifeordaughtershouldhave an abortion. It is the father who controls hisdaughter’s sexuality; when the daughter takes a lover,then the father losescontrol. If the father is tomaintain

control over his family, then the women in the familycannotfreelycontroltheirownsexualbehaviorandtheirown ability to reproduce. Abortion is therefore notinherentlyapoliticalissue,butonlyapoliticalissuewhenit comes to whether strict fathermorality is to reign inAmericanlife.Abortionisastand-inforthelargerissue:IsstrictfathermoralitygoingtoruleAmerica?SoallIhavetodotoreframemyissueisthinkupsomesoundbite–worthytermsandusetheminplaceoftheconservativeterms?No! Reframing is not just about words and language.Reframingisabout ideas.The ideashave tobe inplacein people’s brains before the sound bite can make anysense. For example, take the idea of “the commons”—that is, our common inheritance, like the atmosphere orthe electromagnetic spectrum (bandwidths). These arethe common inheritances of all humanity, and mostpeople who discuss them in this way refer to them as“the commons.” Yet the idea of a common inheritanceandofusing it for thepublicgood isnotyetpartof theframestructurethatmostpeopleuseeveryday.Forthisreason you can’t just make up a sound bite about thecommonsandhavemostpeopleunderstanditandagreewithit.IfRepublicanshavesuchahugeinfrastructure,

howdowecatchup?Progressivesknowthattheyhavetomakeinvestmentsinmedia.What they tendnot toknow is that theyhave tomake investments in framing and in language. The bigadvantage we have is this:Whereas it took more thanthirty years, billions of dollars, and forty-three institutesforconservativestoreframepublicdebatesothedebateoccurs on their turf, we have the advantage of havingscience on our side. Through cognitive science andthrough linguistics, we know how they did it. And weknowhowwecandotheequivalentforprogressivesinamuch shorter timeandwithmany fewer resources.Wealsoknowhowthey’vedonetheir linguistic training,andweknowhowtodoitourselves.Unfortunately, many progressives think this can be

donethroughadagenciesandthroughpollsters.That’samistake. You really do need linguists and cognitivescientists,platformsforin-depthandsustaineddiscussion,and well-honed plans for keeping meaningful dialogueconsistentlybeforepolicymakersandthepublic.WhatwasthedifferencebetweentheRockridgeInstituteandotherprogressivethinktanks?Arethereanyotherthinktanksthatarededicatedtoresearchonframing?Rockridgewasentirelydedicatedtoreframingthepublicdebate, both from a policy perspective and from a

linguisticperspective.Otherprogressivethinktankshaveother primary functions: responding to the initiatives ofthe right, answering conservative charges, telling thetruthwhen there are conservative lies, and constructingspecific policies that progressives can use.All of theseare important functions, but they do not replace theframingfunction,afunctionthatisabsolutelynecessary.To my knowledge, there is now only one think tank

devoted to the overall framing of issues from both apolicy perspective and a communicative perspective—theForwardInstituteinWisconsin.TheForwardInstituteis dedicated to empowering the progressives ofWisconsin to frame state issues from a progressiveviewpoint. They have studied the framing ofWisconsinissuesandhavetrainedtrainerstoworkwithafullrangeof progressives—from political leaders at all levels, tounion leaders, to teachers, to Native Americans, toenvironmentalists,tocitizen-volunteersallwillingtospeakaround the state using progressive frames.The institutehas just started. Only time will tell if they will get thefundingtheyneedtosucceed.Isn’ttaxreliefthenaturalwaytotalkabouttaxes?I’maprogressive,butIhavetoadmit,theydoseemburdensomesometimes.Homeworkinschoolisburdensometoo,butyouhavetodo it if you’re going to learn anything. Exercise is

burdensome,butyouhavetodoitifyou’regoingtobeingood physical shape. Taxes are necessary if we aregoing to make wise investments in our nationalinfrastructure that will pay off for all of us years andyears in the future. That includes investments in thingslikeeducationandhealthcareforthosewhocan’taffordthem. Education and health care are investments inpeople.Theyarewiseinvestmentsbecausetheygiveusan educated citizenry, an educated workforce, and ahealthyandefficientworkforce.Thoseare thepracticalreasons for taxes. Other reasons for taxes are publicservices—likepoliceandfire,disasterrelief,andsoon.Therearemoral reasonsfor taxesaswell.Education

andhealthareimportantfactorsinfulfillmentinlife,andthiscountryisaboutfulfillment inlife.Thereisareasonwhy the Declaration of Independence talks about thepursuitofhappinessand links it to liberty.Thereason isthat they go together. Without liberty, there can be nofulfillmentinlife.Thustherearepracticalreasonswhyitmakes sense to understand taxation as investment, andtherearemoralreasonstounderstandtaxationaspayingyourdues inacountrywhereyoucanpursuehappinessbecausethereislibertyandfreedom.HowdoyourespondorreplydirectlytoaRepublicanstrategicinitiative?You can’t, and that’s why they’re clever. Tax cuts are

notabouttaxcuts.That’swhyyoucan’treplydirectlytotaxcutssoeasily.Theyareaboutgettingridofallsocialprograms and regulations of business. Vouchers andschool testing are not ultimately about vouchers andschooltesting;theyareaboutconservativecontrolofthecontent of education and the elimination of publicresources. To respond you have to put the individualissue into a much larger framework that fits yourunderstanding of the situation. Tort reform is not abouttort reform; it is about allowing corporations to actwithout restraints, and about taking funding away fromthe Democratic Party, since trial lawyers are a majorsourceofDemocraticfunding.Instead of trying to reply to strategic initiatives, you

need to reframe the larger issues at stake from yourpointofview.Youcandiscuss thestrategic initiative,oratleastsomepartsofit,fromyourframework.Taketortreform. Trial lawyers are really public protectionattorneys, and tort law is law that allows for publicprotection—it’spublicprotectionlaw.Whentortlawtriestocapclaimsandsettlements,itseffectistotakeclaimsoutofthehandsofjuries—thatis,toclosethecourtroomdoor, to create closed courts instead of open courts. Inopencourts,where there are juries, the jury candecidewhether a given claim is a matter of public protection.Largesettlementsoftenhavetodowithissuesofpublic

protection—that is, they go beyond the case at hand.Andopencourtsarethelastdefensethatthepublichasagainst unscrupulous or negligent corporations orprofessionals. When conservatives talk about thelawsuits,youdon’tjustsay,“No,no,thelawsuitsweren’tfrivolous,”youtalkinsteadaboutpublicprotection,aboutopen courts, about the right to have juries decide, andabout the last line of defense against unscrupulous ornegligentcorporations.Iffactsthatdon’tfitframesarerejected,doesthatmeanweshouldstopusingfactsinourarguments?Obviouslynot.Factsareall-important.Theyarecrucial.But theymustbe framedappropriately if theyare tobean effective part of public discourse.Wehave to knowwhata facthas todowithmoralprinciplesandpoliticalprinciples.We have to frame those facts as effectivelyand as honestly aswe can.And honest framing of thefactswill entail other frames that can be checkedwithotherfacts.HowdoprogressivevaluesdifferfromtraditionalAmericanvalues?They don’t differ. Progressive values are traditionalAmericanvalues,allthevaluesweareproudof.Weareproudof thevictoriesforequalityandagainst

hierarchy: the emancipation of the slaves, women’s

suffrage, the union movement, the integration of thearmed forces, the civil rights movement, the woman’smovement, the environmental movement, and the gayrightsmovement.We are proud of FDR’s conception of government

“forthepeople”andhisrallyforhopeagainstfear.We are proud of theMarshall Plan, which helped to

erasethenotionof“enemies.”WeareproudofJohnKennedy’scalltopublicservice,

ofMartinLutherKing’sinsistenceonnonviolenceinthefaceofbrutality,ofCesarChavez’sabilitytobringprideandorganizationtotheworst-treatedofworkers.Progressive thought is as American as apple pie.

Progressiveswantpolitical equality,goodpublic schools,healthy children, care for the aged, police protection,family farms, air you canbreathe,water you candrink,fishinourstreams,forestsyoucanhikein,songbirdsandfrogs,livablecities,ethicalbusinesses,journalistswhotellthe truth,musicanddance,poetryandart,and jobs thatpayalivingwagetoeveryonewhoworks.Progressive activists—for living wages, women’s

rights, human rights, the environment, health, voterregistration, and so on—areAmerican patriots,workingwithunselfishdedicationtowardmakingabetterworld,aworldthatfitsfundamentalAmericanvalues.

★16★HowtoRespondtoConservatives

The earlier chapters are meant to explain whatframing is and how it works through language andcommunication systems, what conservative andprogressiveworldviewsare,whatbiconceptualismis,andwhat thedeep issuesare in framing.Butsooneror later, you are on the front line called the dinnertable.Asmystudentsregularlyask,“Thanksgivingiscoming and I’m going to be eating dinner with myconservativerelatives,andIamgoingtogetinarowover politics with my grandfather or my aunt. It’salwayspainful.WhatcanIdo?”

ThefollowingisaletterIreceivedin2004whilewritingthe version of this chapter in the first edition. It arrivedseveraldaysafter IhadappearedonaTVshow,NOWwithBillMoyers.

I listened toDr. Lakoff last Friday night on NOWwithgreatinterest.Ilovetheuseofwordsandhavebeen consistently puzzled at how the far right hasco-optedsomanydefinitions.

So I tried an experiment I wanted to tell youabout. I took several examples from the interview;particularlytrialvs.publicprotectionlawyerandgaymarriage and used those examples all week onAOL’s political chat room. Every time someonewouldscreamabout [John]Edwards’sbeinga triallawyer, I’d respond with public protection lawyerandhowtheyarethelastdefenseagainstnegligentcorporations and [are] professional, and that theoppositeofapublicprotectionlawyerisacorporatelawyerwho typicallymakes $400–500/per hr., andwepaythatinhigherpricesforgoodsandservices.Every time someone started screaming about

“gay marriage” I’d ask if they want the federalgovernment to tell themwho theycouldmarry. I’dgo on to explain when challenged that oncegovernmenthascrossedthehugebarrierintotellingonegroupofpeoplewhotheycouldnotmarry,it isonly a small step to telling other groups, and asmaller yet step to telling people who they had tomarry.Ialsoaskedfordefinitions.Every timesomeone

would holler “dirty liberal,” I’d request theirdefinitionof“liberal.”The last was my own hot button. Every time

someone would scream “abortion,” “baby-killer,”

etc., I’d suggest that if they are anti-abortion, thenbyallmeans,theyshouldnothaveone.I’ve got to tell you, the resultswere startling to

me. Ihad someotherpeople (completelyunknowntome)joinmeandtakeupthesametacks.Bylastnight, thechatroomwascivil.Anamazing(tome)numberofpostersturnedofftheircapitalizationandwewereactuallyhavingconversations.I’mgoingtokeepthisup,butIreallywantedyou

to know that I heard Dr. Lakoff, appreciate hiswork,andamtryingtoput it intopractice.Andit’sreallyreallyfun.

Thanks,

PenneyKolb

This book is written for people like Penney Kolb.Progressives are constantly put in positions where theyare expected to respond to conservative arguments. Itmay be over Thanksgiving dinner, around the watercooler, or in front of an audience. But becauseconservatives have commandeered so much of thelanguage, progressives are often put on the defensivewithlittleornothingtosayinresponse.Butsoonerorlater,youareinPenney’sposition.What

do you do? Penney’s instincts are impeccable, andprovideuswithguidelines.

• Progressive values are the best of traditionalAmerican values. Stand up for your values withdignityandstrength.Youareatruepatriotbecauseofyourvalues.• Remember that right-wing ideologues haveconvinced half of the country that the strict fatherfamily model, which is bad enough for raisingchildren, should govern our national morality andpolitics.ThisisthemodelthatthebestinAmericanvalues has defeated over and over again in thecourseofourhistory—fromtheemancipationoftheslaves to women’s suffrage, Social Security andMedicare, the civil rights and voting rights acts,Brown v. the Board of Education, and Roe v.Wade.Eachtimewehaveunifiedourcountrymorebehindourfinesttraditionalvalues.•Remember thatmost people haveboth strict andnurturant models, either actively or passively,perhapsactiveindifferentpartsoftheirlives.Yourjob is to activate for politics the nurturant,progressive values already there (perhaps onlypassively)inwhoeveryou’retalkingto.

WhatdoItellmystudentswhentheyaskwhattosayat Thanksgiving dinner? My advice: Ask your aunt orgrandfather what they are most proud of that helpedotherpeople.Thoseofmystudentswhohavedone thisreport that, to their surprise, their grandfather or otherrelative did a number of good things to help others andshow some important social concerns. My next bit ofadvice: Keep talking about those things. Themore youkeep talking about their empathy and responsibilitytowardothers,thecloseryoucangettothem.Don’ttryto convert them. Just try to open up and maintain apositive relationship. If you show respect and affectionforyourrelatives,youmaygetsomeback.

•Besuretoshowrespecttotheconservativesyouare responding to.No onewill listen to you if youdon’t accord them respect. Listen to them. Youmaydisagree stronglywitheverything that isbeingsaid, but you should know what is being said. Besincere. Avoid cheap shots. What if they don’tshowyourespect?Twowrongsdon’tmakearight.Turn the other cheek and show respect anyway.That takes character and dignity. Show characteranddignity.• Avoid a shouting match. Remember that theradical right requires a culturewar, and shouting is

the discourse form of that culture war. Civildiscourse is the discourse form of nurturantmorality. You win a victory when the discourseturnscivil.Theywinwhentheygetyoutoshout.•Whatifyouhavemoraloutrage?Youshouldhavemoraloutrage.Butyoucandisplayitwithcontrolledpassion.Ifyoulosecontrol,theywin.• Distinguish between ordinary conservatives andnastyideologues.Mostconservativesarepersonallynicepeople,andyouwanttobringouttheirnicenessandtheirsenseofneighborlinessandhospitality.•Becalm.Calmness isasign thatyouknowwhatyouaretalkingabout.• Be good-humored. A good-natured sense ofhumorshowsyouarecomfortablewithyourself.• Hold your ground. Always be on the offense.Nevergoondefense.Yourvoiceshouldbesteady.Never whine or complain. Your body and voiceshould show optimism. Never act like a victim.Never plead. You should convey passionateconviction without losing control. Avoid thelanguage of weakness—for example, risingintonationsonstatements.• Conservatives have parodied liberals as weak,angry (hence not in control of their emotions),weak-minded, softhearted, unpatriotic, uninformed,

and elitist. Don’t give them any opportunities tostereotypeyou inanyof theseways.Expect thesestereotypes, and deal with them when they comeup.•By thewayyouconductyourself, showstrength,calmness,andcontrol;anability to reason;asenseofrealism;loveofcountry;acommandofthebasicfacts;andasenseofbeinganequal,notasuperior.Attheveryleastyouwantyouraudiencetothinkofyou with respect, as someone they may disagreewith butwho theyhave to take seriously. Inmanysituations this is the best you can hope for. Youhavetorecognizethosesituationsandrealizethatadrawwithdignity isavictory in thegameofbeingtakenseriously.• Many conversations are ongoing. In an ongoingconversation, your job is to establish a position ofrespectanddignity,andthenkeepit.•Don’texpecttoconvertstaunchconservatives.• You can make considerable progress withbiconceptuals, those who use both models but indifferent parts of their life. They are your bestaudience. With biconceptuals your goal is to findout, ifyoucanbyprobing, justwhichpartsof theirlifetheyarenurturantabout.Forexample,askwhotheycareabout themost,whatresponsibilities they

feel they have to those they care about, and howthey carry out those responsibilities. This shouldactivatetheirnurturantmodelsasmuchaspossible.Then,while thenurturantmodel isactive for them,try linking it to politics. For example, if they arenurturant at home but strict in business, talk aboutthe home and family and how home and familyrelate to political issues. Example: Real familyvalues mean that your parents, as they age, don’thave to sell their homeormortgage their future topayforhealthcareorthemedicationstheyneed.• Avoid the usual mistakes. Remember, don’t justnegate the other person’s claims; reframe. Thefacts unframed will not set you free. You cannotwin just by stating the true facts and showing thatthey contradict your opponent’s claims. Framestrumpfacts.Hisframeswillstayandthefactswillbounce off. Always reframe and fit the facts toyourframe.• If you remember nothing else about framing,rememberthis:Onceyourframeisacceptedintothediscourse,everythingyousayisjustcommonsense.Why? Because that’s what common senseis: reasoning within a commonplace, acceptedframe.• Never answer a question framed from your

opponent’s point of view. Always reframe thequestion to fit your values and your frames. Thismay make you uncomfortable, since normaldiscourse styles require you to directly answerquestions posed. That is a trap. Practice changingframes.• Be sincere. Use frames you really believe in,basedonvaluesyoureallyhold.•Auseful thingtodois touserhetoricalquestions:Wouldn’t it be better if . . . ? Such a questionshould be chosen to presuppose your frame.Examples:Wouldn’t itbebetter ifwecouldfix thepotholes in the roads and the bridges that arecrumbling? Or, wouldn’t we all be better off ifeverybody with diseases and illnesses could betreated so that diseases and illnesses wouldn’tspread? Or, wouldn’t it be better if all kids werereadyforschoolwhentheywenttokindergarten?• Stay away from set-ups. Fox News shows andotherrabidlyconservativeshowstrytoputyouinanimpossiblesituation,whereaconservativehostsetstheframeandinsistsonit,whereyoudon’tcontrolthe floor, can’t present your case, and are notaccorded enough respect to be taken seriously. Ifthe game is fixed, don’t play. And if you do play,reframeanddon’tbeapatsy.

•Tellastory.Findstorieswhereyourframeisbuiltintothestory.Buildupastockofeffectivestories.• Always start with values, preferably values allAmericans share such as security, prosperity,opportunity, freedom, and so on. Pick the valuesmostrelevanttotheframeyouwanttoshiftto.Tryto win the argument at the values level. Pick aframe where your position exemplifies a valueeveryoneholds—likefairness.Example:Yourunclesays, “We need right-to-work laws. Unions arecorruptandrunbythugs.Theyforceyoutojoinandjust take your money.” Response: “Unions makeyou free—free from being a slave to a company.Without a union, you have to takewhateverwagethe company offers, often with no pension ormedical care, with no constraints on hours orscheduling, and no guaranteed overtime pay. Iwouldn’twant to be a slave to a company Iworkfor. Iwant tobeable toeatdinnerwithmy familyand have weekend time with my kids. Unionscreated weekends. People used to have to worksix-day weeks for less pay than they get now.Unions created eight-hour days,when people usedtowork tenor twelvefornomorepay.Unionsputyouon an evenbasiswith the company. Iwant tobe paid fairly, treated fairly, be respected in the

company where I work, and feel good about thecompany. I’m not interested in being a slave.WhateverIpaytoaunionImorethanmakeupforwithpayfrommyjob.”•Beprepared.Youshouldbeabletorecognizethebasicframesthatconservativesuse,andyoushouldprepare frames to shift to. My website,www.georgelakoff.com, posts analyses of frameshifting.Example: A tax cut proponent says, “Weshouldget ridof taxes.Peopleknowhowtospendtheirmoneybetterthanthegovernment.”Reframe:“Thegovernment hasmadeverywise investmentswith taxpayer money. Our interstate highwaysystem, forexample.Youcouldn’tbuildahighwaywith your tax refund. The government built them.Or the Internet, paid for by taxpayer investment.YoucouldnotmakeyourownInternet.Mostofourscientificadvanceshavebeenmadethroughfundingfrom the National Science Foundation and theNational Institute of Health—great governmentinvestments of taxpayermoney. Computer sciencewas developed with taxpayer money, so was thesatellite system, so were the chips in our cellphones, so were the wonder drugs we need. Nomatter how wisely you spent your own money,you’d never get those scientific and medical

breakthroughs. And how far would you get hiringyourownarmywithyourtaxrefund?”• Use wedge issues, cases where your opponentwillviolatesomebeliefheholdsnomatterwhathesays. Student debt is a good example. Ask if hebelieves in equality of opportunity and anopportunity society, which conservatives havecontinuouslyarguedfor (asopposed to“equalityofoutcome.”) Reframe: “Many poor students withtalent can only go to college if they get agovernment loan. But those loans cost between 6percent and 12 percent interest and leave studentswith a mountain of debt that many cannot afford.The income from that debt yields profit for thegovernmentthatisscheduledtobefunneledintothegeneral fund for many years into the future.ElizabethWarrenhasproposedloweringthestudentdebtinterestratetoanaffordable3.86percent,stillgivingthegovernmentsomeprofit,whilemakingupthe profit lost to the government by plugging taxloopholes that allow the rich to avoidpaying taxes.The students would then go to college, get outwithoutamountainofdebt,andthenbeabletousethe money they earn—not to pay off thegovernment loans, but to get married, buy homes,andhavekids,spendingthatmoneyintheeconomy

andboostingtheeconomyandcreatingjobs.Doyouwant equality of opportunity with the poor able toafford college loans and boost the economy or doyou want to protect unfair tax loopholes forbillionairesandkilloffequalityofopportunity?”•Anopponentmaybedisingenuous ifhis realgoalisn’twhathesayshisgoal is.Politelypointout therealgoal,thenreframe.Example:Supposehestartstouting smaller government. Point out thatconservativesdon’treallywantsmallergovernment.They don’t want to eliminate the military, or theFBI,or theTreasuryandCommerceDepartments,or the nine-tenths of the courts that supportcorporatelaw.Thatisbiggovernmentthattheylike.What they really want to do away with is socialprograms—programsthatinvestinpeople,thathelppeople to help themselves. Such a positioncontradicts the values the countrywas founded on—the idea of a community where people pulltogethertohelpeachother.FromJohnWinthropon,thatiswhatournationhasstoodfor.•Youropponentmayuse language thatmeans theopposite of what she says, called Orwellianlanguage. Realize that she is weak on this issue.Use language that accuratelydescribeswhat she’stalking about to frame the discussion your way.

Example: Suppose she cites the “Healthy ForestsInitiative” as a balanced approach to theenvironment.Pointout that it shouldbecalled“NoTreeLeftBehind”becauseitpermitsandpromotesclear-cutting, which is destructive to forests andother living things in the forest habitat. Use thename to point out that the public likes forests,doesn’twantthemclear-cut,andthattheuseofthephony name shows weakness on the issue. Mostpeoplewant to preserve the grandeur ofAmerica,notdestroyit.Don’tyou?•Rememberoncemorethatourgoalistouniteourcountry behind our values, the best of traditionalAmerican values. Right-wing ideologues need todivide our country via a nasty cultural civil war.They need discord and shouting and name callingand put-downs. We win with civil discourse andrespectfulcooperativeconversation.Why?Becauseit isan instanceof thenurturantmodelat the levelof communication, and our job is to evoke andmaintainthenurturantmodel.

Those are a lot of guidelines. But there are only fourreallyimportantones:

ShowrespectRespondbyreframing

ThinkandtalkatthelevelofvaluesSaywhatyoubelieve

★ACKNOWLEDGMENTS★

Each morning, my wife, Kathleen Frumkin, gets to themorningpaperbeforeIdoandhomesinunerringlyonthedeep and often hidden implications of themain politicalissuesoftheday.Muchofwhatappearsinthisbookisaresponsetoherinsights.PamelaMorganeditedthefirstversionofthetalkthat

appearsaschapter1.Shealsohelpedmework throughmanyoftheissuesdiscussedthroughoutthefirstedition.Don Hazen, editor ofAlterNet, had the idea for the

firstversionof thisbookanddidagreatdeal tomakeitpossible. He has been a constant source of importantquestionsandofhelp,intellectualandotherwise,inmanyways.ElisabethWehlinghashelpedmework throughmany

ideas,bothasstudentandcolleague.Manyoftheideasdiscussedherearoseindiscussions

with those connected to the Rockridge Institute: LarryWallack, Peter Teague, Bruce Budner, Eric Hass, SamFerguson, Joe Brewer, Jason Patent, Dan Kurtz,Katherine Allen, Alyssa Wulf, David Brodwin, FredBlock, Carole Joffe, Jerome Karabel, Kristen Luker,Troy Duster, Ruth Rosen, Jessica DiCamillo, MelindaFranco, Jonathan Frank, Cathy Lenz, Jodi Short, and

JessicaStites.Other friends who have contributed ideas in

discussions include George Akerlof, Don Arbitblit, PaulBaer,PeterBarnes,JoanBlades,WesBoyd,TonyFazio,David Fenton, Paul Hawken, Arianna Huffington, DanKammen, the late Anne Lipow, Ted Nordhaus, GeoffNunberg, Karen Paget, Robert Reich, Lee Rosenberg,the late Jon Rowe, Guy Saperstein, MichaelShellenberger,SteveSilberstein,DanielSilverman,GlennSmith, George Soros, Alex Steffen, Deborah Tannen,Adam Werbach, Lisa Witter, Rebecca Wodder, andRichardYanowitch.Andfinally,atoasttotheFatherofFrameSemantics,

my longtimeBerkeleycolleagueandoneof thegreatestlinguists ever, the late Charles J. Fillmore, who firstintroducedmetothepoliticalimportanceofhiswork.Hisname should be honored by everyonewho has becomeawareoftheimportanceofframing.

★ABOUTTHEAUTHOR★

GeorgeLakoff is the country’s leading expert on theframingofpoliticaldiscourseandoneoftheworld’smostrenowned linguists and cognitive scientists. He is theauthor of numerous books on politics—including Don’tThink of an Elephant!, The Political Mind, MoralPolitics, Thinking Points, The Little Blue Book (withElisabethWehling), andWhose Freedom?—as well asnumerousbooksonlanguageandthemind.Lakoffhas consultedwith the leadersofhundredsof

advocacy groups on framing issues, lectured to largeaudiences across the country, run dozens ofworkshopsfor activists, spoken regularly on radio talk shows andTV shows, addressed the policy retreats and thecaucusesforboththeSenateandtheHouseDemocrats,consulted with progressive pollsters and advertisingagencies,beeninterviewedatlengthinthepublicmedia,andcontinuestodoextensiveresearchontheframingofpublicdiscourse.Currently Distinguished Professor of Cognitive

ScienceandLinguisticsattheUniversityofCaliforniaatBerkeley, Lakoff is a founder of the fields of cognitivescience and cognitive linguistics and has previouslytaught at Harvard and the University of Michigan andwas a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the

Behavioral Sciences at Stanford. For more than twodecades, he was codirector of the Neural Theory ofLanguageProjectattheInternationalComputerScienceInstituteatBerkeley.HealsospentmorethanadecadeasseniorfellowattheRockridgeInstitute,anonpartisanthink tank, and has served on the international advisoryboardofPrimeMinister JoséZapateroofSpain, on thescience board of the Santa Fe Institute, as president ofthe International Cognitive Linguistics Association, andonthegoverningboardoftheCognitiveScienceSociety,whereheisnowafellowofthesociety.Hehaslecturedat major universities in dozens of countries around theworld.Hiscurrenttechnicalresearchisonthetheoryofhowtheneuralcircuitryofthebraingivesrisetothoughtandlanguage.His blogs appear regularly on his website

(www.georgelakoff.com) and at The Huffington Post,Truthout,AlterNet,CommonDreams,andDailyKos.

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TableofContents★Contents★★Preface★Introduction:ReframingIsSocialChangePartI:Framing101:TheoryandApplication

Framing101:HowtoTakeBackPublicDiscoursePartII:Framing102:FramingtheUnframed

FramingtheUnframedReflexivity:TheBrainandtheWorldSystemicCausationPoliticsandPersonhoodThePrivateDependsonthePublic

PartIII:FramingforSpecificIssuesFreedomIssuesThePikettyInsightontheAcceleratingWealthGapGovernmentbyCorporation

PartIV:Framing:LookingBackaDecadeWhat’sinaWord?Plenty,IfIt’sMarriageMetaphorsofTerrorMetaphorsThatKill

PartV:FromTheorytoActionWhatConservativesWantWhatUnitesProgressives

FrequentlyAskedQuestionsHowtoRespondtoConservatives★ACKNOWLEDGMENTS★