In taking over the framing of just about every major issue, conservatives have hidden major truths. Democrats need to speak those truths from their own moral perspective. To show how, we have just published The Little Blue Book: The Essential Guide for Thinking and Talking Democratic. Here is how the book applies to the Wisconsin Recall:
The Wisconsin recall vote should be put in a larger context. What happened in Wisconsin started well before Scott Walker became governor and will continue as long as progressives let it continue. The general issues transcend unions, teachers, pensions, deficits, and even wealthy conservatives and Citizens United.
Where progressives argued policy -- the right to collective bargaining and the importance of public education -- conservatives argued morality from their perspective, and many working people who shared their moral views voted with them and against their own interests. Why? Because morality is central to identity, and hence trumps policy.
Progressive morality fits a nurturant family: parents are equal, the values are empathy, responsibility for oneself and others, and cooperation. That is taught to children. Parents protect and empower their children, and listen to them. Authority comes through an ethic of excellence and living by what you say, rather than by enforcing rules.
Correspondingly in politics, democracy begins with citizens caring about one another and acting responsibly both for oneself and others. The mechanism by which this is achieved is The Public, through which the government provides resources that make private life and private enterprise possible: roads, bridges and sewers, public education, a justice system, clean water and air, pure food, systems for information, energy and transportation, and protection both for and from the corporate world. No one makes it on his or her own. Private life and private enterprise are not possible without The Public. Freedom does not exist without The Public.
Conservative morality fits the family of the strict father, who is the ultimate authority, defines right and wrong, and rules through punishment. Self-discipline to follow rules and avoid punishment makes one moral, which makes it a matter of individual responsibility alone. You are responsible for yourself and not anyone else, and no one else is responsible for you.
In conservative politics, democracy is seen as providing the maximal liberty to seek one's self-interest without being responsible for the interests of others. The best people are those who are disciplined enough to be successful. Lack of success implies lack of discipline and character, which means you deserve your poverty. From this perspective, The Public is immoral, taking away incentives for greater discipline and personal success, and even standing in the way of maximizing private success. The truth that The Private depends upon The Public is hidden from this perspective. The Public is to be minimized or eliminated. To conservatives, it's a moral issue.
These conservative ideas at the moral level have been pushed since Ronald Reagan via an extensive communication system of think tanks, framing specialists, training institutes, booking agencies and media, funded by wealthy conservatives. Wealthy progressives have not funded progressive communication in the same way to bring progressive moral values into everyday public discourse. The result is that conservatives have managed to get their moral frames to dominate public discourse on virtually every issue.
In Wisconsin, much if not most progressive messaging fed conservative morality centered around individual, not social, responsibility. Unions were presented as serving self-interest -- the self-interests of working people. Pensions were not presented as delayed earnings for work already done, but as "benefits" given for free as a result of union bargaining power. "Bargaining" means trying to get the best deal for your own self-interest. "Collective" denies individual responsibility. The right wing use of "union thugs" suggests gangs and the underworld -- an immoral use of force. Strikes, to conservatives, are a form of blackmail. Strikebreaking, like the strict father's requirement to punish rebellious children, is seen as a moral necessity. The successful corporate managers, being successful, are seen as moral. And since many working men have a strict father morality both at home an in their working life, they can be led to support conservative moral positions, even against their own financial interests.
What about K-12 teachers? They are mostly women, and nurturers. They accepted delayed earnings as pensions, taking less pay as salary -- provided their positions were secure, that is, they had tenure. In both their nurturance and their centrality to The Public, they constitute a threat to the dominance of conservative morality. Conservatives don't want nurturers teaching their children to be loyal to the "nanny state."
The truth that The Public is necessary for the Private was not repeated over and over, but it needed to be at the center of the Wisconsin debate. Unions needed to be seen as serving The Public, because they promote better wages, working conditions, and pensions generally, not just for their members. The central role of teachers as working hard to maintain The Public, and hence The Private, also needed to be at the center of the debate. These can only be possible if the general basis of the need for The Public is focused on every day.
Scott Walker was just carrying out general conservative moral policies, taking the next step along a well-worn path.
What progressives need to do is clear. To people who have mixed values -- partly progressive, partly conservative -- talk progressive values in progressive language, thus strengthening progressive moral views in their brains. Never move to the right thinking you'll get more cooperation that way.
Start telling deep truths out loud all day every day: Democracy is about citizens caring about each other. The Public is necessary for The Private. Pensions are delayed earnings for work already done; eliminating them is theft. Unions protect workers from corporate exploitation -- low salaries, no job security, managerial threats, and inhumane working conditions. Public schools are essential to opportunity, and not just financially: they provide the opportunity to make the most of students' skills and interests. They are also essential to democracy, since democracy requires an educated citizenry at large, as well as trained professionals in every community. Without education of the public, there can be no freedom.
At issue is the future of progressive morality, democracy, freedom, and every aspect of the Public -- and hence the viability of private life and private enterprise in America on a mass scale. The conservative goal is to impose rule by conservative morality on the entire country, and beyond. Eliminating unions and public education are just steps along the way. Only progressive moral force can stop them.
The Little Blue Book is a guide to how to express your moral views and how to reveal hidden truths that undermine conservative claims. And it explains why this has to be done constantly, not just during election campaigns. It is the cumulative effect that matters, as conservatives well know.
The Little Blue Book can be ordered as en e-book or paperback at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iTunes, or at your local bookstore as of June 26.
Robert Koehler: Progressive Morality
Rep. Anna Eshoo: Revisiting Citizens United
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| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Electoral Votes (270 to win) |
332 | 206 |
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Total | 65,899,660 | 60,932,152 |
| Percent | 51.1% | 47.2% |
| Democrats* | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Current Senate | 53 | 47 |
| Seats gained or lost | +2 | -2 |
| New Total | 55 | 45 |
| Democrats | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Seats won | 201 | 234 |
Govt is not society, it is the entity which has the legitimized use of force upon society. Only actions which by their nature require the use of force are entirely proper only for govt: law creation, enforcement, and the court system. Any other function in society that can be can be performed without the use of force can be done without govt action. We as a society can choose to place other actions in the scope of govt, but it is not necessary and sometimes less efficient to do so.
Morality goes out the window when it comes to the conservative ideology. Their type of morality is religion based with no room to move but further to the right, and yet they legislate against Sharia laws because of their fears while not figuring in the fears of the own religious beliefs. Bottom line is that religion has no place in the laws of our land.
The founding fathers were deists and freethinkers who were not that many years away from the religious upheavals and persecutions of Europe. They knew they had to keep religion out of government. There is a wide ranging written record of their opposition to religion in government.
Scott Walker regained his Governorship because the attention span of a Wisconsinite is the length of the body of a newt, running at full speed, curled up and taking a nap. They simply did not get the significance or the understand the importance of kicking this con artist out the door. He does not represent Wisconsin. I doubt if he ever did. But then that's my take on things, and as an outsider I must bow to the inevitable: 'his' people wanted him right where he was, and actually (for the majority) did not care for those so desperate to protect themselves, their jobs, and their families.
You see, just like a block of cheese, once cut apart the separate pieces do not crawl back into place and begin the process of resealing. Once cut apart . . . one lump of cheese thought, 'uhmm-uhmm good!', while the other lump thought, 'less is best', and a third lump--still in a daze--cried out in dismay, 'doomed!'
And so it was. All three were right. All got exactly what they either did or did not deserve.
And yes, on occasion I do have cheese from Wisconsin, and in agreement, it is good.
No other state in the country could possibly have had better informed and better prepared citizens for the election. The polling showed this.
Seriously, this excuse for a bad result is trotted out by progressives in Wisconsin against all reason. There's no state in recent memory with a momentous election where resident literacy and full acquaintance with the issues -- not to mention having a firm opinion early -- could possibly have been more of a fact. So it's particularly with reference to this election that this excuse sounds more stupid than it possibly could anywhere else.
Free speech is great because it helps identify who's the most delusional.
While I agree that pensions are really deferred earnings, what people condemned to work in the private sector see is something that's equally true and compelling. Their pensions -- which were also deferred earnings -- were long ago taken away. And, not being in the public sector, they have no right to form unions, which about half of them would like to do. Notably, unions bear a good deal of responsibility for their self-satisfied refusal to attempt much organizing over the past couple of generations.
Meanwhile, these private-sector workers -- who, by the way, haven't seen a real raise in many years -- see well-protected public-sector workers setting up for retirement, which is now pretty much a pipe dream in the private sector. And they, the private-sector workers, are paying for this luxury, as it's now perceived, with their taxes.
No one, neither the unions nor the government under Democrats or Republicans, has done one blasted thing for private-sector employees in the past 40 years. (And that includes Obamacare, which preserves hideously wasteful private insurers at workers' expense.) Given the fact that no action or intervention along these lines is likely to be forthcoming, it's quite reasonable for voters -- conservative, moderate or even progressive -- to strike out at the imbalance and injustice.
that they bought the line "they didn't need them anymore" had nothing to do with it?
BTW-- just give them a call and they will be delighted to help private workers form a union! It is the workers who ignored them-- not the other way round.
The public workers are not the ones who took away their pensions-- so why blame them?
You do know that they don't get SS when they retire-- right? So they should vote to "end SS as we know it"-- since it does not effect them-- thus bringing private workers back in "balance" since that would only be "justice".
I'm sure there is a corollary Ancient Greek tragedy in their somewhere.
One of the progressive indignations is that citizens -- including a vast number of union members -- did not vote in their "self-interest" in Wisconsin.
It's interesting that motivations progressives loathe as conservative vices (self-interest, self-reliance) they go on to lament as virtues lacking among their fellows, who they believe are obliged to support their own selfish interests. ;-)
Agreed. And Dems now control the Senate in Wisc so Gov Walker will NOT be able to repeat his antics of last year. He overreached last Spring and now he does NOT control the state legislature. The people have spoken....
Sure, but it's going back to republicans in November. The dems have really hurt their image with how things have worked out in Wisconsin. They ran instead of fought, then they acted like sore losers and did the recalls. I'd love change some of the stuff Obama has done, but I will do so by voting against him, not trying to recall or impeach him. You also have to realize, no matter how much you dislike or disagree with republicans, they take democratic strategies and perfect them.
The issue is that as with other laws (DOMA comes to mind), he's not enforcing the law. That's his job. "But Congress doesn't act." Well, under the rule of law, when new laws aren't made or old ones repealed, alas the executive branch's job is to enforce the law as written -- not pick and choose.
Separation of powers. And it's instructive that progressives show, out of sheer tribalism in support of their man, that they no longer care about it. Indeed, that they love -- absolutely adore -- the naked abuse of executive power they thought so criminal by Bush.
Well then what's the big deal? If all Walker has done with the legislature is encode in law the very things the unions "gave in to," why would the unions who thus gave in object so strongly that they'd try to get rid of Walker?
;-)
Shouldn't *all* non-union members of The Public pay union dues? Since so many are leaving unions, this would really help their coffers.