Great Article on Building the Left by Learning from the Right

I try to read all I can of the various diagnoses and prescriptions for building liberalism and the Democratic Party because exposure to a lot of points of view helps you choose what you believe best describes where we are, where we want to go and how to get there. The following article is a good one and takes a contrarian view to some of the current conventional wisdom. An excerpt follows but be sure to read it all:

http://www.publiceye.org/hardisty/wrong_about_right.html
"Wrong About the Right

"By Jean Hardisty and Deepak Bhargava
"From The Nation, November 7, 2005

"The now dominant narrative about the right's rise to power holds that conservatives invested huge amounts of money in a number of think tanks over the past thirty years and brilliantly framed their messages in ways that were simple and resonated deeply with much of the American public. By embracing a top-down, hierarchical movement structure and relentless message discipline, the right was able not only to triumph at the ballot box but also to change the very terms of political discussion— demonizing "big government" and celebrating "tax relief," "personal responsibility" and "free-market capitalism."

"This account of conservative strategy has piqued the interest of a growing number of progressive groups, who argue that the left should adopt a similar strategy. And it is currently driving the activities of many major progressive donors.

"The difficulty here is that, as an explanation of the right's ascendancy, it is at best incomplete and at worst misleading. What's more, it is not clear that progressives should emulate all of the right's tactics, or that we will succeed by doing so. There are certainly lessons to be learned from the right— but for the most part they are different from those commonly assumed. Here is an alternative view of the insights progressives should take away from three decades of conservative domination."

...in glancing over it, it's clear the authors don't understand "framing" ("currently in vogue among progressives," they state). "Framing," as advocated by Professor George Lakoff promotes those very "ideas" or "core beliefs" (he calls them "values") that the authors of this article promote.

Semantics.

NGU.

populations--primarily the young and single women. That is the way to win elections, by doing the hard work. We're not going to gain anything by nibbling around the edges of the conservative block. We need disciplined, directed efforts to keep all present Democrats engaged, and then expand the organization to include young people of color in the party's hierarchy... Recommended as required reading for all.

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