Geroge Lakoff is a Professor at UC Berkley and has written several books about the use of linguistics and psychology in politics. This article in 2003 highlights the predicament facing progressive political candidates and the many ways that conservative political figures have dominated political discussions for the last 40 years.

In Nov. 2007, Lakoff participated in the "There You Go Again: Orwell Comes to America" conference in New York. LinkTV has been airing a few of the panel discussions. Lakoff in particular really impressed me with his description of the problems facing progressive politics in America and the huge mistakes made by the Democratic party for the last several election cycles. I've heard this before and its been pretty obvious that conservatives have done a better job of making political problems into emotional responses.

...conservative think tanks, have framed virtually every issue from their perspective. They have put a huge amount of money into creating the language for their worldview and getting it out there. Progressives have done virtually nothing. - George Lakoff

What I found really interesting about Lakoff's analysis was that he clearly understood the relationship between politics and the modernist vs. post-modernist mindset. Pointing out the "enlightenment fallacy", he located the mistake of liberals in our trust of the modern enlightenment's appreciation for logic, reason, facts, and data. Drawing on the writings of George Orwell, he highlights that Orwell was wrong because Orwell assumed that if everyone could gain access to good information then they would be able to see the problem and break out of the spell of the empire. The problem is that this simply will not work. No amount of solid facts and figures will change the perspective of anyone who is operating from inside a particular linguistic metaphorical frame. Once the frame for the discussion is cast, there is no going back. You can't forget it. It's there. It's like trying to not think about an elephant when you read the phrase - "don't think about an elephant".

Language always comes with what is called "framing." Every word is defined relative to a conceptual framework. If you have something like "revolt," that implies a population that is being ruled unfairly, or assumes it is being ruled unfairly, and that they are throwing off their rulers, which would be considered a good thing. That's a frame.

If you then add the word "voter" in front of "revolt," you get a metaphorical meaning saying that the voters are the oppressed people, the governor is the oppressive ruler, that they have ousted him and this is a good thing and all things are good now. All of that comes up when you see a headline like "voter revolt" - something that most people read and never notice. But these things can be affected by reporters and very often, by the campaign people themselves. - George Lakoff

A classic example in our current political environment is "supporting the troops". Once that frame has been drawn around the discussion, there is a false dichotomy. It's simple. You are for the troops or against the troops. No amount of data about the justification for war will be effective in the discussion once the frame is set. The more we talk about the facts or point to the root problems, the more it sounds like we are missing the whole point of the discussion. The result is that political parties mostly talk past each other and no common ground or positive solutions can be developed. Progressives have not historically tried to recast the framing story. When is the last time you heard anyone frame the war as the "American Occupation of Iraq"?

Democrats have repeatedly failed to cast the same types of emotional frames for the discussion. In fact, almost all the discussion happens within the frames set by conservative thinkers. Progressives spend most of their energy arguing for the negation of the topic rather than offering positive images. For example, you can't talk rationally about women's rights inside the frame of "pro-life" because the issue is no longer about the women, its framed around the image of an "unborn child". You can't talk about responsible fiscal policy inside the frame of "taxation as a penalty for success" (i.e. Joe the plumber) because no amount of data about our national deficits under the Reagan and Bush tax policies will answer the concern about taxes as "penalties", or left over cold-war reactions to notions of "spreading the wealth". This is why Barack Obama has spent more time answering emotional rhetoric and goof-ball allegations and why little real political discussion took place in the debates. It also explains why the answer to "who won the debate" is so elusive when everyone feels like their guy won.

LinkTV has published the entire conference on the internet. I highly recommend the bipartisan panel discussion including George Lakoff along with conservative spin master Frank Luntz (the mad genius of right wing political polling). Frank is a smart guy and willing to own up to some of his tactics. I've read and enjoyed his book "Words that work". Watching this discussion has made me rethink my approach to political discussions. I agree with Lakoff, Orwell was wrong. Simply educating people with the best data will not solve the problem. I've had enough of these conversations with my conservative friends to know the answer is not found by sharing the facts. It is a matter of reframing the discussions.

On a side note, I think this is exactly what Brian McLaren means when he talks about framing stories in his book "Everything Must Change". He's shown that the same issues apply to religious discussions. Brian's approach to hearing everyone speak without immediately damning their framing story is important. He has done a wonderful job of reframing theological discussions to help many Evangelicals hear the rich history of theological discourse from within a completely different frame. At a minimum, he's opened the door for those Evangelicals to realize that their frame has not always been the dominant frame for the discussion.