Strategizing Posted by Oaktown Girl, 25 Oct 2007 05:55 am

“Safe” Is Going To Destroy This Country

In the post-9/11 propaganda game, “safe” is even more corrosive to our Constitutional rights and liberties than “War on Terror”. Why? Because it’s insidious.

Contrary to what the corporate media would have you believe, there’s actually a good number of Americans who absolutely understand that a “War on Terror” is not only illogical and impossible, but a hoax designed to consolidate money and power into the hands of a very elite few. By contrast, “safe” actually sounds reasonable on the face of it, and therein lies the danger.

But let’s back up.

A few years ago I, along with many others of a progressive mind set, got excited by the news that Democrats were finally starting to understand the power of language in “framing” issues. It’s a simple concept: be the on who sets the terms of the debate and you’re likely to be the one who wins the debate. At long last, Democrats were finally going to start engaging in the framing battle and quit yielding every talking point on every issue to the GOP.

George Lakoff was leading the way with his insanely popular book that came out in 2004, Don’t Think of an Elephant, which we were assured Democrats were studying assiduously. It didn’t matter if you had quibbles with Layoff’s “nurturing parent” (liberal) vs. “strict father” (conservative) premise. The substance of the book was sound: take control of the language and you take control of the argument.

Thomas Frank’s book, What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, also came out in 2004. It had a different angle but a similar theme: how Democrats can win back Red State America by changing their ways of communication and messaging. Frank was the darling of progressive talk radio and blogs for about the next two years straight. I know that many Democratic politicians were well aware of Frank’s book because they were asked about it frequently in interviews. Their response to the book was always glowing, and it seemed as though Democrats were finally understanding what the rest of us had understood for years, decades even. The clouds had parted, the Dems were “locked and loaded”, and we were all ready to roll.

It’s now been three years since Lakoff’s and Franks’ books were published, and even being in the majority, the Democrats continue to cede the language of every argument to the Republicans. This keeps them in the position of being back on their heels and leads to inevitable defeat. They are rarely, if ever, on the offensive. What the hell happened?

Well, whatever happened (or more accurately, didn’t happen), nowhere is the language rollover more damaging to America than in the Democrats’ adoption of the word “safe”. As far as thwarting terrorist attacks goes, it’s a totally bullshit word. Nevertheless, the Republicans grabbed “safe” for themselves, legitimized it in the political discourse, and declared that they are the ones who can get us there and keep us there.

There are two important points here. One is about political strategy, the other is about our reality and the future of this country.

On the strategy front, by adopting the Republicans’ “safe” meme, the Democrats have already lost. The Republicans have firmly planted their flag on Planet “Safe” and have staked out every patch of land there. The Democrats, trying in vain to inhabit some small acre of Planet “Safe”, expose themselves as pathetic losers in a game they can’t win, yet can’t seem to stop themselves from playing.

On the reality front, ironically, “safe” is one of the most terrifying things happening in our country right now. “Safe” is a fantasy. The absence of danger is not a position in society that can ever be attained. “Safe” does not exist, but that delusion is being used as a powerful double-edge sword: one side repeatedly hammers home the word “safe” in order to convince Americans that they are not safe and need to be protected; the other side is used to maintain the myth that there is such a thing as “safe”, and that we can get there. But taking away civil liberties and engaging in preemptive war does not increase safety, it only increases the illusion of safety.

It’s obvious who wins and who loses in this. Follow the money, follow the control, follow the power.

When Hillary Clinton said, “I believe we are safer than we were. We are not yet safe enough”, I thought my head was going to explode. She rolled over for the Republicans (and against America) in two very serious ways. First, implicitly praising the Bush administration by implying their policies thus far have made us “safer” (against all evidence to the contrary). Second, by continuing to assert we can get to this mythical place called “safe”.

The Republicans have successfully positioned themselves as being the ones who are “tough on terrorists”. Really? You don’t eliminate a hornets’ nest by whacking it with a baseball bat, and that’s basically what BushCo is doing. Not smart. I would like to see the Democrats start using the word “smart” instead of “safe”.

The Republicans think the answer to cracking terrorist networks is to let the government listen in on everybody’s phone calls and read everyone’s email. Again, not smart. Here’s one example of how Democrats positioning themselves as “smart” can be used:

When you’re trying to find a needle in a haystack, the answer is not to make the haystack thousands of times bigger.

“Smart” is something we can do. “Smart” is something we can be.

Our country can never be brought down by terrorists. Our country can only be destroyed from within - by us. “War on Terror” may be the slogan for that internal destruction, but “safe” is what’s driving it.

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Responses to ““Safe” Is Going To Destroy This Country”

  1. on 25 Oct 2007 at 6:03 am 1. christian h. said …

    So true. “Safe” is, not, of course a new phenomenon. It has long been an integral part of the justification of racist oppression (as in “we need to keep our country safe from (black, immigrant, …) criminals”).
    Now international terror is a godsend for the “safety” crowd. This whole “safe” business is especially weird in a nation that has “risk-taking” as an important part of its national myth.

  2. on 25 Oct 2007 at 8:59 am 2. black dog barking said …

    I would like to see the Democrats start using the word “smart” instead of “safe”.

    Sorry, Madame MoJ, but the other side is well prepared for any counter-insurgency spearheaded by “smart”. I think President Dukakis proved that in 1988.

    “Framing” is a tool of persuasion with plenty of mass-marketing overtones. I don’t have any special insight into our collective hive-mind but I do think “real” might be a more effective framing weapon than “smart”.

    For one thing “real” carries the potential to inflict ego damage on the target. In our mass market notSmart isn’t a condition to avoid but actually a badge of honor (cf Bush, George Walker), a sign that you’ve escaped the influence and approval of the over-educated elites. Contrast notReal, an implied critique of the same elites—out-of-touch because of their over-education. The same group of happy notSmartians is very real in their approach to life. They understand how things really work, and therefore what is really important.

    IMHO the target group would be very sensitive to challenges to the practicality of their views (for instance: whose surrender lets us leave Iraq?), whereas they could give a shit what the Other thinks of the intelligence of those views.

  3. on 25 Oct 2007 at 9:26 am 3. Oaktown Girl said …

    Black Dog, how about Real Smart?

    There’s no perfect word or frame, or strategy. Everything is vulnerable to attack and critique, even “real”, as people will choose to decide what’s real based on a set of beliefs that may or may not have anything to do with fact. For example, while some folks might not be doing too well in life right now, the “reality” is that they will be rewarded in heaven later. Or Jesus will be returning soon to straighten everything out, and anyone who doesn’t understand that is not being “real”. Or “the market” will straighten everything out, or our military might, and that’s reality.

    There’s a lot of things the Democrats can and should be doing in order to stop handing the reigns of every issue over to the Republicans. What I’m trying to get at here is the big picture, and “smart” is just one idea.

  4. on 25 Oct 2007 at 9:56 am 4. black dog barking said …

    There’s no perfect word or frame, or strategy.

    I agree and I may have inadvertently hijacked this thread by poking at the specific.

    More important is the notion of grabbing the initiative on political discussions, confronting the “corrosion” of substituting wrong-headed rhetoric for solutions. Arguing “I am *not* a traitor” over and over isn’t cutting it.

  5. on 25 Oct 2007 at 10:14 am 5. Oaktown Girl said …

    What I’m trying to get at here is the big picture, and “smart” is just one idea.

    …and of course that “safe” is greasing the rails toward our destruction.

    I agree and I may have inadvertently hijacked this thread by poking at the specific.

    Arrgh!! A hijacker!!
    Seriously, I hope we don’t skew off into the minutiae. And “I am *not* a traitor” is not cutting it, indeed.

  6. on 25 Oct 2007 at 10:54 am 6. James Killus said …

    Well, first of all, Hillary is the “safe” Democratic candidate (front runner who can point to the record of her husband and promise more of the same). So it’s hardly surprising that she finds “safe” to be a useful.

    Obama also, has been running as a “safe” candidate from the beginning, with his “let’s stop relitigating the 60’s” rhetoric.

    You’ve got two guys in a bar, one clearly crazy beligerant and the other standing up to him. What do the customers want? “Take it outside” they say. They don’t want the fight to happen. It’s not safe.

    People want to pretend that the Culture War is something that can just be called off. There is also a great mass of the public that a) doesn’t want to admit that the country has been taken over by evil thugs, and b) doesn’t want to admit that they themselves went insane for several years after 9/11 and enabled the insane thugs to hardwire the process into their insane thuggery.

    But it isn’t so much that the Democratic Party has ceded the argument to the Conservative Movement. It’s the intelligensia, or what was once called “The New Class,” people who make their living with words, that are responsible. A great deal of time and money has been spent on creating the Great Conservative Propaganda Machine, and it’s simply impossible to mount a response to it overnight, or even in a few years. Destroying the Conservative Movement is going to take a generation, and if anyone has the fantasy that the Right Wing can be destroyed with it, get over that one immediately. The Right has always been a force in this country, and it always will.

    Speaking of fantasies and narratives, I’m pretty sure that it’s important that “security” actions are most often taken against threats that are not real, but which have appeared in fiction and motion pictures. The can’t-take-liquids-onto-airplanes is completely bogus from any technical standpoint. But the “binary explosive” gimmick was in Die Hard with a Vengeance, so lose that handlotion, granny.

  7. on 25 Oct 2007 at 11:32 am 7. Oaktown Girl said …

    But it isn’t so much that the Democratic Party has ceded the argument to the Conservative Movement. It’s the intelligensia, or what was once called “The New Class,” people who make their living with words, that are responsible.

    No argument there. I’m simply referring to the way it’s played out in corporate propaganda machine.

    And I agree nothing’s going to happen overnight. I get so frustrated with these crybabies that claim they’re going to take their toys and go home because the Progressive Caucus of the Democratic party is not yet in the majority, and it’s already been what, 5 minutes? But for god’s sake, we do have to start somewhere, and the Dem “leadership” doesn’t seem to get that.

    And the whole no liquids on airplane drama - another head exploding moment, especially after I heard a scientific breakdown of what it would actually take to do damage by using liquids on an airplane. Do you remember just a month or so back a woman was not allowed to bring breast milk on the plane for her own damn baby?

    And speaking of “safe” candidates, I won’t be surprised it Iowa decides to tell us the Democratic candidate is going to be Joe Biden. Afterall, that’s why they claim they chose Kerry for us (based on what folks said in post-caucus polls about “electability”).

  8. on 25 Oct 2007 at 11:46 am 8. christian h. said …

    And speaking of “safe” candidates, I won’t be surprised it Iowa decides to tell us the Democratic candidate is going to be Joe Biden. Afterall, that’s why they claim they chose Kerry for us (based on what folks said in post-caucus polls about “electability”).

    Well thanks, Oaktown Girl. Thanks for ruining my day - there I was safely engaging in wishful thinking, and now you confront me with the reality that instead of a fairly reactionary, but assertive candidate (something I can live with) we might get a candidate whose main qualification is that he likes to hear himself talk. A lot.

    Anyway, I want to add that in order to successfully create new “frames” it would help if there was actual opposition to the policies being framed.

    Really, “freedom” for example is a term that is, politically speaking, just lying on the street waiting for someone to pick it up. Nobody outside the DC elite (and few even there) take Bush and the gang seriously anymore when they talk about “bringing freedom” somewhere (Cuba, say). It would be so damn easy to run with that - but you can’t do it if you just confirm Bush’s judges, and AG’s, and pass his “spy on everyone” laws…

    This is just one example - there’s lots of terms with historically positive connotation out there that the Dems could use if only they made them come alive with actual policies.

  9. on 25 Oct 2007 at 1:58 pm 9. Oaktown Girl said …

    Firedog Lake has information here about a petition you can sign to Harry Reid to tell him to respect the hold Chris Dodd is placing on a bill that give the telecom companies retroactive immunity for illegal domestic spying. Go!

  10. on 25 Oct 2007 at 2:46 pm 10. spyder said …

    Do you feel unsafe??? Well maybe we should feel a tad more anxious in our happy days??? I am pretty sure the WAAGNFNP represents a major constituency among those groups that are now despised by the Reichswing given this official list of their most dangerous enemies:
    10) ThinkProgress
    9) Muslim Student Association
    8] CodePINK
    7) American Civil Liberties Union, National
    6) Family Research Council
    5) Center for American Progress
    4) League of the South
    3) MoveOn.org
    2) Universities and Colleges
    1) Media Matters for America

    “Reality has a well-known liberal bias.”

    Okay, i am not so sure about the Family Research Council, that may have been a typo on their part when they really meant People for the American Way???

  11. on 25 Oct 2007 at 2:49 pm 11. spyder said …

    I caught this last night late (around midnight) and found it to be absolutely energizing and invigorating. To love and serve humanity establishes the measure of a person.

  12. on 25 Oct 2007 at 3:09 pm 12. Oaktown Girl said …

    Thanks for the links, spyder.
    Bill O’Liely calls Media Matter an “extreme left hit squad”, or something to that effect. So reality not only has a liberal bias, it’s an assassination squadron as well.

    christian (#8) - Agreed. And it’s hard to imagine that the word “freedom” has ever meant less than it does in this current administration.

  13. on 25 Oct 2007 at 4:09 pm 13. christian h. said …

    Actually, the fact that the O’Lielies (love that one) of the world now call organisations like Media Matters “extreme left” instead of “liberal” at least gives some hope. Apparently, “liberal” isn’t the swear word it used to be.

    I signed the letter/petition to Reid this morning. Another case where I just don’t get the Democrats. No matter how much money they get from the telecoms, AT&T must be among the most-hated companies in the US - it seems like a total no-brainer to me, politically. The only thing I can imagine is that they are afraid that the bosses in other businesses are going to say “first, they came for the telecoms…”.

  14. on 25 Oct 2007 at 5:11 pm 14. Oaktown Girl said …

    Apparently, the Dems are afraid of being tagged with all the blame if/when there’s another terrorist attack. This has nothing to do with retro-immunity, but it’s all under the same illegal surveillance umbrella.

    Of course the Dems would not have to be afraid of being tagged with the blame had they not allowed the Rethugs to set the terms of the debate: curtailing our freedom and liberty increases our “safety”. And that’s the entire point of my post today.

    And as for the corporate media and what they always call “far” or “extreme” left - what gets me the maddest is that nobody ever demands that they actually define what they mean by “far left”. It’s just allowed to be put out there, unchallenged, as a sort of all-purpose fear tactic.

  15. on 26 Oct 2007 at 12:05 pm 15. spyder said …

    Then there is the seriously insane on the “extreme” right:
    Right Wing Enraged: Laura Bush Is A ‘Butt-Kisser’ For Wearing Headscarf In Mideast

    lauraWhen House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) wore a headscarf while visiting the Umayyad mosque in Damascus in April, the right wing pounced on her, attacking her as “subservient” and calling the act “disgust[ing].” Ironically, the right wing failed to note that First Lady Laura Bush had also worn a headscarf while previously visiting the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.

    During a tour of the Middle East this week, Laura Bush again donned a traditional hijab given to her as a gift by a Saudi Arabian doctor. Subsequently, several progressive bloggers questioned whether similar “opprobium” would follow from the right wing this time. Now we have our answer.

    The conservative blogosphere has released its seething intolerance, collectively rising up to denounce Laura Bush as “Ms. Pander Clause” for wearing the head cover:

    “I find the image from Saudi Arabia so disturbing. … That she would oblige her hosts by wearing a shmata on her head is a tacit endorsement of Islam’s subjugation of women.” — Weekly Standard

    “Bad craziness in Saudi Arabia … [W]e get this, from one of the most misogynistic societies on the planet: a photo of Laura Bush wearing an abaya and a veil. — Little Green Footballs

    “This is Sheikha Laura, yesterday, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia … Laura Bush [is] butt-kissing Saudi King Abdullah.” — Debbie Schlussel

    Showing tolerance and respect for other cultures is interpreted as “butt-kissing” by far right conservatives.