Barbara*in*Seattle wrote
My take is that Governor Dean is working his a$$ off for us. We really have to trust him. He is working under the Republican radar and that?s where he needs to stay or they will do all they can to discredit him and destroy his progress.
He also had a brand for the Republican Party. It?s the party of Deficits, Divisiveness and Deceits. And, to this, I?d like to add Destruction (of the environment and so many other things.)
Possibly the easiest way for him to reach out to all of us is to put a message up on the DNC website and let his brother know so that he can let us know to read it. Don?t expect it to go into a lot of detail as he needs a certain level of security and secrecy. We must be content with brother Jim for the time being.
I was especially thrilled to hear him suggest that WW4C go to DFA for help. Inside I was just whooping and hollering! He has our backs. And our best interests at heart. To all of you, I say, take heart. If you can, try to get into your local Dem party to try to get a position on the new DNC State office. The DNC is one of those fast European trains coming down the track. We need to either lead, follow, or get out of the way.
Side note here, I went to the last Town Hall meeting on election reform last night and asked when we were going to have public meetings on the REPUBLICAN manufactured Diebold machines. Which was greeted by thunderous applause. It felt really good. Especially when the two speakers came up to me afterwards and thanked me for what I said.
wOOt!!!!! Barbara does politics. :o)
Barbara*in*Seattle wrote on April 16, 2005 01:22 PM:
okey dokey, HEre goes. this first part is by way of introduction and setting the scene. None of Howie in it yet.
Ok, my report about the Dean meetings.
Dean was, as usual, in fine form. Gracious and greeting and talking to as many people as he could.
He outlined his broad plan for supporting a year round campaign HQ in each of the 50 states. He has, so far, funded 4 of these states. If I remember correctly, they are ND, Missouri, Mississippi and W. VA. Of course, to do this, the DNC needs a steady inflow of cash. (i'm wrong here, i know)
He gave the usual rhetoric about the Republicans. After all, we love the red meat. He was in Oregon on the 13th at several meetings, here in Seattle for 3 meetings, starting at 7:30 in the morning, and left in a rush to catch a plane for the next round of meetings. Howard is literally running from meeting to meeting, talking to as many people as he can. This is CRITICAL to the outcome of the next round of elections. I know that we all want a piece of him to call our own. I was very fortunate to have been able to go to these events.
The first two were advertised on the DNC website, actually on the home page. Dean had to cancel another performance in Seattle in February. Only because he did this, was I able to go the first two of the three. I got a refund of $150 from the Feb. event, and added another $100 out of pocket.
I did this because I belong to DFA. I wanted to hear him first hand and be able to report back what he had said. It was well worth it. Folks, you?ll have to trust that he knows what he is doing. He is able to meet with anywhere from 50 to 1,000 people at a time. They are all DNC fundraisers. We need this inflow of cash to run the 50 state campaigns. And, believe me, he is getting the turn out in the red states. He was talking about one of them (sorry, can?t remember without going back over the .wav file) and said that 900 people showed up to get into an 800 person room. They had to send out for pizza to feed the overflow. The Democratic Party is alive and well in the red states. We just have to support them.
After the two official DNC events in the morning, Howard went directly to another meeting of a group I belong to called Washington Women for Choice. This is where I can go into some detail. However, remember that I just had a teeny little recorder and this was the first time I used it and I couldn?t make out what was being said some of the time. I tried to mention it when this happened. And, remember, when we speak, we are not always grammatically correct. I didn?t correct Howard?s grammar, I just tried to get down what he said. Plus, I felt the need to throw in a comment or two here and there. I think it?s obvious where. If not, ask me.
He first started out by giving his definition of ?Choice?.
HD - I suspect that there is some disappointment in this room on some recent things that have gone regarding the issue of ?Choice?. Let me talk just briefly about the ?Choice? issue. I would urge you to be careful to separate out the Democrat Party from the people who (unintelligible) the Democratic Party. For example, the recruitment of Casey and Langelin (spelling?) is not the same as the Democratic Party?s position on ?Choice?. It came at an unfortunate time when were thinking about how to talk about ?Choice?.
This is going to be open to what ever you want to say. Let me tell you about my personal strategy on ?Choice?. First of all, there is a consensus on abortion in this country, believe it or not, but here is consensus in this country, which I suspect most of you people in this room are outside, as am I. I used to be on the board of Planned Parenthood for 5 years and Vermont is one of the few states that used Public Funds to pay for poor women?s abortions outside the purview of Medicaid which, of course, (unintelligible) we?re one of the most liberal states, outside of New Hampshire, in the country. So I?m outside the National Consensus on abortion.
Here is what the National Consensus on abortion is. Number 1 ? most people don?t think we should do 3rd term abortions except to preserve the life of the mother. They think we should have parental notification. They think that abortion in general, for the first two trimesters is ok - the earlier the better. This is what most of Americans think, about 60% of Americans. And the rest of us are outside those parameters. My view is that we couch the debate on abortion in a way that we can?t win.
I don?t know how many of you are George Lakoff readers, but framing matters a LOT. The person that frames the argument, wins the argument. We frame the argument wrong. Now look, I?m as in your face as any politician I know. And I love being in your face as it makes you feel good, but sometimes you lose the argument when you get ?in your face.?
I argue that we aught not to use the word ?Pro-Choice? any more because they?ve made it into a word that?s similar to ?pro-abortion?. What I argue is there?s no such thing as a pro-abortion party and there?s no such thing as a pro-abortion person. Nobody wants to put people in the position that they have to make that choice. But fundamental debate ? let me fill this out a little bit.
When I was campaigning for DNC chair, I talked to a lot of southern women, who said that they were pro-life. And they say that I think abortion is terrible, I wouldn?t want an abortion, I wouldn?t want my daughter to have an abortion, but if the next door lady, gets herself in a fix and needs one, I?m not sure its up to me to tell her what to do. Now we would define that person as ?pro-choice?. But because she defines herself as ?pro-life?, the minute we say ?pro-choice?, she?s not listening to us anymore.
I think we aught to do it this way. There?s no such thing as a ?pro-abortion party?, George Bush?s wrong to say so. The fundamental difference between the parties is not whether who?s pro-abortion and who?s not, nobody?s pro-abortion, but the fundamental difference between the parties is that we believe that a woman has the right to make up her own mind up about her health care, they believe that the decisions should NOT be made by politicians like Tom DeLay.
When you talk about a woman?s right to make up her own mind, you are talking to every woman in America, not just the people who think they are pro-choice or pro-life or what ever it is. My strategy on ?Choice? issues (I?m trying to ban that word from my vocabulary) is to refuse to let them make it an issue about the morality of abortion and make it about whether a woman has a right to make up her own mind. Cause we?ve got to have a ton of women on our side who may be uncomfortable with the issue of abortion. I think many Americans are uncomfortable with the issue of abortion. They don?t know what to do, they don?t really want it to be illegal, but they don?t want abortion on demand, which is what the Bush people say we?re about. We?ve got to make the debate about whether a woman has a right to make up her own mind, or whether that should be left to politicians.
If we can re-brand this issue in that debate, then I think that?s the end of the debate. It?s always going to be a very difficult issue because you?ve got - it?s a queasy issue for people, but we can win it if we say and make sure the debate?s about if a woman has a right to make up her own mind. That?s how I think we should re-brand it that?s why (mumble mumble hand wave, couldn?t make out what he was saying)
Obviously, I?m a doctor, I don?t think its any of the governments business whatsoever. I think it should be left up to medical ethicist and patients, and whoever else the patient wants to bring in. But that?s not the prevailing view, it?s a very difficult issue for most Americans and my strategy to deal with it is to talk about a woman?s right ? not ?Choice? - to make up her own mind. Rights, we?re talking about rights here, not talking about abortion rights, we?re talking about a woman?s right to make up her own mind.
If you are disciples of George Lakoff, which I have become, you know that this stuff is important, it matters enormously what words you use. And the instinct of a lot of the people, especially to the generation ahead of yours and my generation and older who sacrificed so much and fought so hard to win this battle, their instinct is ?How dare these people come along and undo this, lets really hit them in the face.? its going to be a losing political strategy.
So, I?m done and I?m ready to take questions, comments and rude remarks.
WW4C (Washington Women 4 Choice)- So it?s great to be thinking about the language and how its position can affect us. Because a majority of Americans are neither extremely conservative, nor extremely liberal. So when we talk about changing the message, and communicating it both on ?Choice? and a whole wide range of other issues, how is the Democratic Party going to develop those strategies, test those messages and get those messages out?
HD ? Well we?re going to do it in the usual way, we?re going to develop the message from the ground up. And I?m going to try to teach people this one. I?m going to tell you something about (something) politicians, which is something I learned a great deal about in my run for President, they are very risk adverse (which I?m not) but they learn very quickly. They are smart at copying what works. You know, two weeks before Iowa you couldn?t tell who Howard Dean was up on the podium, they were all talking about the same things we were talking about. Because we had a very powerful message.
Well, I?m not going into with any credibility to the inside the beltway politicians, and say, ?Here?s how you need to talk about abortion.? What we should do is just do it, and if it?s good and it?s right and we?re winning, they?re going to copy us. It?s a much more affective way to try to convince them. Because, for them, some thing I can?t understand about inside the beltway. So basically, we?re going to develop this, we?re going to lay it all out there, it makes people very nervous. I had a guy from Mississippi call me up and beg me not to talk about abortion when I went down there, and I politely said yes, yes, yes, and then did whatever I wanted and it was terrific! We had 900 people show up in an 800 person ballroom and had to order pizza because they ran out of food. Four former democratic governors were there. And that was very unusual because most local officials run the other way when a national democrat comes through. I said just exactly this, and there were a lot of people doing that (nods head up and down). You know, I think the best thing to do is do it, try it, see if it works. But we can?t be a lot worse off than we already are, unless the Supreme Court changes and this is why it is so interesting um um. So let?s just try it. Let?s see if it works. And so far, in my little anecdotal focus group testing, it has worked with people in the middle of the road who go, ?Oh yeah, I think a woman should have the right to make up her own mind. ?
Interestingly enough, I think the Terri Schiavo case has helped us a lot. Because when you talk about the right of a person to make up their own mind, and the families the right to make up their own minds, they don?t generally think about abortion, they now are more likely to think about Teri Schaivo.
WW4C - Can you talk about the next presidential election and how deep the candidate bench is going to be in terms of democratic candidates. It seems the Repubs have quite a few potential candidates.
HD. So do we. The Republicans will probably coronate theirs, pretty much like they did with Bush. They will try to figure out, which is interesting because I think McCain will probably be pushed out right away. We don?t do that, but I?m figuring that we?ll have at least eight candidates. Right now there are Hillary, Kerry, Edwards, maybe Biden, Russ Feingold, Evan Bahy, Schumer (? Maybe Turner? Couldn?t quite make out), Vilsack, Richardson. So obviously, it?s a huge list that will be winnowed out within the first two primaries and maybe.
WW4C - I?m a little concerned about the bottom up strategy because the Republicans have demonstrated time and time again that a top down strategy does work. So I?m concerned about our ability to stay within a singe message and a single unified vision for the party if we?re going to say that everybody has a voice. Not to say that you can?t do both, because you can have people give input, create the vision and then give everybody the message. But I didn?t hear you say that, so
HD ? That?s because I didn?t say it.
WW4C - Ok. But I?m concerned, because we?ve tried it the last two elections and that hasn?t worked.
HD ? I think we aught to have more message discipline. I admire the business model of the Republicans, but the reason we can?t use it exactly is because we?re not Republicans. You know, Democrats are very bright and their very independent minded. Especially the guts, the activist guts of the party, many of whom are in this room. So try to imagine that I told you that we were going to support parental notification because that?s what was decided, would you be comfortable going along with that message? Perhaps not. So, we really do, Democrats are different than Republicans. We are not automatons and zealots that take orders from the one on high and whether that?s the President or someone other one like Jerry Falwell. We?re independent minded, thinking people. So, what I?m going to try to do is fashion the national message from the bottom up by getting people to buy into the message because they are going to help create it.
And then, there?s going to be room, there?s going to be debate and dissent as we move forward. The key is to have the major spokesmen of the party all be on the same page. This is not going to be easy, as somebody asked me upstairs, and I said that if I get 75% of the time that the democrats would be on the same page.
But the trouble is, if we try the top down model, people are just going to leave the party. You know, half the people, more than half the people, no, it?s just about exactly half the people that supported me in the presidential race? there?s this huge Pew research poll about the people that were supporting us. Half of them were favorably disposed to the greens and didn?t consider themselves democrats. If we start this top down, you know, there?s no room for dissent in this party, they have some place to go. There?s just too many people who care deeply about issues in our party. It?s not just about party discipline. It?s a fundamental disagreement I have with Republicans. They want to be in power for the sake of being in power. We want to be in power so we can change America and move it, and have our progressive country back again with moral values. And in some ways, they?re going to succeed in the short term, but we have the power to make this a great country and we?re the only ones, because they don?t have the power to make this a great country because of the way they organize and . . .. I can only think of two great republicans, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt. And, Theodore Roosevelt, at the time, most people would have said he?s not really a republican. And maybe not Lincoln, either.
Certainly, the republicans have done nothing to honor the legacy of Abraham Lincoln. The reason the republicans are generally incapable of possessive leadership in America, is because they think its top down. And real leadership empowers people, and trusts them to make their own decisions and then go back up. There?s risk in that. And the risk is that people will say things that are off message. But I don?t know how to eliminate that risk without becoming republican, then we?d have two republican parties.
WW4C - What message can we get out that can compete with the republican simple message of god, gays and guns. We need something simple.
HD ? That we?re gonna do. We have this complicated exercise we?re going to do. You bring it from the bottom up, you bring it together. Each party from each state is going to have twenty-five things that they want to run on, we?re going to take the three things they all have in common. Then we are going to go to people like Lakoff and have him phrase this in a way that?s easily understood. So THAT, we have to do. But the point I?m trying to make is that we can?t enforce that vigorously. My guess is that, because of the power of the message, and its ease, that will be the brand of the Democratic Party. I?m just saying, that unlike the Republican Party, we can?t force every dissident out of the party, nor do I think we should.
WW4C ? This group has been labeled a ?Botique PAC?. We have not been contacted by Paul Berendt or any other State or County Democrats. The party does not even know if we?re willing to support their messages because we are under the radar. I believe, based on emails I get, that there are lots of these ?Botique? groups popping up and it seems like there?s not only this message piece, but there?s this support piece that .(she talked around in circles trying to get to the point that this is a group with access to a lot of money and they?d like to work in harmony with the state party but are being ignored)
HD ? Well, the organizers in every state are going to make sure that this happens. In the mean time, if Paul Berendt won?t get a hold of you, you need to get in touch with him.
WW4C ? We have, to no avail.
HD ? Well, if he won?t do it, then Karen (Marchio) or someone else in the hierarchy needs to be made aware. We have to do that. And if worse comes to worse, then you go to the DFA meetups and go through them because DFA is certainly going to have an influence. (wOOt!!!)
WW4C ? It?s not as much as us needing the attention of Paul Berendt, it?s more the fact that I think we could be a stronger force for communicating with our neighbors who may be swing voters, if I know what the three touch points are because we?ve got that message, we can be more effective.
HD ? I think it is a ridiculous idea that there should be a ?Botique PAC? and here?s why. All of you are here because of one issue? But, think of the influence on the people you touch in your lives as you go around talking about things that have nothing to do with this issue. So to have an extraordinary group of fifty women who are leaders in their communities, who all happen to come into this PAC around this particular issue, you are an enormous communications resource for us. And, you know, if Paul isn?t willing to realize this, then we?ll find someone in the Democratic Party who is.
LOTS OF YELLING AND WHOOPING AND AGREEMENT!!1
HD ? Women?s Leadership Forum, Pam Eakes. We are going to totally re-tool that and combine it with the Women?s Caucus, and they?re going to run the women?s outreach. Actually we should have men?s outreach because women are the vast majority of our party. Sixty percent of democratic votes are women.
WW4C ? Couldn?t really understand. Too far away from the mike.
(my personal observation here - And, this part, I think we all have to get ingrained in our minds and hearts)
HD ? How many of you were upstairs at the first meeting I had? There was a poll, and I?m not going to go into all the details of it, but the bottom line of the poll was, there?s (can?t make out) income people, that are terribly fearful economically, but at the other end of this barbell like distribution, there?s this terrible fear about what?s going to happen to their family, which supersedes their terrible fear of their economic viability. They?re the ones that are worried about what?s coming over the television at their kids, they are worried about what their kids are doing when they are working two jobs to support them, their worried about a drug problem because the sheriff?s department just discovered a meth lab two counties over.
But, they don?t have the education level that you do so they?re afraid that their kids are going to become gay in school because the teachers have plots to turn everybody in America gay. But that?s the problem. We laugh at it because it?s so ridiculous, and what we need to do, and we fail to do because we are very smart and we think we can convince people that there?s no such thing as a plot to turn your children gay. The problem with that is, the plot to turn your children gay, and gay marriage and abortion and all this stuff is that they?re surrogates. Surrogates for a terrible fear about loosing control of your family and your children. So we don?t address the fear, we address the surrogates. And, of course, that?s not what the problem is, so we don?t get anywhere.
We have to find a way . . . Clinton would have been great at this, he would have said, ?I feel your pain. I know how hard it is to raise a child in this moral environment we have in this country.? That?s all you have to say. You don?t have to promise to get rid of gay people and abortion and everything else. You just gotta say I understand what it is you?re going through. That gets you halfway in the door so that they can then think about it.
These are the people we wring our hands over and say, How can these people vote against their own economic interests?? Now as far as married women go, I think the soccer moms had very little to do with moral values and had a lot to do with security. I believe in a political consultants theory, that never made it to the front page, nor did the campaign take advantage of it, that one of the reason?s John Kerry lost, if not a very big one, was because of the massacre of the 300 children in Chechnia. Where people could see children that looked exactly like theirs, 300 of them were killed when these terrorists took over this school and blew it up and all this terrible stuff. I?ve gotta believe that every woman with school age kids in America went. ?Oh my God. Who?s going to stop that from happening?? and they decided it was Bush that would more likely to do it.
So, you know, there are a lot of issues we?ve got to deal with. The good news is that there is no reason that we shouldn?t touch these folks that voted with Bush, we?ve just got to push the buttons in a different way. We can?t do it with our minds, we?ve got to do it with our hearts. Because these people don?t vote with their minds most of the time, they make an internal - - It doesn?t mean they?re dumb, they?re NOT, They?re less well educated, but they certainly not dumb. They make an internal calculation based on an enormous amount of feedback, and they vote from here (points to his heart). Mostly not from here (points to his head). We vote from here (points to his head). The data on my campaign was so fascinating, most of the people - 72% of the people who supported me, vote from here (points to head) - they vote on issues. But most Americans vote from here (points to heart) and we have to learn ? and we know what their issues are ? we know what their worries are and their concerns. We just do a lousy job of touching them because we try to appeal to them from her (touches his head). This doesn?t work
WW4C ? One more question, I think that?s all the time we have.
HD ? Oh you can have two. Papal dispensation.
WW4 C ? What is the time line to get this done.
HD ? We hope to get at least the basic messaging package done, certainly by September and then we?ll massage it through the word-smithing processing to the pro?s and that shouldn?t take very long. So I?m hoping by mid fall, this year, we?re going to have the brand we want to make the Democrats, we want people to know us by that brand. There?ll be controversy over it and some people won?t be happy with it, and maybe we?ll have to change it a little bit, but we gotta try it.
WW4C ? Following up on the messaging thing, there?s got to be a way to talk to these people. She said more, but I didn?t catch it all. Howard?s answer pretty much lets you know what she said.
HD ? Can?t say it the way you just said it though. And that?s what I struggle with all the time, too. I say things in the way that I know aren?t going to work because I can say them to people like you instead of (interrupted here). It?s true, but it?s also very difficult, because remember, it?s deep in human nature, the dark side of human nature, to always blame somebody else. You know, I once (ONCE?? My aside) said something that got me in a lot of trouble, but it?s true. Bush uses the same techniques that Milosivich uses. Now, minus all the violence. but he, basically, incites one group of people against another in order to further his own political ends. That?s why he is such a despicable human being. Because he knows better, too. He knows better.
You know, Bush is not a bigot. I know him, he?s not a bigot. And, the truth is, he?s not anti gay. Which makes what he?s doing, worse. Because he knows it?s wrong. This is not some guy that, like Stalin, who comes from all these horrendously internally difficult battles. This is a guy who was brought up in relatively good circumstances. He knows it wrong to be discriminatory, and he?s not. He just uses that because he knows he can away with it. And that is despicable.
But the problem is that you can?t teach people not to do it. Because it?s deep in our souls to blame somebody else when things aren?t going well and that?s what they are going to do. We have to find a way. . . and it?s going to be hard. We can?t go in there and say, ?Well, look. We understand that you worry about your children after school so we have an after school program for YOU. It?s hard for your kid to get ahead, so we have a Headstart program for YOU.? That?s what they expect, that?s not what they want. They don?t want help with what they perceive is US telling them how to raise their kids, what they want help with is to be able to raise their kids the way they think they should raise them with a little help to do that. And those are the kinds of things we have to message.
And first of all, if we could get the Evangelical (sorry, I took the recorder out of it?s little case here to see if it was still recording and the noise wiped out part of his talk) part of religion that escapes me in Evangelicalism, there are a fair amount of Evangelicals that are tired of Bush. They think that he uses them every four years and then where is he when it?s time for reaching out for the poor?
Most Evangelicals actually DO care about the part of Christianity that we never hear about on the television. In fact, they care about it a lot. In fact, there?s a group of very conservative Evangelicals who are getting hell from the Republicans because they think we aught to do something about the environment. The stewardship of the world, of the earth is something that?s a big deal in both the new and the old testament.
So, we gotta get those folks to stand up and make it ok for them to stand up for those principles and that?s some work I can do. I?ve actually had some calls from some of the Evangelicals saying would I meet up with them. And the answer is YES, we can certainly meet with them to find common ground. I?m actually having meetings with the Catholic Church to find common ground. If they do what they did last time, there?s going to be war between the Democrat Party and the Catholic Church.
You know, this socially progressive movement we have in this country was basically built by the Democratic Party and the Catholic Church and the Labor Unions. And now, they?re going in every which direction and it?s very difficult. We?ve got some major stumbling blocks with the Catholic Church. But, on the other hand, we also have enormous common ground which I argue they?re ignoring. And we aught not to ignore because it?s what makes America great.
So, there?s a huge amount of work to be done. I feel like I?m an ambassador to, uh I don?t know what country, uh Yugoslavia before it blew up. But I?m also optimistic. I?m really optimistic. I don?t know how long it?s going to take us to turn this around, but remember, it took them 30 years to build this machine and they started after the Goldwater debacle. We?re starting at 48%. So, I do think it?s possible to do this? It just means we all have to work hard and we all have to examine our own pre-conceptions on how we relate to others as we go forth and try to give this message of, basically, what I consider to be social and economic justice. That?s really the core value of the Democratic Party. It?s social and economic justice.
My other argument is, social and economic justice makes us the far-sighted party, because without that, Capitalism doesn?t work and neither does Democracy. And we want Capitalism and Democracy to work. I argue that we?re the Patriotic Party, because we realize that America is a greater good than the Democratic party, they think the Republican Party is a greater good than America. That?s what makes them such lousy leaders, and the plane is leaving and I gotta get outta here.
WW4C ? Recommended that we all read Don?t Think of an Elephant. About framing. Wondered what he would suggest to rename this organization. Washington Women for Choice is the wrong frame. So the frame has to change.
I turned the recorder off after this and I?m sorry that I did. Pam Eakes, who works with Howard, had a lot of good things to say.