Visual metaphors?
Progressives should start using frames that paint images that evoke the emotions involved in Progressive values. The violence in todays culture will make it an uphill battle but the concept of a hero is still there, if not a scrambled one.
For example, take 'empathy.' What are situations where we need to be empathetic? When we need to take action to help someone?
I think this might have been in "Don't think of an elephant" but if you picture someone drowning, your first instinct is to help them. This makes the phrase "drowning in..." a very powerful one.
Perhaps we should find multiple scenarios for each value, then we will have a cache of metaphors at hand to see what fits the best.
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New! Visual communication essential
1) Visual presentation is now THE medium of communication for all but the seriously middle aged and older. If you think it's worth bemoaning that fact, feel free to waste your time; it won't change a thing!
2) Frank Luntz and the neocons have successfully inculcated their reactionary framing over a period of thirty years. Anyone who thinks progressive framing will be successfully communicated in a lot less time is a "daydream believer."
3) The last is even more the case because progressives have shown an exemplary inability to arrive at a consensus regarding alternative verbal frames. AND, in the rare cases where they have, they've shown an even more astonishing inability to communicate them consistently.
The Democratic convention would likely be the best launching platform for a strong visual campaign. Anyone who has watched Keith Olberman's sequences where he, for example, shows an administration spokesman
(There is, by the way, nothing more devastating to the sway of dictators and other monoliths than humor. That's why political satire is one of the first things they always suppress.)
The Democratic convention -- including not only the keynote, but also the nominees' speeches -- should be heavily weighted toward rapid-fire and probably heavy-handed visuals (a la Olberman and MANY others). These should be repeated continuously and absolutely CONSISTENTLY throughout the convention AND throughout the entire campaign thereafter.
They should focus attention not only on the easily illustrated lies and incompetences of the executive, but should also make the entire opposition party share fully in the responsibility. I can imagine a couple of refrains repeated endlessly:
"George Bush and the RUBBER-STAMP REPUBLICAN CONGRESS . . . "
"SAYING IT DOESN'T MAKE IT SO . . . "
Etc.
I would expect the opposition to haul out the "usual suspects" to express their dismay with all the hyperbole at their command. "UNPATRIOTIC," "ELITIST" (that's really a good one!), "LIBERAL," etc., etc., etc.
For JUST THIS ONCE -- maybe we could fail to pass "the stupid test." The truly appropriate response would be to REPEAT exactly the same material OVER AND OVER AND OVER. AND . . . OVER AND OVER AND OVER . . . . . . .
AND, most of all, it would be not to listen for one second to absolutely and repetitively PROVEN losers like Shrum and company to whom the Democrats have paid a ton of money in the past to tell them that they shouldn't raise any "SENSITIVE" issues. Ya know what? Those are the ONLY issues anyone cares about.
I need hardly add that the Olberman example above is but one of probably THOUSANDS of techniques that would be highly effective.
Enough said.