Verbosities

Al sent me a link this morning to a news article covering Hillary Clinton's speech at an event in New Hampshire yesterday, in which the content quoted seemed to speak with nearly unavoidable socialist undertones. While I seriously doubt Hillary Clinton is an advocate of full-fledged socialism in the US, it's inarguable that the tone and tenor of her presentation of policy has largely been interpreted in that way, which leads people to assume that we're on some sort of slippery slope into Marxist economic repression.

I think if you managed to sit with Hillary one-on-one and were receptive to understanding the merits of the policy she's suggesting, it would probably clarify a lot of the concerns you'd have in this regard. However, very few have that luxury, so she ends up depending on speeches like this one to communicate her message.

It's not working.

Leaving the merits of her policy behind, and working under the assumption that she's not the love child of Marx and Engels, I think the way in which she presents her ideas is illustrative of something a little broader - that is, Democrats have had a difficult time shaping their ideas into the proper context to appeal to emotions, morals and values. Here's a few clips:


HillaryClinton.com - Speech to the Manchester School of Technology - 5/29/07

Because you can't look at the Manchester School of Technology without realizing that it didn't happen by accident. It was built by the people of this state who, even 25 years ago, understood that to compete in today's economy, young people need the skills for today's jobs. That's what we've always done here in America: When our economy changes, we don't panic or give up or wring our hands -- we simply change with it. That's what has happened here at MST. I really applaud you for doing that, because we have to look for examples like this to figure out what we need to do more broadly across our nation.

Now we've done this before. We did the same thing back at the turn of the 20th century. Back then, the American economy was dominated by large corporate monopolies. Corruption was far too common and good government far too rare. Women couldn't vote, and the minimum wage, well, that wasn't heard of and worker rights were completely unimagined. Back then, America was a country filled with haves and have nots -- and not enough people in between.

The first highlighted sentence is around the idea of "change." Using the idea of "change" is a potentially powerful notion to either demonize the past or present, or to present in context the accomplishments of progress. Since she's apparently setting up the ideas that progressive politics were born out of a previous economic period of adjustment, she needs to surround the necessity of "change" with phrases that express the ideas of evolution, growth and progress. Instead, "change" isn't augmented. It's left as a cold notion to which the listener can attach his own ideas.

For example, if a displaced blue-collar machine shop worker hears that, he's going to hear something entirely different from the white collar investment advisor who's made a killing as the stock market exploded. A powerful message needs to be a consistent message.

Next is the idea that "we have to... figure out what we need to do" about the evolving economy. Again, it's another cold and lonely phrase that is left to the listener to interpret. Our leaders don't "figure out what we need to do," they show leadership and engage in proactive problem solving. A leader who is so flummoxed by a problem that they have to "figure (it) out" is not a leader at all, they're just sticking their finger in the dyke, plain and simple.

The last part of this is just clumsy construction of her framework. Corruption and corporate monopolies back then? Please. This is nothing but an obviously subtle jab at the current corporate culture of Enron and Clear Channel. Problem is, she doesn't nail it down from there. She leaves the idea to rest at the turn of the 20th century, which leaves the listener to wonder if she knows what's going on in the world right now.

I'm reminded a little of Jim Webb's response to the 2006 State of the Union, where his message about our economic crisis was exceptionally well-crafted. Here's a comparative clip:

Regarding the economic imbalance in our country, I am reminded of the situation President Theodore Roosevelt faced in the early days of the 20th century. America was then, as now, drifting apart along class lines. The so-called robber barons were unapologetically raking in a huge percentage of the national wealth. The dispossessed workers at the bottom were threatening revolt. Roosevelt spoke strongly against these divisions... Tonight we are calling on this President to take similar action...

Webb set this up with statistics and anecdotal evidence, then delivered the comparative analysis before taking a swing at the administration to make things right. Hillary says, "Things are changing, they've changed before." Webb says, "Things are changing, and this situation is unacceptable." Whose message is more effective?

Moving on with Hillary:

In response to these excesses, the progressive movement was born. Throughout the late 1800s and early 1900s, the progressives busted trusts and fought for safe working conditions and fair wages. They created the national park system, and replaced a government rife with cronyism with a merit-based civil service. They understood, as the great progressive President Teddy Roosevelt once said, that "The welfare of each of us is dependent fundamentally upon the welfare of all of us."

Here's your first "Workers of the World Unite!" moment of the speech. The idea that we shouldn't let CEO profiteers plunder their companies, fire their workers, move offshore and still collect a thousand billion dollar golden parachute (I'm exaggerating) is a powerful one, but Hillary hasn't really gotten there yet. By discussing the economic difficulties of a bygone era without tying the similarities to where we are as a people today, she hasn't yet given us anything but forgotten history to rally around.

Then, she goes and uses the word "welfare" twice, including the close of the quote that says "welfare of all of us." It's not the same as "welfare FOR all of us," but contextually she's just supported the idea that the government should take care of everyone without providing cause to do so. Not a good way to cultivate agreement.

Webb also quoted Roosevelt: "Roosevelt spoke strongly against these divisions. He told his fellow Republicans that they must set themselves "as resolutely against improper corporate influence on the one hand as against demagogy and mob rule on the other." And he did something about it."

Webb celebrates that Roosevelt used that moment in history to say he wouldn't be beholden to corporations, but he also wouldn't pander to mobs of people demanding satisfaction either. He would nobly do what was best for the country, and that's an appealing notion to anyone who carries even the smallest sliver of patriotism.

Welfare is a tricky topic with blue-collar folk. On one hand, I think there's a resentment that their tax dollars are going to support people who "abuse the system," whatever that means in their own heads. On the other? They almost certainly want a government which is capable of supporting "deserving" people, should those people get unlucky and fall on hard times. This is why "we should be interested in everyone's welfare" is a tougher sell than "we should be interested in allowing everyone to invest in their own success."

Well, today, at the beginning of the 21st century, I think it's time we remembered those lessons. For the first time in history, we have a truly global economy...

[snip]

Like it or not, that is the reality of globalization. And it isn't going away. However, if managed properly, globalization may offer the promise of new markets, new growth, and new opportunities for broadly shared prosperity to young people like Colleen.

Again, here's where the notions of evolution and progress should be explored and celebrated. We're a better, more advanced economy than we were then, and although we have new challenges, we're also better equipped to address the issues of each day with more agility and access to good information than we've seen in the history of the world.

Hillary, however, basically says "This is our world now, and it's not going away. But this world may offer promise to young people." MAY offer promise? Unbelieveably weak assertion, and one which does nothing to center her discussion's framework on the basis of belief. She's stuck on an assumption right now, and hopes you come around to the same conclusion. Sincerely awful sentence construction. And the idea that it's the young people who will maybe see the promise of prosperity? What happened to our current working class just now? Are we just leaving them in our rear-view mirrors?

Even if we accept the framework around that ghastly delivery, wouldn't it make sense to paint a picture of tremendous opportunity, but one in which only the CEOs are truly profiting? Here's Webb again:

When one looks at the health of our economy, it's almost as if we are living in two different countries. Some say that things have never been better. The stock market is at an all-time high, and so are corporate profits. But these benefits are not being fairly shared. When I graduated from college, the average corporate CEO made 20 times what the average worker did; today, it's nearly 400 times. In other words, it takes the average worker more than a year to make the money that his or her boss makes in one day.

What Webb does is drive the wedge between "us" and "them" for the listener, sequestering the CEO class and telling you how fast they're outpacing you over the last 30 years. Even if you're a manager-type, you probably haven't seen more than 5% in a yearly raise in close to ten years, but your CEO can be an abject failure and still collect huge on his way out the door. Republican or Democrat, this is a message that appeals to a sense of "fair" and the moral idea that the deserving aren't just the third-generation blue-blood CEOs born into their place in society.

Jumping ahead with Hillary:

Unfortunately, for the past six years it's as though we've gone back to the era of the robber barons. Year after year the president has handed out massive tax breaks to oil companies, no-bid contracts to Halliburton, tax incentives to corporations shipping jobs overseas, tax cut after tax cut to multimillionaires, while ignoring the needs and aspirations of tens of millions of working families.

And how has he paid for all of this largess? By running up record deficits. He has simply charged it to our national credit card and left our children and grandchildren to pay the bill.

In fact, every baby born today starts like with $29,000 of national debt on his or her tiny shoulders, the largest birth tax in our nation's history.

That's brilliant right there. Tugs on all the right moral and emotional strings, and rightfully accuses those who would take our nation into debt of setting our children up for future failure. The idea of "mortgaging the future" doesn't mean as much as it used to, with Americans carrying huge amounts of mortgage debt without a great deal of consequence (except, you know, that they are tethered to the corporate teat and won't ever see financial freedom with $300k in a home loan), so pushing the debt to a real burden on our children as a tax is the way to sell her message. She should work that into every speech, but only if she can develop plans that don't tax and spend us past the point of reason.

It's also important to understand these policies are consistent with the administration's theory about how we should manage our economy: leave it all up to the individual.

That's why they want to privatize Social Security and let individuals bear the risks. It's why their answer to the health care crisis is limited to creating health savings account, which allows the healthiest people to get the best deal, with little concern if the sickest get worse.

They call it the ownership society. But it's really the "on your own" society.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. You can't go from the huge Republicorporate Machine funnelling our dollars of debt into the pockets of Halliburton to an idea that management of the economy is left up to the individual. Worse yet, you also can't go from saying "things are wrong" to implying that the fault lies with the individual and not the government. I don't think she means to put people out there as their own scapegoat, but here we are...

Jumping ahead again:

(W)e can't restore the American dream unless you're a very visible part of it.

It's time for a new beginning, for an end to government of the few, by the few and for the few, time to reject the idea of an "on your own" society and to replace it with shared responsibility for shared prosperity. I prefer a "we're all in it together" society.

Now, there is no greater force for economic growth than free markets, but markets work best with rules that promote our values, protect our workers and give all people a chance to succeed.

When we get our priorities in order and make the smart investments we need, the markets work well.

Let me reiterate the point I made about welfare above in the context of this argument. The voters to which she is appealing want to be told that they'll have a chance to continue to work for a fair wage, to continue to support their families, and to not have to worry about their health care because these are the things they deserve. Instead of appealing to that sense of "fair," she's appealing to a sense of community, and of sameness.

Which has the greater moral pull? That I should get what I deserve for being a decent and hardworking person, or that my tax dollars should pay for everyone else's problems? Here's Webb again:

In short, the middle class of this country, our historic backbone and our best hope for a strong society in the future, is losing its place at the table. Our workers know this, through painful experience. Our white-collar professionals are beginning to understand it, as their jobs start disappearing also. And they expect, rightly, that in this age of globalization, their government has a duty to insist that their concerns be dealt with fairly in the international marketplace.

You tell the people that used to be able to take care of themselves not that you're going to lump them in with the welfare cases, but that you're going to make sure they are "dealt with fairly in the international marketplace." That's the framework of fair and equitable that appeals to the likely voters.

I read through the rest of the speech, and she actually does a fairly decent job of appealing to the sense of equity when outlining her policies through the remainder. While it's good to see speeches with some meat in them this early in the campaign, Hillary could do a better job of setting up the framework that it's the deserving and hard-working Americans in the middle and lower classes who need a boost, instead of trying to sweep together all of society, even if that is her ultimate goal.

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