Sorry if a dupe, but this guy has it. It is all about "framing" the

[harrison]

issues. This guy says what I have been thinking a long time. The Dems need to get it together.

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It is all about language.So if you go on Fox News -- "fair and balanced" -- two liberals, two conservatives, and one commentator who is asking the questions, and the question is, "Are you in favor of the President’s tax relief program or are you against it?" -- it doesn’t matter what you say. If you say, "I’m against tax relief," you’re still evoking that framing. You’re still in their frame, and all that it automatically brings with it: what kinds of policies are good, who is bad, and so on. That’s how Fox News works. It frames the issues from a conservative perspective. Once the issue is framed, if you accept the framing, if you accept the language, it’s all over.

BuzzFlash: Howard Dean is being criticized because it is considered political suicide to roll back tax cuts ("to roll back tax relief," as the right wing and the Bush administration call it). Would it be an example of good Democratic framing to say he doesn’t want to roll back tax cuts; he wants to promote community enrichment and community growth? And that to do that, he’s going to need more participation and support from members of the American community.

George Lakoff: Not good enough. You have to provide another, progressive understanding of taxation. And you also have to make it very, very clear that there’s a basic problem here. Cognitive scientists call it the problem of hypocognition. That means that you actually lack some of the complex ideas that you need. Not every important idea is already out there, with a name. Not every important idea has become normal and conventional. Sometimes you have to talk for a while to explain what a particular idea is, and you have to come up with language for it. By the way, this was also true of conservatives. They have been working at it for 30 years to develop their language.

http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/04/01/int04003.html