FRAMESHOP

New Site Design!

Jeffrey Feldman — 2011-10-12T11:34:42-04:00

As of October 12, 2011, the url "http://www.frameshopisopen.com" will no longer link to the Typepad version for Frameshop, but will link to an upgraded version of the site at Wordpress.com.

The new Wordpress format was chosen to better serve the growing number of readers who interact with Frameshop via smartphones and tablet computers, and to make sure that the site emphasis on legibility and ease of sharing keeps pace with changes in social media.

The new site theme is from my favorite web designer: Khoi Vinh. When I first started frameshop, I contacted Khoi and asked him if he would design the site for me. As it happens, he was a little busy becoming a leading figure in his industry. Fast forward six years--Khoi's original grid-system layout blog template is now available for Wordpress clients. Game, set, match.

It will take some time to move all posts over accurately from Typepad to the Wordpress system. Also, given the way Google indexing works, I want to avoid the problem of ghost pages in Google searches (pages that show up in Google, but then lead to a dead end because the original site is no longer online).

For those of you with bookmarks, the new wordpress url is: http://jeffreyfeldman1.wordpress.com

Also: the new site offers two different page styles for users reading from smartphones--as well as the option to use a "flip" format when viewing from a tablet. Both formats are intuitive, easy to use, and optimized for small/touch screens. And you can easily switch back and forth to standard web view.

This will give on-the-hoof Frameshop readers more options.

Finally: ads are gone. Over the past year, ads have no longer brought in enough revenue to justify the design clutter they dropped on the site. Ergo: so long, ads--thanks for all the fish.

Anybody who is still wishes to sponsor Frameshop--a decision I endorse with gusto--drop me an email and we'll work something out that fits elegently and effectively into the new site.

When a Message is Clear, but Some Don't Get It

Jeffrey Feldman — 2011-10-05T20:54:02-04:00

If you have been following the Occupy Wall Street movement (OWS), by now you have heard the question "What is the message?"--posed sometimes nicely, often aggressively. This is often followed by some variation of "they have no message."

Let me clear this up right now, because the message of this first stage of OWS has been crystal clear. The message is: "Join us." Also, that message has been received from sea to shining sea, as the saying goes. The proof is in the pudding, or in this case: the proof is in the fact that the one OWS event has not spread to dozens of events and marches, with many more in the offing.

But wait a sec: if I get this, and you get this, why are so many people not getting this?

The Message in "What's the Message?"

Back up for a second and think about this scenario.

Has anyone ever asked you "What's the point of Facebook?" I get this question all the time and it is maddening to try to answer. There is no good answer to this question because the question itself already contains an answer. In general form, the questioner is saying: "I do not support [x]," only they are saying it in question form. These questions are in fact criticisms masked as invitations to clarify. "Want to know what Facebook is about?" I always respond,"Try it. If it's for you, you'll get it right away." This answer typically elicits the real response lurking behind the question, which is some anti-social media variation of "Hey, you kids, get off my lawn!"

Now back to "What's the message?"

From its inception, the Occupy Wall Street movement has been confronted by a very similar "I do not support [x]" question posed as: "What is the message of Occupy Wall Street?" This question is posed earnestly by some, less so by others--there is a wide range.

There is nothing wrong with a new movement--a movement in the process of taking shape--that initially makes sense to some people, but not to others.

Why do some people just get what is going on with OWS while others are resistant to it? Why do some people get Facebook while others do not? Because it (e.g., Facebook, OWS, whatever) is in their immediate framework of understanding. Clearly, many people get that the first message of OWS is "Join us." Many people, therefore, are inside the same framework and, therefore, are able to understand each other as this new kind of political activity takes place.

At the same time, many people see OWS happening, but they do not get it it yet--or they get it and disagree with it or think they get it and think they disagree with it or they see it and hate it. These people are in a different frame of reference. Maybe they will eventually join others in the framework that has allowed others to unify and join each other at the level of political action, maybe not.

The "Injustice" Frame

The reason people get OWS when they engage it either at the level of joining at street-level or engaging via some other avenue (i.e., online discussion, etc.) has to do with a broad frame of reference for a range of political and economic events that we can call: the injustice frame.

The injustice rame means that people see a broad range of phenomenon--government, economy, environment, social welfare, foreign policy, consumer habits, political ideology, history, media, etc.--all through a very broad lens of injustice.

People already seeing current politics or the economy through the lens of the injustice frame will tend to get what is happening in OWS while people seeing things from another frame will tend not to get OWS.

Look at the signs at the events and they all tie back to the injustice frame. The point of these signs that the media has ridiculed as "not having a core message" is twofold: (1) emphasize the broad frame of injustice as a way of seeing the current American situation and to declare a simple message to anyone watching (2) "Join us" (see above).

Before cohering to media-ready messages, "injustice" for OWS has produced a core set of principles: full participation, fairness, responsibility, equality. It has also identified a core set of problems troubling our political and economic system: greed, unchecked corporate power, government corruption.

Thus, beyond that basic frame and broad message, the OWS activities have focused more or less on a specific kind of injustice as a core principle: economic injustice.

OWS expressions of economic injustice frame can be seen in widespread use of phrases in both casual conversation in and around street level events and discussion online.

The phrases "corporate greed" and "we are the 99%" are both messages emphasizing economic injustice. These phrases do not carry specific policy demands--yet--so much as they are used to invoke a broad frame about the lack of fairness crippling our current economic and political systems. And, since they are secondary messages, they are also meant to invoke the broad message of OWS so far: Join us.

But what about people who already see or politics and economy through a broad frame of injustice, but do still do not "get" OWS? Many of these people are very committed to leftist politics already via other organizations, including the presidential election campaign, non-profits, fundraising and so forth.

Why do people who agree at a broad level with arguments about injustice still not get it?

Participation Must be an "Affordable" Alternative

This question is actually much more interesting than the "What's your message?" stuff being peppered by the media.

Online discussions in particular are rife with people 100% committed to fighting economic injustice, but who just cannot find a way of seeing OWS as anything other than a distraction from the actual fight against injustice.

Fair enough.

Some people will just disagree with the premise or style of OWS as a form of political engagement. Still others will not see corporate greed as a problem to be dealt with at a systemic level, so much as a hiccup to be treated.

Has America driven into a ditch of economic and political injustice completely or do we just have a small chip in windshield? People who disagree with the extent of the problem will disagree with OWS. Not everyone agrees with everything.

But some people agree and still do not get it for a different reason: affordability

By "affordability" I do not mean the dollar cost of understanding OWS, but the cost in terms of what one must give up to participate. In particular: how much time does it take for a person to come to a point of participating in OWS or just getting it?

All political actions that require participation run into this problem of affordability, but OWS is bumping up against it big time. And not surprisingly.

Camp out for weeks on end in a public square? The people who can do this are few and far between, initially. In fact, more people have time than believe they do. So, convincing people that they can participate is a top, if not "number one" priority at this stage.

Who can afford to participate and get OWS initially? People whose time is not otherwise committed are the first category. This is because a 24-hour-per-day occupation is a huge time expense. In fact, while the OWS organizers have been very good at solving the problem of affording food and other necessities, they are still having some trouble figuring out how to make the time commitment more affordable to more people.

But affordability is not just an issue relating to participation, but also relating to understanding meaning. Who can afford to understand the meaning of OWS so far? The answer is: not very many journalists.

Some journalists are predisposed to reject OWS because of where they work. Most journalists, though, may want to get it, but simply cannot afford to take the time to do so. A journalist's time is beset with deadline demands that make even a minimum commitment to understanding current political events often unaffordable.

Then again, even the wealthiest journalists in terms of time to spend understanding, may not be willing to spend the time to understand.

This week, however, there has been a big change in the coverage. The initial protest was quickly dismissed by many newsrooms as a "hippie" event. Now that the protest has reproduced all over the country, journalist are relating to it as a political even "of national significance." The success of the message "join us"--which has lead to more protests--has resulted in bringing in more journalists even if those journalists do not think they understand the message...yet.

Stay tuned. Soon enough, even journalists who claim they do not get what is happening because OWS has not produced formal policy positions--they will spend more and more time flushing out the details of the protest. Because as the OWS movement grows, the cost of ignoring it also grows.

(Note: Keep in mind throughout these Frameshop discussions that I am not an OWS leader. I am writing these posts from my office, not from Zuccotti Park or any other protest location. The ideas in this post are my own and were not developed in the context of a general assembly or working group.)

New Focus: Occupy Wall Street

Jeffrey Feldman — 2011-10-05T11:29:19-04:00

Like all of you, I have been watching the events unfold across the country under the general rubric "Occupy Wall Street." Rarely am I ever mistaken for a street-level activist--and for good reason, but I confess to being very inspired by what I see. And so, without claiming any mantle of leadership or authority, I will devote the next round of Frameshop posts to Occupy Wall Street (OWS).

Long-time readers of Frameshop will also note that it has been some time since the site content has been updated. I have been very active both writing and commenting via Twitter (#JeffreyFeldman) and have opted over the past few years to post my original work on The HuffingtonPost. Also, I have been fortunate to find a new audience via regular appearances on CBC television. Altogether, I chose to transition Frameshop from a day-to-day source of engagement with politics to a resource for those looking to understand issues deeper via the past work on the site.

But current events have drawn me back to the work of wrestling with the language and ideas at the heart of American politics. In a nutshell: We're back.

To new readers joining us from Twitter, HuffPo and CBC--welcome! To familiar faces who have been with us all along--welcome back!

As always, I apologize in advance for any technical glitches on the site. My blogging habits have evolved over the past year and, frankly, I'm not sure if Typepad has evolved with me. So far it seems good, and the clarity of the old site design still seems to make sense to me. I may make some changes, however, as we move forward and will be sure to let you know along the way.

Also, to those who know me and my writing habits: type edits are always appreciated when caught by readers with better eyes for detail than myself. Please feel free to note edits in the comments. All I ask is that you do it as briefly as possible. No drama, please. Typos do not mean an author is unprofessional or lacks character and telling me something along those lines will have zero impact on the future of typos on this site. I do my best.

Formalities completed--next post will take up the substance at hand: Occupy Wall Street.

Speaking in Yellow: The Crisis in Our Politics

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-09-03T11:50:06-04:00

Lately, American politics is neither blue nor red, but yellow.

Like the "yellow journalism" that plagued the turn of the last century, this new era of Gilded Age politics has been overrun by obscene exaggerations and outright falsehoods, all whipped into national hysteria by newsrooms that long-ago swapped research method for PR wave moxie.

Most of this yellow journalism, of course, flows from a few for-profit news corporations seeking to make money by keeping their readers in a constant frenzy. William Randolph Hearst, allow me to introduce you to Rupert Murdoch.

As you might have noticed, however, media induced frenzy in the age of newsboys in shorts is like a codeine stupor compared to the cocaine jolt of cable news with a Facebook-Twitter chaser. It seems quaint these days to even call the news cycle "24/7." The last plague of yellow journalism grew from big headlines and front page stories. Today's yellow journalism thrives in second-by-second updated web and social media where sensationalism reproduces faster than bacteria in a middle school gym locker. Today, yellow stories overwhelm the actual issues before any real ink hits actual paper.

And with this kind of speed, today's yellow journalism instantly engulfs any political issue it wants. The border between yellow journalism and yellow politics is, as a result, a distinction without much of a difference.

Most of us probably cannot remember the last time we debated, let alone acted upon, a national issue devoid of yellow politics.

Taxes? Tea Party! Health care? Nazi extermination! Environment? Global conspiracy! Afghanistan? Collusion with terrorists! Education? War on Christmas! Economy? Socialist takeover! Manufacturing? Communist takeover! Family? Homosexual takeover! Urban planning? Muslim terrorists!

And on, and on. There is no end to this new run of yellow politics. And as a result, we have become a nation that does nothing--a nation that can do nothing, apparently, but keep churning through yellow stories.

Think about it: Are any of the current debates on the issues that concern our future actually happening in terms of red vs. blue anymore?

Supposedly, FOX News is the broadcast voice of red America. But tune in, lately, and the programming is all yellow.

Glenn Beck tells us that on the issue of healthcare, Americans should not be debating actual programs or solutions, but whether or not our government is totalitarian. He says much the same for the rest of the issues we face. And his viewers do just that. Yellow, yellow, and more yellow.

At last week's speaking tour event Beck billed a "rally," his viewers demonstrated what it sounds like when American's speak 100% fluent yellow.

To speak yellow, one need only replace the actual issues that face our current government (i.e., levy vs. do not levy taxes, public vs. private education, war vs. diplomacy, etc.) with hyperbolic imaginary stories. Replace red and blue with yellow.

How should we pay for Social Security? Obama is a Communist!

What should be America's foreign policy in Central Asia? Obama is a secret Muslim!

What kind of energy policy should we craft to transition from oil to renewables? Obama blew up Deep Water Horizon to pass his radical agenda!

Do you have any evidence proving any of these fantastical conspiracies to be even remotely true? God bless Glenn Beck!

Nobody can argue with a person speaking entirely in yellow because there is nothing to argue against. It's like with a bag of marshmallows.

And yet, while FOX News, Beck, Limbaugh and most of the Newscorp-cum-Clear Channel business sector are a driving force behind the yellowing of our politics, they are not the only force.

Since running for Vice President and quitting her job as Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin has cultivated the extraordinary power to turn any political issue yellow by the simple act of updating her Facebook status (a remarkable feat when you think about it).

For years, for example, Republicans and Democrats debated the best way forward on healthcare reform. Now, Sarah Palin updates her Facebook status and--death panels! Suddenly, we are all speaking in yellow.

For months, FOX News discussed the merits of having new "moderate" Muslim leaders in and around the World Trade Center neighborhood in New York. Now, Sarah Palin updates her Facebook status and--ground zero mosque! Suddenly, we are all speaking yellow.

And what is the result of this sudden onset of yellow? For starters, the people pushing yellow are making a mountain of cash doing it.

In the time since she stepped down from her job as Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin has amassed a staggering $13 million, and the money keeps flowing. Tens of millions of dollars for typing sensationalist lies into her Facebook status line? There are a few more steps involved (i.e., speaking fees, book advances, reality show contracts, etc.), but the engine that drives the Palin gravy train runs on high octane yellow.

If this keeps up, Sarah Palin will be the first politician in history to successfully ride the yellow wave from total obscurity to mega millionaire media mogul. And once she hits that thresh hold (say, $25 million), Palin's yellow fortune will be large enough to buy her some legitimate credentials: a Senate seat, perhaps?

How do we get out of this cycle? How do we stem the tide of yellow?

Well, the last wave of yellow journalism to sweep the country ended when the country twice voted for FDR, against the hysterical warnings on the pages of newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst. With the wind kicked out of his yellow business model by a President willing to push populism and strong reforms, Hearst's yellow empire faded quickly.

I am not so sure the same thing would happen, today. And yet, it sure would be great for the country if it did.

Imagine if President Obama--elected on a groundswell of popular optimism and youthful energy for tackling real issues with real action--imagine if he were to suddenly find his fighting voice. Imagine if he were to draw the line and push back against the yellow tide drowning the country.

"Epic" would be too small a word.

What the President needs to do is remind us ally what issues are really at stake. And he can do that by focusing debate relentlessly on the core symbolic issues we face and the practical choices stemming from them. No more splitting hairs. No more worrying about swing voters. These are the stakes. This is what's real. This is what we must do.

He has ended the war in Iraq, now he must bring the fight at home--the fight against yellow politics.

We need to hear from the President more, much more, on the everyday issues that concern us. We need to see him speaking passionately and often, away from DC, outside of the backroom negotiation tables. He needs to become, again, a voice so big and a story so large that the yellow voices will seem puny again by comparison. Sure, Sarah Palin will probably make more cash along the way, but so be it. Without the President stepping up to lead national debate, yellow will continue to overrun the levies until we are all drowning.

The crisis in American politics is clear: Either we stop speaking in yellow or America should accept its fate as a nation that can do nothing--that will do nothing.

Either we do what is necessary to return to real issues and meaningful action in our politics or: marshmallows, as far as the eye can see.

And that is a fate we can, and should, avoid.

Conspiracy Tea Served Up As Constitutionalism

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-03-28T18:47:09-04:00

Probably the most oft-heard refrain from the Tea Party adherents is a vague, undefined notion that by dressing up in costumes, shouting and spitting at members of Congress, they are somehow acting in defense of the United States Constitution. Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin (de facto prom king and queen of the Tea Party) are forever claiming that their protestations against "big government" and taxes hail from a deep reverence for the Constitution, which they say has been victimized--indeed, mortally assaulted by Democrats under the guise of economic reform.

Is the Tea Party movement "constitutional" or is it something else?

Are we really supposed to believe, for example, that Glenn Beck (a shock jock with no legal training whatsoever) and Sarah Palin (a celebrity-cum-failed-politician known for celebrating her own ignorance of U.S. history and civics) somehow have an understanding of those aspects of the U.S. Constitution that, say, would come into play when the mandate to purchase health insurance was extended to the States in 2014?

To even ask that question is to immediately grasp how ridiculous the claim is that the Tea Party movement is somehow defending the Constitution.

Tossing aside the word "Constitution," a much better word to describe Tea Party politics would be "conspiratorial."

If we take this word "conspiracy" and we hold onto it while we look at the latest coverage of the Tea Party rallies in Searchlight, Nevada or Washington, DC, we begin to see more clearly what holds together this movement.

What Tea Partier's share is not an understanding of the founding document defining the form and function of our system of government. What they share is an embodied sense that the United States government has been "taken over" by a conspiratorial movement. Where other Americans still a government operating within the framework of the Constitution, the Tea Party activists see a government whose every lever has been gripped by the many hands of conspiracy. To be a Tea Party activist filled with enough rage to lean back and spit in the face of an elected official is to know in your bones that "Constitution" has been displaced by "conspiracy"--and your job is to kick the conspiracy out and put the "Constitution" back in place.

If you ask: which aspects of the Constitution have been compromised, Tea Party members inevitably respond with the word "Taxes." But if you point out that the Constitution Clause of the U.S. Constitution allows for exactly the kind of economic reforms the government has enacted during the Obama administration--indeed it allows for reforms even stronger--the TEa Partier inevitably responds with another word: "lies."

To talk about the Constitution in any detail with a Tea Party member results, in fact, with little more than an accusation that you (or I) are part of the conspiracy, part of the lies. Tea Party activists are convinced at a deep emotional level that the conspiracy now running the government has been perpetrated by tyranny, masked as justice--evil, masked as good.

There is, in other words, a circular and nonsensical kind of argument that is characteristic of the Tea Party: either you believe the conspiracy exists--or you are part of it.

"Conspiracy" and "Constitution."

It would be fascinating, for example, if a journalist were to put Sarah Palin in a position of having to explain which aspects of the Commerce Clause she felt the recent health insurance regulation bill violated. If Sarah Palin claims to be the leader of a Constitutional movement, she should have no trouble explaining her position on the Commerce Clause.

Here, for example, is a law professor Mark Hall explaining why the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the Constitutional power of Congress to tax income, easily allows for the health insurance mandate:

Constitutional attacks fall into two basic categories: (1) lack of federal power (Congress simply lacks any power to do this under the main body of the Constitution); and (2) violation of individual rights protected by the “Bill of Rights.” Considering (1), Congress has ample power and precedent through the Constitution’s “Commerce Clause” to regulate just about any aspect of the national economy. Health insurance is quintessentially an economic good. The only possible objection is that mandating its purchase is not the same as “regulating” its purchase, but a mandate is just a stronger form of regulation. When Congressional power exists, nothing in law says that stronger actions are less supported than weaker ones. An insurance mandate would be enforced through income tax laws, so even if a simple mandate were not a valid “regulation,” it still could fall easily within Congress’s plenary power to tax or not tax income. (http://bit.ly/9P483O)

Some individuals may not agree with the mandate, but the Constitution allows for this kind of regulation, such that arguments to the contrary certainly will not stand up to Judicial scrutiny.

As you might have guessed, though: if you so much as try to make this argument to a Tea Party activist, they will respond that you and Prof. Hall are both part of the conspiracy.

This leads to an interesting conclusion about the nature and makeup of the average Tea Party activists: if a deep understanding and reference for the U.S. Constitution is not what draws them to the streets, what does? The answer seems to be: a tendency among certain Americans, often deeply ingrained, to buy into the idea that the world is run by hidden cabals.

Is it any wonder, then, that these Tea Party events have drawn in people whose lives are steeped in other conspiracy theories besides the most recent health care taxation plot?

Other conspiracy theorists at Tea Party events include gun rights conspiracists (who think the government is conspiring to take away their guns), anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists (who think Jews are conspiring to take over the world financial system), racist conspiracy theorists (who think blacks are conspiring to take over white America), Christian conspiracy theorists (who think non-Christians are conspiring to destroy Christianity)--and so on.

The racism and outbursts of violent rhetoric at Tea Party rallies that has shocked Americans has been a product of all these various forms of conspiracy theory merging into one cacophonous mass of screaming voices. Some of these conspiracy theorists are drawn in by the vague talk about defending the Constitution, but many more are just there because they find a common way of speaking about nefarious plots threatening the world.

The sad reality is, however, that conspiracy theory makes for good TV, which means it is very unlikely that anyone in the mainstream media will ever sit people like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck down and force them to answer questions about the Constitution they claim to be defending. Beck and Palin have become experts at stoking people's sense that the conspiracy is not just out there, but that it is just minutes away from breaking down the door and dragging us all off to the gulag. And for those whose lives are saturated with conspiracy theories, consuming the rhetoric of Palin and Beck is not unlike an alcoholic slipping into a bottle of gin: it consumes them.

How to stop all this?

At every step, the media and elected officials need to stand up and refute the idea that the Tea Party is about the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution not only allows for economic regulation and taxation, but the health and prosperity of our nation depends on those very aspects of the Constitution being faithfully applied. If we are willing to toss away our faith in the constitution because a bunch of conspiracists are standing on street corners shouting, that would be bitter tea indeed.

GOP Leaders Match Up Message to Violent Talk

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-03-24T14:46:37-04:00

Words matter--and they matter even more when they are violent words. Apparently, GOP leadership agrees.

Despite the unwillingness of mainstream media to connect the dots, the base and leadership of the GOP are matching their rhetoric to the disturbing rise of violent talk at Tea Party rallies and amongst conservative anti-government groups. The conclusion: rather than recoil at violent language, GOP leadership seems to see it as a chance to turn out votes.

Most notably, Chairman of the RNC, Michael Steele, issued a recent call to Republicans to put Nancy Pelosi on the “firing line” because of the health insurance reform bill.

By using the phrase “firing line,” Steele encourages Republican activists to think of the next election as an execution of the opposition or a violent killing. The language Steele uses is not neutral. “Defeat” is defined as “kill.” “Voting” is linked to “shooting.” Winning the election is couched in an image of bloodletting.

In a similar violent vein, Sarah Palin via Twitter told her Republican followers to “reload” and “aim for” Democrats, directing GOP activists to her SarahPac website where they found a map of the country festooned with rifle scope cross-hairs over Congressional districts held by Democrats.

Palin’s rifle scope map is the kind of image one might expect to see in an ad for a violent, first-person shooter video game. Again, neither the language nor the imagery Palin uses are neutral. For Palin, the concepts of political “organizing” and “volunteering” are recast as the functions of a rifle. “Campaigning” is re-imagined as a counter assault on a war battlefield. Even more disturbing, Palin re-imagines the traditional U.S. map as a military kill list. Engaging in election politics is framed as violent assault.

When seen in the context of this violent rhetoric by the highest-profile figures in the Republican Party, recent calls for gun violence seen at Tea Party rallies on Capital Hill take on new meaning.

If the GOP leadership is truly appalled by calls for violence in response to legislation passed in Congress, their language would reflect that abhorrence for violence. Instead, GOP leadership seems to be shaping their messages to match the violent turn in the rhetoric from their base.

Even more disturbing, however, the violent framing from GOP leadership has suddenly sprung up in a context where anti-government conservative groups are inciting their members to engage in physical acts of violence against Democrats, resulting in bricks being thrown through windows of Democratic Party offices and vandalism against the house of a Democratic Congressman’s family member.

Mike Vanderboegh, former leader of the Alabama Constitutional Militia, recently called for hundreds of thousands of gun owners to "point their muzzles at the hearts of tyrants" when discussing ways to oppose recent congressional legislation. Reports have come out linking Vanderboegh's statements to recent violence against Democratic Party offices.

What should be done?

First and foremost: The mainstream media has an obligation to connect the sudden use of violent rhetoric and imagery by GOP leadership to the various incidents of violent language and actions by political activists. Telling viewers that right-wing violence is “isolated” or “fringe” is inaccurate at best, misleading and dishonest at worst.

Second: GOP leadership needs to make unequivocal statements condemning all explicit use of violence and violent rhetoric in politics. Silence is consent.

Third: GOP leadership needs to demonstrates constructive ways for their supporters to express their disagreement with the opposition’s ideas or legislation. Brandishing weapons--either literally or on posters--is not constructive. Death threats are not constructive.

When Americans threaten to use firearms to enforce their political views, the violent threats carried by that language undermines the system of public debate on which our system depends. Healthy political debate can sustain a great deal of anger and passion, but it cannot sustain repeated threats of violence and calls for violent assault as a form of political engagement.

It is time to for right-wing political violence to stop before passions turn to bloodshed.

Do Doctors in America Turn Away the Uninsured?

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-02-26T12:00:40-05:00

If President Obama's health care summit revealed anything in the long hours of partisan whining, it was a fundamental difference in the crisis that each side believes is on the table for Congress to solve. Democrats spoke to a national humanitarian crisis caused by an industry run amok, while Republicans talked of a series of consumer obstacles caused by government meddling in the market place. Who is correct?

To believe the Republicans, one would be forced to accept the central claim they make over and over and over again: anyone at anytime can go to a doctor and be treated irrespective of insurance coverage or financial circumstances.

Is this claim true? Are the uninsured denied care upon going to a doctor?

The answer is: yes--the uninsured are denied care by doctors all the time. How this denial of care happens, however, is something that nobody in Congress or the media has bothered to discuss on the public stage, despite the fact that it is one of the most common and banal evils of our democracy.

To see how patients are denied care by doctors, we must begin by exorcising from our heads the Norman Rockwell painting many of us carry around in our heads--the painting of a boy sitting in the office of a country doctor. For about the past 40 years, "going to the doctor" in America has not had much in common with the nostalgic image of a ruddy-cheeked old man putting his stethoscope on the chest of a nervous teenage boy. That kind of simple and direct interaction between doctor and patient did happen in the past--I vaguely remember it when I was a boy in the early 70s. But it has been a long, long time since things were that simple.

Nowadays, to get into the room with a doctor, we must first make it past the system each practice sets up to weed out the paying customers from those who cannot pay. This often humiliating experience begins with a phone call to the front desk of the doctor's office.

The person who works behind that front desk is in charge of two tasks: (1) ascertaining how the patient is going to pay for the appointment and (2) fitting the patient into the doctor's schedule of appointments--in that order. Barring some personal connection, nobody in America can get a doctor's appointment without getting past the hurdle of payment maintained by the receptionist in charge of maintaining it.

To determine if we can pay for an appointment, the receptionist asks first for insurance plan information. Even if we have insurance, that may not be enough to see the doctor because at this point we may find out that this doctor's office only accepts patients with certain insurance plans. If our plan is accepted, we can move forward, if not, we move on to the next hurdle.

If we are uninsured or our insurance plan is not accepted by this clinic, the receptionist then asks for a valid credit card to cover the cost of the appointment. If we have a valid credit card, we give it to the receptionist and we can move forward. If not, we move on to the next hurdle.

In the absence of a valid credit card, some medical practices will allow us to pay for the appointment in advance using cash. If we can pay, we must go to the office and do so, whereupon we can get an appointment. Many doctor's offices, however, do not allow cash payment because most appointments involve an element of the unknown in terms of final cost. Because of this, "payment in cash" is often allowed only if a patient can guarantee the payment with a credit card number: a deal breaker for many people. Therefore, if we do not have enough money to pay cash in advance and a credit card to back it up, we move on to the next hurdle.

At this point, the receptionist will likely suggest another practice or an emergency room visit.

We have not been denied care by a doctor, in other words, but we have not really made it anywhere near the doctor, yet, either. Instead, we must now head down to the local hospital emergency room and get treated there. Since we cannot pay cash at the emergency room anymore than we could pay at the doctor's office, we will be treated by virtue of laws put in place to recover from state and federal government some of the costs of an unpaid emergency room visit. We will go home treated, but we will not have established any kind of relationship to a doctor. Most likely, we will have been treated by an overworked and under-appreciated medical resident 72 hours into a 48-hour shift.

In some cases, a medical practice who determines a patient is unable to pay will allow a patient to talk to the doctor briefly, either in the doctor's office, in the waiting room, or briefly over the phone.   An uninsured and non-paying patient making it into the examination room, however, is possible, although unlikely.

This is not a comment on the individual character of doctors in America, today. Most doctors are selfless and service-oriented: good people with a desire to use their skills to improve people's lives no matter what the cost.

But doctors have a larger concern that most often mitigates their ability to exercise this direct kind of care for any patient who comes their way regardless of financial circumstances. Doctors, today, erect a barrier between themselves and their patients because their ability to treat their covered and paying patients depends on their ability to keep the doors of their medical business open.   And so, in order to protect their practice, doctors must look for ways to minimize, if not eliminate altogether, the financial losses to their businesses incurred by treating patients with no means to pay.

Good people, with good hearts, often build business in which they surround themselves with heartless bureaucrats tasked with guarding the gate and protecting the bottom line. And that is often the case with doctors.

The receptionist who is paid to keep uninsured and non-paying patients from entering the doctor's examination room is one of those barriers. Patients, however, also develop internal barriers--psychological hurdles--that keep them away from the doctor.

Americans who lose their health insurance coverage often do not even bother to try to make appointments at the doctor's office out of concern that to do so will risk financial ruin or humiliation.

Since it is not possible to put a limit on how much a doctor's office can charge to a credit card, patients are often worried that giving a doctor a credit card could result in tens of thousands of dollars in charges, unexpectedly. Rather than thinking of doctors as people who can and want to help them--the way most doctors see themselves--tens of millions of Americans think of doctors as financial predators to be avoided at all costs.

Likewise, the pain of having to admit one's own indigent status in the course of making an appointment is often too much for proud Americans to bear. And so they stay away from the doctor.

Is it true, then, as Republicans claim, that nobody has ever been denied care upon going to a doctor? Is this humanitarian crisis in America really just a political fiction as the Republicans would have us believe? Experience and logic lead us to conclude otherwise.

American is packed to the gills with the most skilled and selfless doctors in the world--and millions of Americans, each and every day, despite trying, never make it to the examination room to see them.

Oh, The Vision Thing

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-01-28T10:54:42-05:00

"Oh, the vision thing."

That was the reaction of George H. W. Bush when he was urged to speak to a bigger picture beyond the small pieces of his legislative agenda. They may be strange succor for a Democratic President, but those words hold a crucial lesson and a grim warning for Barack Obama.

The lesson? Articulate a governing vision bold enough to dominate the bare-knuckle brawl of contemporary American politics, or start working on that resume. The warning? George H. W. Bush was the last U.S. President to serve only one-term.

No matter how strong President Obama's performance was in his first State of the Union address--and it was a very strong performance--at best he gave the American public pieces of the puzzle, but did not give voice to his big picture.

Invest in green industry, put people back to work, cut taxes for the middle class, revoke Don't Ask, Don't Tell, drawn down forces in Iraq, limit corporate political donations--yes to all, but why? What is the fundamental story of America in the world that grounds all these individual pieces in an overarching moral logic? After one year in the White House, the President still has not told us.

The consequences for such a glaring sin of omission on the part of the President will be dire.

Namely, because the President has not advanced his own big picture vision, the two competing visions already scrapping it out like angry dogs on the public stage will continue to polarize the electorate, chip away at the President's popularity, and stymie the legislature's ability to get anything done.

The first competing vision is the idea that "government is bad," which hails from the conservative politics of Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and Ron Paul. Since Obama took office, however, this vision has evolved from "government is bad" to "government is tyrannical." Day in and day out, the big story of American government as a tyrannical, even totalitarian force is dumped by the truckload on the public sphere.

The second competing vision is the idea that "Government is good," which hails from the liberal politics of Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, Ralph Nader, and Dennis Kucinich. Since Obama took office, however, this vision has evolved from "government is bad" to "corporations are tyrannical." Day in and day out, the big story of corporations as a tyrannical, even fascist force echoes louder and louder across the political landscape.

Because the Obama administration has neither sided with nor articulated an alternative to these pugilistic political philosophies, all of his legislative items have been and will get caught in the cross fire like innocent bystanders at a road rage shoot out.

When health insurance reform came up, the "government is tyrannical" block argued that Obama's approach represented a "government takeover" of our lives that would lead to a radical loss of freedom. Obama's health care reform was the tip of the spear of an a totalitarian takeover of America, they argued.

On the other side, the "corporations are tyrannical" block argued that Obama's approach to health insurance reform would lead to the end of democracy and the emergence of a corporatist dystopia. Obama's health care reform was the first step in the corporate remaking of America as a feudal state.

Rather than advancing his own vision, President Obama set his reform agenda amidst these two warring ideas--where it was ripped to pieces.

And so it was, and so it will be, for every piece of reform he sends to Congress.

The State of the Union speech, with tens of millions of voters tuned in to listen, could have been the platform where the President once and for all unfurled his own distinct governing vision. But it was not.

Instead of a "the vision thing," the President's State of the Union address was couched in a patriotic theme.

When the going gets tough, as it has in the past, "We don't quit." America is no place for quitters. We succeed because we solve problems. The American spirit is--"resilient."

Part Tony Robbins, part General Patton, the President's narrative theme of "success through tenacity" was crafted to inspire the listener. At that task, he succeeded big. But the opportunity cost of choosing performance pzazz over clear governing vision (he could have done both) was that voters did not walk away with a strong sense of how our individual priorities fit within the future of the nation.

With so many problems to solve, voters will ask, why shouldn't we solve my problems first? Because government seeks to harm you, not help you, answers one side of the fight; because corporations are hurting our future, answers the other side. The only answer from the president is: politics.

What should be his vision? What should be the missing big picture from the President that gives logic and a sense of priorities to his agenda?

The answer, I believe, begins with two of the most basic four-letter words in the American vocabulary: work and land.

The fundamental basis of America is not the getting-and-spending of wealth, but what Franklin Roosevelt once called "the joy and moral stimulation of work." Without work, the foundations of our country, our communities, our families, and ourselves will begin to decay and, ultimately, collapse.

A President's governing vision should be grounded in the ideal of work and that ideal should lead to a substantive agenda of full employment, strong wages and guaranteed health care. And that same vision should fiercely protect in the fullest sense the lives of those now retired, as well as the lives of those who will enter the work force in the future.

At the same time, if we allow our industriousness to destroy the land--if we do not become stewards of the American landscape--then our work is in vain and our lives are meaningless. For hundreds and hundreds of years, the American dream has been rooted in the land. Our drive to cherish that land is not just a stop gap measure, it is the center of who we are as Americans.

A President's governing vision should be rooted in the idea of the American landscape and that ideal should lead to a substantive agenda of new energy innovation, technological innovation, as well as sustainable practices in industry and our day-to-day lives.

Whether government is big or small is not the issue. The issue is whether we have the courage and the drive to enlist every tool at our disposal to build a future guided by the American ideals of work and land.

Prior to his State of the Union Address, President Obama had flirted with the symbolism of work and land, but he had not articulated a bold vision. He has planted an organic garden on the White House lawn, but he has not called for a 21st-Century land ethic to guide or lives.

Likewise, the President has given speeches in factories and proclaimed commitment to putting people back to work, but he has not reached for all the tools at his disposal to create a 21st--Century public works program to restore public confidence.

And so the power of the President's rhetorical performance will elevate us for a short while-a day, maybe a week--but after that, the dueling visions will again take over the public square, the political stalemate will return, and the rising tide of cynicism will wash away more and more American idealism.

To all this, the White House would respond that polling shows 21.58% of the public prefers "pragmatism" to political bickering or that 22.2% of "independent voters" respond positively when the President talks about "solving problems," without siding with one or other ideological battles. To those voices in the White House, I say that one year is a long time in politics--a very, very, very long time. After one year of pushing "pragmatism" justified by polling on swing voters, the results are bad.

An administration that plays to swing votes at the expense of articulating a clear governing vision ends up mired in the very morass it claims to be avoiding. That is precisely where President Obama is now.

So, remember the vision thing, Mr. President, or else--suffer the same fate as those in the past who forgot it.

To Succeed, Obama Must Make "Change" Feel Real

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-01-27T10:20:23-05:00

One year into this administration, a President elected on a slogan of "change" is now faced with calls from every corner of the political landscape that he must change if he is to avoid total failure.

Irony can be so ironic.

Speaking about the public's expectations about Obama, Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico described to the New York Times the difficult task the President must accomplish in his State of the Union address:

The American people want to see that you’re going to make a change, but for the president it’s important that he not shift radically because of one election...He needs to stay the course and not all of the sudden become something that he isn’t. The country was very inspired by Barack Obama— all kinds of voters. He needs to reconnect on that basis.

In other words, President Obama inspired the nation because he symbolized "change," but after one year those same voters are demanding that his version of change is not change at all. Therefore, Obama must find a way to change himself if he wants to reclaim the symbol of positive change.

Whew! What a complicated mess.

The bottom line is that the voters who sought change by electing Obama do not yet feel any change in their lives after one year of his Presidency.

Instead, these former supporters of Obama see a series of changes elsewhere in the country, the result of which is that their enthusiasm for Obama has change into anger at Obama.

In particular, the change Obama supporters see is a strengthening of the place and well-being of large corporations in American society. While corporations have always played a larger role in the American system, many erstwhile Obama enthusiasts feel that corporations became even more powerful and more influential as a result of the President's actions in 2009.

Specifically, most of the anti-corporate anger emerges from the perception that the executive class of larger private and publicly traded companies have dramatically increased their personal wealthy by exercising their influence over government since President Obama took office.

Overall, the new intensity of anger at corporate executives has redefined the meaning of the most central word in Barack Obama's political arsenal.

One year ago, the word "change" in American politics mostly meant "a break from the political leadership of the past." In the 2008 Presidential primaries, when Obama supporters talked of "change" they meant "not Bush" and "not Clinton." Today, when these same voters talk about "change" they mean "not in favor of wealthy corporate executives."

This shifting meaning has caused two large problems for the President in recent weeks.

The first problem is that the White House has has not found an effective way to tap into the anger generated by the new meaning of "change" as it is now being used by a large majority of his base, Obama's support amongst Democrats has plummeted. To address this problem, the President will try to speak out in his State of the Union speech against the recent Supreme Court ruling on corporate spending in politics, but it is not clear that this rhetorical approach will reconnect with his base.

The second problem is that the Republican Party has found a way to tap into the anger generated by this new meaning of "change" and combine it with the different, but also intense anger of the Tea Party movement to win a midterm election. To address this problem, the President will try to argue in his State of the Union Speech that he is a true champion of working families.

Whatever happens in his speech, tonight, it seems unlikely the President will be able to solve the problems "change" is now causing for him in one pass.

To reclaim the high ground on "change," the President must persuade his once fervent supporters to stay with him, and he must deliver policies that lead quickly to a feeling of economic progress in their lives. The only way to accomplish the second part of that equation, is for the President to set down a policy goals of using government resources to put unemployed people back to work within the next 3 to 6 months--an emergency work legislation of the order that FDR created in the last great unemployment crisis of American history.

In this sense, the economic fate of the nation's working families and the political fate of the President are at the same crossroads.

Swing for the Fences, Mr. President!

Jeffrey Feldman — 2010-01-26T12:52:35-05:00

With working families across America in an uproar over the endless nightmare of job losses--with key voting blocks in once Democratic strongholds clamoring after any scrap of decisiveness in recent elections--with the Twittering classes crying out for boldness from the man elected on the promise of once-in-a-lifetime "change"--in the midst of all this, President Obama plans to use his State of the Union address to unfold a series of small-bore middle class tax credits and federal spending cuts.

It's the bottom of the first inning--nobody on, nobody out--and the White House is sending out its biggest hitter to bunt his way onto first base.

If I had one message for the President heading into his speech, tomorrow night, it would be this: Swing for the fences, Mr. President!

Despite what the President's advisers maybe telling him about this or that poll showing movement or persuadability in this or the other right or left leaning Congressional constituency--the problem Barack Obama must overcome in his State of the Union is the perception in the eyes of the public that he is a weak leader.

How did it happen? Who cares. There is no crying in baseball. The only road out of a hitting slump is to swing away. And Obama is in the mother of all slumps.

Whatever speech the President has on his desk right now, he needs to look over every page and make sure there is no bunting anywhere in it on it or near it.

Swing hard, Mr. President. Swing for the fences. Now is the time to hit away.

Early on in the President's first year, Rush Limbaugh hoped that the President would fail. If tomorrow night's State of the Union speech is timid or filled with overly technical tax incentive tinkering, then Limbaugh will have won and the home team will have lost.

Right now, every working man and woman in America has one thing and one thing only on their mind: jobs. Will I keep my job? Will I lose my job? Will I get my job back? What will I do if I go another year without a job?

Bold presidential leadership in the State of the Union speech must make sense in the context of this anxiety-filled national conversation--this endless, fretful, but proud conversation. To be seen and heard as a strong leader, the President's words must not only make sense to, but also resonate with Americans worried about work.

In a recession and a crisis of leadership far worse than the one we are currently witnessing, newly elected Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented the country with a simple, bold message when he delivered his first State of the Union Address in January of 1934.

A year earlier, Roosevelt had told the country that the banks were too greedy and too fearful to lend Americans the money they needed to put people back to work, and yet there were plenty of resources and workers ready to get started. In his State of the Union, he followed up that same, bold theme:

Without regard to party, the overwhelming majority of our people seek a greater opportunity for humanity to prosper and find happiness. They recognize that human welfare has not increased and does not increase through mere materialism and luxury, but that it does progress through integrity, unselfishness, responsibility and justice.

Work was the key to a American progress, Roosevelt explained. Progress through integrity. Progress through unselfishness. Progress through responsibility. Progress through justice.

Beyond the general refrain of progress, FDR specified exactly how his first year in office created and improved job prospects for millions of Americans:

We have made great strides toward the objectives of the National Industrial Recovery Act, for not only have several millions of our unemployed been restored to work, but industry is organizing itself with a greater understanding that reasonable profits can be earned while at the same time protection can be assured to guarantee to labor adequate pay and proper conditions of work. Child labor is abolished. Uniform standards of hours and wages apply today to 95 percent of industrial employment within the field of the National Industrial Recovery Act. We seek the definite end of preventing combinations in furtherance of monopoly and in restraint of trade, while at the same time we seek to prevent ruinous rivalries within industrial groups which in many cases resemble the gang wars of the underworld and in which the real victim in every case is the public itself.

Progress through abolishing child labor. Progress through guaranteed adequate pay. Progress through preventing monopoly. Progress through millions of people back to work.

After one year of trying everything that was pragmatically possible to get people back to work--succeeding at some, failing at others--FDR stood up and in front of Congress and swung for the fences.

Fast forward to the next great economic crisis and the current President must find a similar bold theme again.

To those say that it is too late for "pretty words"--that substantive policy is all that matters now--Obama should calmly, but decisively ignore them. There is no question that a bold vision should be backed up by solid proposals to put people back to work--but that does not mean the President should cede the sphere of public opinion and burn the midnight oil at a policy desk. It means he should speak even bolder, fight even harder.

Bold leadership for a President must transpire in the public arena. Should he bunt at the dais, it matters little if a President swings for the fences back stage, on Air Force One, or in a room full of experts gathered in the Oval Office. What the people see and hear is what makes for Presidential leadership.

And what we need to hear is what the President means by progress. How are we going to lift ourselves out of the self-doubt and fear of unemployment and into a productive future of integrity, unselfishness, responsibility, and justice?

The answer is not by "tax credits" nor any other kind of accounting rhetoric, but by putting people back to work. The future the President must describe, tomorrow night--a future that gives logic and reason to all his substantive proposals--must be one where every American who wants to can and will get back to work.

Tax credits for middle class families and cutting back on special interest waste are both good things. But in a State of the Union Speech at a time of national concern over jobs, they are minor league proposals.

The timeless story of an America standing tall because we are working again--that is the home run Obama should aim to hit.

Swing for the fences, Mr. President! Hit away.