I urge everyone on Daily Kos to read ""The Obama Code," a diary today written by George Lakoff. Lakoff is telling Kossacks that many of us, maybe most of us haven't grasped the central point of Obama's Presidency nor his methods to build consensus.
If you have already read it, read it again. I discovered some really exciting ideas in Lakoff's diary, and my thoughts are below the fold. They are less important than his. But, I have written meta diaries like this beforew, and I can't help myself. So, think of this as a rave review for a book, except the book is a DKos diary.
1. Students or Teachers?
I'm putting The Obama Code on the wall in my studio to remind me that it's no longer enough for me to be "progressive." I need to be a student again so I can learn to effectively help the President achieve what we all agree needs to be done. On this site, we want to be teachers, agitators, leaders. Lakoff says we still have much to learn. I'm humbled by his intellect.
In the Christian Bible, Jesus spoke in parables to explain the inexplicable. Lincoln did the same in his political speeches. Obama has mastered this as well. George Lakoff has identified what I hadn't, and he has explained it so I can understand it. Obama's overarching meassage isn't in his day to day statements, nor even in his speeches. His message is implicit rather than explicit.
I have never been able to articulate what excites me so much about Barack Obama. I have tried to explain him to others by describing his calmness. He is incredibly relaxed, in the way only a person who has nothing to hide can be relaxed. In person, he is preternaturally centered. He is clear. He is articulate. He is brilliant. He is disarmingly charming. He is determined and focused like a champion athlete.
This all sounds ridiculously juvenile because I'm describing impressions rather than substance. But, what would people who had listened to Lincoln at the Cooper Union speech have said about him? Would they have said, "he was pretty OK?" No, they were mesmerized - and I'm talking about people who walked in to that speech assuming Lincoln was a hayseed that told railsplitter jokes. They left buzzing about a man of substance.
2. When is talk important?
Obama is very like Lincoln in this sense. His 2004 convention speech accomplished the same thing Lincoln's speech did. It told a lot of people something about the man more than his oratorical skill. Obama's inaugural speech was dismissed at the time as something close to failure because it didn't soar like his campaign speeches did.
Lakoff disagrees. The quote in the diary from Obama's inaugural speech is telling. Lakoff says:
Take a look at the inaugural speech. Empathy: “the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job, the firefighter’s courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child…” Responsibility to ourselves and others: “We have duties to ourselves, the nation, and the world.” The ethic of excellence: “there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of character, than giving our all to a difficult task.” They define our democracy: “This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed.”
Lincoln's Gettysburg Address was reported at the time by the press as, "the President also spoke."
We may look back on Obama's first inaugural speech as historical. 2,000,000 people will be able to say, "I was there." I didn't understand at the time the political and intellectual power in Obama's words, but Lakoff did.
3. The cognitive unconscious and empathy
Lakoff explains the "Obama Code" with a linguistic term called "the cognitive unconscious." To understand it, you need to read his diary, but it's not hard to see he is right when he says that Obama's expression of his political philosophy is indirect, that the philosophy behind his strategies is a unified vision of empathy, which is what binds us together as Americans, and binds Progressives together on this site.
Lakoff's theory reminds me that my impulses on a couple of current issues may be right, even though they are not the most "progressive" positions I could take.
For instance, I believe that sending a few thousand more troops to Afghanistan is something we should withhold judgement about until we learn what the overall policy turns out to be.
I think the determination of the President to treat his political enemies as friends is also the correct choice. It's maddening to watch someone accept blows like a Zen Master without returning them, but that is what Obama is doing in the early part of his Presidency. What it will do, I now believe, is sap the right of their energy to fight.
We all need to be students of the President. He is working hard to teach us where we have been misguided just as much as he is teaching our foes the same thing. If we continue to fret over every news cycle, bemoan every wingnut idea or allow our individual passions and priorities to overshadow our commitment to national renewal, we run the risk of failing our own cause.
4. The Prestige
In a magic trick, the final part is called "the prestige." It is the part of a trick that goes beyond where you can imagine it could go. The prestige is what makes the trick special. Prestige is also how we describe something of value, especially culturally.
Lakoff's last point is that we need a national progressive establishment that can counter the "noise machine." We all know this. That's why we're here, and that's why we are working to make the Democratic Party more progressive. For our policies and points of view to develop the "prestige" of being considered common knowledge among regular civilians, our very best chance is for us to learn what the President is trying to teach us, that coalitions aren't monolithic, but can be elastic, so we are unafraid to work with people we disagree with on things we DO agree with them on, and with others on other issues where the same is true.
Lakoff says that the Obama Code tells us to compartmentalize our passions and learn to ignore labels in order to identify allies within the opposition. As "the reality based community" it makes sense that we can learn this before wingnuts can.
So, let's try.