[Mb-civic] Progressives and Democrats: Assert Your Brand!

[ean at sbcglobal.net]

ONE MORE really good essay from Thom Hartmann.  Insightful!  
Pass this on to Howard Dean and the dorky democratic leadership 
please....


Greetings! 
For more of these, check out www.thomhartmann.com and click the 
"articles on democracy" link. And feel free to pass these along to 
others. 
Here's my latest article. 
Thom 
Progressives and Democrats: Assert 
Your Brand! 
Politics is all about branding. And brands are not about issues or 
details - they're about identity. 
When progressives and Democrats think of how Bush voters 
understand the word "Republican," they assume these folks are 
thinking "pro-life"; "moral values"; privatization and deregulation; 
"free trade"; lower taxes; and stripping power from what 
Republicans call "special interests," like labor unions and groups 
advocating rights for women, gays, and other minorities. 
But that's not the picture average Americans think of when they 
hear the words "Republican" or "conservative." 
Instead, like any good brand, the words "Republican" and 
"conservative" evoke feelings as much as pictures. The main feeling 
is one of identity: "My tribe." The main picture is the brand's logo - 
the American flag. At a deeper level, they carry pictures, stories, 
and feelings of NASCAR, Budweiser, the American flag, "standing 
tough" and "standing tall" in the world, and pulling yourself up by 
your bootstraps 
Not only are most Republican voters largely unaware of the details 
of the issues facing our nation, studies show that most are badly 
misinformed. In some part this is the fault of the media, but the 
larger reason is that when a person has bonded to a brand, it 
becomes part of their identity. They then develop a psychologically 
sophisticated and largely unconscious internal system to filter out 
and reject contradictory information. 
Progressives, liberals, and Democrats have failed to apply this 
simple reality, and therefore have allowed conservatives to define 
our brands for us. The very sophisticated effort to do this has been 
led by Gingrich, Luntz, and Limbaugh, three men who understand 
the psychology of branding, and have used it to sell the Republican 
party and the word "conservative" to Americans with all the zeal - 
and all the cash - used by other famous brands like Coke, Levi's, 
and Wal-Mart. 
This is not rocket science, and it's not a secret. There's an entire 
industry devoted to teaching these concepts (in which I worked for 
two decades). 
So why haven't progressives and Democrats figured this out? 
We're still letting cons define our brand for us, and they're still doing 
it aggressively. In the month of February, 2005, timed to coincide 
with the Academy Awards, a con group has rented prominent 
billboards in Hollywood that will show a smiling picture of George W. 
Bush with the slogan: "Thank you, Hollywood!". In a row under the 
prominent and smiling Bush are less flattering photos of Michael 
Moore, Whoopi Goldberg, Ben Afleck, and other outspoken liberals. 
There are no Democratic billboards showing the biggest supporters 
of the Republican Party - corporate fat-cats like Ken Lay, with 
private jets and limousines, living in baronial mansions. 
In classic marketing theory, there are two foundational concepts. 
Features ("what is it?") without benefits ("why should I care?") lack 
relevance. And, benefits without features lack credibility. 
Once these are mastered, you "chunk up" (to use NLP terminology) 
to branding: "Features and benefits without identification ("Who am I 
when I use this product?") lack "stickiness" or persistence. 
Progressives and Democrats are still working on features - the 
details of programs. 
Most progressives know all the features they're interested in: 
Universal single payer health care, a viable social safety net, prison 
and sentencing reform, a livable wage, support for unions and the 
repeal of Taft-Hartley and its heirs, voting (and voting machine) 
reforms, revoking corporate personhood and getting corporate 
money out of politics, moral leadership in the world, and working for 
a reduction of crime and poverty at home and towards stable, 
lasting worldwide peace (to name a few). 
But there's no "benefit statement" in lists like these. Sure, some 
people think they're obvious, but the cons know - as does any good 
marketer - that you have to lead with the benefit, and only then do 
you follow with the features. Sell "lower taxes" to everybody before 
rolling out tax cuts for the wealthy. Sell "personal accounts" for 
Social Security before rolling out benefit cuts for future generations. 
Sell "protect your children" before rolling out homophobia and 
theocracy. 
And, even worse, the left hasn't yet defined its brand. 
What is our logo? Bill Moyers briefly talked about wearing a flag on 
his lapel, trying to re-brand the flag as the logo of the liberals, but 
because there was no national effort behind it, it died. 
What is our identity? The cons have succeeded in making much of 
America think that to be liberal is to either be a wealthy actor or a 
scruffy gadfly. While many people wouldn't mind being either, few 
identify themselves in such terms. 
The largest lights of the Democratic Party - it's founder, Thomas 
Jefferson, and it's two most famous recent presidents, FDR and 
LBJ - knew their brand and their identity, and brought the majority of 
Americans along with them. The largest landslide Democratic 
election victories of the 20th century were FDR's after he introduced 
the New Deal, and LBJ's after he introduced the Great Society. 
Their logo was the flag, and their identity was average working 
people, and those who aspire to the economic and educational 
middle class. 
Jefferson not only defined the identity of the Democratic Party that 
he founded - the longest-lasting political party in world history - but 
defined the identity of America as well. He defined us in positive 
terms (what we're for) in the Declaration of Independence, as well 
as in contrasting terms (what we're against like the "ban on 
monopolies in commerce" he tried to write into the Bill of Rights). 
For example, in a February 8, 1786 letter to James Madison, 
Jefferson made clear his thoughts on what he considered a great 
international immorality - national belligerence that leads to a war of 
choice. 
"And it should ever be held in mind," Jefferson wrote, "that insult 
and war are the consequences of a want of respectability in the 
national character." 
Later, Madison - also a member of Jefferson's Democratic 
Republican Party (which dropped the "Republican" from its name in 
the 1830s, although the www.whitehouse.gov website now lists 
Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and John Quincy Adams - the first four 
Democratic presidents - as "Republicans") would write, "No nation 
could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare." 
FDR brought us back to Jefferson's ideals with his third inaugural 
address, sometimes called his "Four Freedoms speech," on 
January 6, 1941, when he said: 
    "The basic things expected by our people of their political and 
    economic systems are simple. They are : 
    "Equality of opportunity for youth and for others. 
    "Jobs for those who can work. 
    "Security for those who need it. 
    "The ending of special privilege for the few. 
    "The preservation of civil liberties for all. 
    "The enjoyment of the fruits of scientific progress in a wider 
    and constantly rising standard of living. 
    "These are the simple, the basic things that must never be 
    lost sight of in the turmoil and unbelievable complexity of our 
    modern world. The inner and abiding strength of our 
    economic and political systems is dependent upon the 
    degree to which they fulfill these expectations." 
In that, FDR created a brand, a packaging concept, a place for 
people to anchor their identity. It's name was the New Deal, but it 
was far more inclusive than just that. 
Twenty-three years later, in his first State of the Union speech after 
the death of JFK, Lyndon B. Johnson said: 
    "This administration today, here and now, declares 
    unconditional war on poverty in America. ... 
    "These programs are obviously not for the poor or the 
    underprivileged alone. Every American will benefit by the 
    extension of social security to cover the hospital costs of their 
    aged parents. Every American community will benefit from 
    the construction or modernization of schools, libraries, 
    hospitals, and nursing homes, from the training of more 
    nurses and from the improvement of urban renewal in public 
    transit." 
In declaring his Great Society program and starting the Medicare 
program, LBJ cut poverty in America in half. And he, too, created a 
brand. (Had he not gotten caught up in Vietnam, he may now be 
remembered as one of our greatest presidents, as the impact of his 
social programs on America were tremendous.) 
And, like Jefferson, both FDR and LBJ were overwhelmingly re-
elected by the American people after declaring sweeping social 
programs that benefited average working people and those who 
aspired to the middle class. 
The brand - the identity - of progressive ideals doesn't need to be 
reinvented. It's been with us since the founding of this nation. It long 
predates the Republican's Faustian deal with the Robber Barons 
and war profiteers. And when the Democratic Party has been 
strongest, it's been because Democrats have asserted a clear 
brand that stood in opposition to Republicans and their fat-cat 
owners. We are the - truly - We the People. 
If the Democratic Party is to survive, it must embrace the 
progressive concepts that led to its founding in the late 1700s. It 
must tell average Americans what's in it for them, and once again 
give Americans a "brand" with which they can identify. It must stop 
playing defense, letting the Republicans define the agenda of public 
debate, and instead reinvigorate traditional progressive rhetoric, 
legislation, and identity. 
Democrats must reassert their brand, and establish their identity. To 
do this, the Party must say, loudly: "We're for the average working 
stiff in America, and we'll prove it by bringing jobs back from 
overseas by pulling out of the WTO and NAFTA, supporting 
organized labor, strengthening the social safety net, and keeping 
government from being a honey pot for either churches or 
corporations." And then they must come up with a simple name for 
it, like Newt's "Contract" or Roosevelt's "New Deal" or LBJ's "Great 
Society" to provide voters with a hook for identification. 
They must further back this up by working with Greens and 
progressives for Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), the end of Republican-
affiliated corporations programming our voting machines, and 
advocate social, economic, and environmental reforms - and 
bringing them into the Party. 
Only then will the Party of Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Johnson again 
be able to advance social justice at home and peace around the 
world. 
Thom Hartmann (thom at thomhartmann.com) is a Project 
Censored Award-winning best-selling author and host of a nationally 
syndicated daily progressive talk show. www.thomhartmann.com 
His most recent books are "The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight," 
"Unequal Protection," "We The People," "The Edison Gene", and 
"What Would Jefferson Do?." 




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