There are really no substantive issues to discuss in many political debates, because the motivation behind reducing politics to talking points - whether it's abortion, guns, or 9/11 - is purely to hold on to power. The points are used to herd a base which has conditioned to jerk its knees on demand. That deafening sound you can hear is these canned talking points drowning out all other ideas and concepts.
This is not a metaphor. Semantically speaking, the Right in the US has successfully herded its base in much the same way that a rancher herds cattle. It's only now, after the herders are starting to reek of disaster, that the cattle are starting to break free.
As I see it, staseis/frames/whatever you want to call them, are closely related to emotional framing. And emotional framing is the real point of rhetoric. The intellectual content - the elements that can be argued about rationally - are the cover story, not the persuasive payload.
This means it's only intermittently possible to dismiss a talking point by not agreeing with the premise.
The real root of framing is perpetual tracking of dominance/submission relationships. The Right wins these arguments because they assert dominance very forcefully - and that's the subtext which makes the rest of the frame believable, and which crowds out alternative responses.
When Iraq goes wrong, or when abstinence advocates are caught hiring hookers, or some other tragicomical disaster strikes, that dominance relationship is challenged. That's when it becomes possible to challenge the talking points. At that point they're no longer convincing - not for rational reasons, but because in emotional terms, a loss of dominance equates to a loss of credibility.
Lakoff seems to have started this by raising the issue of frames and explaining how the frames used by progressives and conservatives are based on different value assumptions.
But my point is that there's an even more basic level where the debate isn't about values but about tribal and inter-tribal hierarchies - and specifically about the dominance and submission relationships that define them.
When a conservative talks about abortion, the abortion issue itself is a cover-story for the real dynamic - which is an assertion of power over those who disagree.
This power-grab dynamic is the one unifying feature of all conservative politics and corporate expansionism.
And there is no rhetorical answer to it, because it's not a rhetorical position - it's simply a statement of 'I own you and I control you'.
When you look at the Iraq quagmire, or Gitmo, or any of the other Bush disasters, or the Econo or FT writing nonsense about Europe, the basic aim is to assert dominance, either by force or by chutzpah and fiat.
The talking points around that aim are tangential. They're either lies, or irrelevant, or they don't make sense.
So how do you rhetorically challenge an assertion of dominance?
The rhetorical answer to assertions of dominance is to ignore the assertion. You can't be me, I'm taken
So you have some sort of debate with an authorian that tries to some sort of audience build himself (or herself in some cases) up as a dominator. What are the aspects of a dominator? Can you lead them into a rethorical situation where these aspects can not be fulfilled? This of course also depends on who you are in this situation.
To make in a bit more concrete, say that you are debating death penalty with a law-and-order authorian. If you are seen by the audience as more powerful (having higher rank or something) you can dismiss his attempt at establishing dominance by a lofty discussion on the realities of crime (what is). But if you are less powerful that will be seen by those seeking a leader as confirming your opponents masculine and muscular ways. Instead you might be able to ridicule your opponent - claiming he is searching for the bogeyman under his bed - and by turning him into a ridiculous figure, that is scared while you (who are less powerful) walks with courage undermine his position as leader.
Then of course there are battles you can not win, and when the opponents control the pulpit (ie MSM) that is often the case. A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!
We don't lose on intellectual grounds nor even with the ideas we esteem and espouse. We lose because we're gawd-awful at making our case. There is no reason we can't use framing. It's not making the worst case the better but making the best case the persuasive. We lose, among other reasons, when we unquestionably accept the Neo-Lib/Con stasis. (Thanks to Kellogg for the concept!)
Do I wish to see the Left move into spouting vacuous inanities? Of course not. What I do wish to see is our use of modern communication techniques to level the playing field so that our message is not overwhelmed at the starting gate.
Some think-tank minds may know proper rhetorics very well - but they also know that it may not necessarily suit individual interests. Once you know principles of proper rhetorics, you may twist or foul the principles to your own advantage, especially if you know human mind well.
Today, the only good opportunity for real debate are televized presidential debates - and boy, those debates are formated to make proper debating very difficult. You "cannot" address the opponent directly, for example. Even worse, the trend is to allow still less time for argumentation, with stiffer restrictions still. Progressive politicians are too submissive in following the rules, both agreed or "unwritten" - while the other side knows very well how to proceed and wait out.
Sure, people have short attention spans and could be annoyed by statistics, pedantic logic. But these pitfalls are overemployed and overstressed, to detiment of progressive politicians. As the "anti-intelectual" culture is being strenghtened continuously, debates are easier to manipulate by those with certain powers.
Progressives need to reverse these trends. You can't do much at once, or openly. Preparatory measures are needed. But the goal must be a more rationality-friendly media. Proper debating principles are out there, but they need to be imposed (at least partially). It may take an ongoing "fight", but the progressives need more weight of rationality.
Making up one-liners and talking points is important, especially now; the progressives should learn and use that reasonably well. But they must feel more comfortable with talking out their arguments properly and fully, and confronting right-wing nonsense directly. The point is to inspire and bring your idea or message to other people - it does not matter much whether you do that following implicitly optimal rules (perceivably "accepted" by everyone), or whether you succeed in a "too brainy" way. You also do not have to convince absolutely everyone.
