Shibboleth

The volunteer coordinator Jessica  and I got into an interesting discussion about rhetoric the other night at Sharon's party. She felt, like I often feel,  the difficulty in dealing with the right's rhetoric and how it has captured the discussion. And dominates the public discourse. We agreed that you can't really argue point by point, because of an inherent asymmetry in the loaded language that they use. So you can't argue logic, even though it is important and very useful to break down the fallacy and syllogistic inconsistencies, just so you see where the faults are and what they are.
So how can we on the progressive side use a more powerful rhetoric, and how can that be useful?

Really, the first task is to identify the target audience whom you wish to address.
You will never convince the right wing to change their thinking, because it is not based on evidence or logic to begin with but on an emotional self-aggrandizing sham logic or gut feeling involving some unspoken assumptions that will not stand the light of reason so are shrouded in layers of self-referent sentiment. And combine that with the loaded language of specialized meanings you get an assymetry that defies actual discussion the whole effect being to stifle persuasion. You can stand toe to toe and trade assertions, but it might not do any good. Still, you will be serving notice that you aren't buying their BS.
So who are you talking for? Folks that have good feelings but who are uninstructed, folks who are just now getting involved, and folks who are discouraged about never hearing exactly why our side is in fact morally and politically excellent.

Back in the day, through the 20s and 30s there was so much left wing rhetoric that the american public burnt out on it. That social-equity rhetoric is now felt to be shameful, communist, degrading, wrong.

To the point that we of the left are vaguely ashamed of our own point of view.
In the 30s and then again in the 70s this culture was presented with the idea of a "revolution" a radical restructuring of the social and economic relation and Americn culture pretty roundly rejected that restructuring, even though, for the dialectician, it wasn’t that simple, we got the Great society and John birch at the same time. And the left, which has a conscience, feels bad that it failed  and feels bad that people whio didn’t understand in the first place, felt threatened.

Now the left is embarrassed to hold these views.

So I have to say to the progressive in public life, don't be embarrassed, be proud to want to help the poor, to want health care for all, and proud to strive for a fair system. Paid for by all, especially by those who benefit the most.

Progressive rhetoric has an important place that needs to be recognized and utilized more readily in the public discourse.

There is a strong current of reason that needs to be articulated, like it once was. The left used to be the masters of the podium.

First progressive principle that is understated in public discourse is that old stand-by, social responsibility. It was said often that history will judge a civilization on how it treats its weakest citizens. TQM, the management philosophy and the reason Lexus builds great cars, says the same. "Your suppliers will treat you exactly like you treat your smallest customer" I don't know how that happens but it seems to be true. I used to hear this but I don't anymore.
There used to be an old Mainline christian church rhetoric, based more or less on the "sermon on the mount" advocating social responsibility as a matter of simple christian (with a small c) virtue. Feeding the poor, clothe the naked, heal the sick.

My second underused concept is that good shit costs money. You cant drive a Maybach and expect to pay for a Kia. Same for communities. Financial responsibility.
You wouldn't enjoy a nice meal in a nice restaurant and then refuse to pay the bill. Neither should you live in a nice community with streetlights and a fire department and refuse to pay taxes, even though much of what the taxes pay for is intangible. Intangible but necessary.
Wealth is not created in a vacuum.
People need to pay for the benefits they accrue.

The level playing field is an expensive facility.

A third point being that it is NOT A GAME. I heard Mr Romney saying to Jimmy Kimmel in the most patronizing tone that folks who don't buy health insurance aren't playing by the rules, and that because of that they should be excluded coverage for preexisting conditions. As if it were a simple choice and that they didn’t have health insurance because they were cheating the system. Mr Romney repeated and extended the metaphor until I realized that he really does think it is a game and that the game is more important than the players. The guy just doesn’t understand how it is to live in the working class strata of near-poverty, where you never have enough money to pay all the bills in any given month, which is the ordinary reality of too many Americans.

The minute this "game" metaphor comes up we need to jump on it hard, get all judgmental and not let it pass as a rhetorical device. Put them on the defensive right off the bat. Maybe for the rich it is a game, to see how much they can get away with, but for the rest it is a life and death struggle.
The middle class pays too much, the wealthiest don't pay enough, and the poorest simply self-destruct  in the most painful and expensive way possible.

A new rhetorical opportunity, which seems to me to be  worth thinking about, is a legitimate question about who or what actually creates jobs. The 1% all act like they do it, and that we shouldn’t tap their wealth to finance the community,that it is either/or,  and they always use the fear of job loss to justify their tax exemptions. But one thing about capitalists that is an eternal truth is that they cut jobs anyway. Whenever possible.
http://www.businessinsider.com/this-billionaire-venture-capitalist-gave-a-ted-talk-saying-rich-people-dont-create-jobs--and-ted-is-refusing-to-post-it-2012-5#ixzz1v4NvmZV2
It turns out the TED folks really didn’t shut this down for the reasons stated, but it is an interesting point and it captures a rhetorical opportunity.

TL;DR  Demand creates all economic activity. Consumers create demand. Rich consumers consume more but only to a point, no matter how much money you have you can only consume so much, 24 hrs in a day etc. One stomach. You can consume a ridiculous amount, but not an infinite amount. Beyond that point, hoarded wealth seems to lose its influence on the vigor of the economy... Unless it is spent, like governments spend money, to buy things, big things. Wealthy people never buy big things. Nobody buys a new interstate highway, or a highway bridge, or a state park, or a reservoir, or a subway system. Or a guided missile frigate.
Companies build production facilities, to be sure, but not out of altruism or excess of capital. They build in response to demand for products, and if you have that you can get the money whether you have it in pocket or not. Privately accumulated wealth in individual hands beyond a certain point  does not, in fact, create jobs. Neither do the owners of capital. Consumers create jobs.

Capital never hires a worker unless and until it is forced to

Finally, I have a candidate for fallacious rhetorical device of the year. A shibboleth for the left. The word Oligarchy, a wonderful scary word that just sounds badass. And this might be a very effective point to make. The right has the word “Government” which they use with scorn and loathing, when they wish to cloud an issue or frighten the uninstructed.

In case you are wondering, a shibboleth used to be, back in the old testament days, a bone, a shoulder blade from a sheep, which are kind of creepy looking to start with, that the head priest would invest through ritual and prayer with all the troubles of the tribe, which were then thought to actually go live in that bone, like for instance the Philistines, or the plague or whatnot. Then when the priest wanted to intimidate everybody, to make them toe the line he would give the stink-eye and yell and then brandish the shibboleth and everybody would cower terrified in awe.

The 1% is an Oligarchy.

A) people wont know what the fuck an oligarchy is but it sounds bad.

B) they might know from the news about the rich gangsters in Russia and everybody knows that Russians are shady.

Cheap trick? maybe, and then you have to ask why not use a device or two just to create some breathing room? Folks who use dishonest rhetorical devices and fallacious reasoning as a matter of course are in no position to begin enforcing rhetorical purity.