Don't Think of an Elephant - George Lakoff

If you are a liberal you must read this book. George Lakoff is a linguist a UC-Berkeley, and he writes about why conservatives have been so successful in the US in he last 30-40 years. Conservatives have thought about their values, invested in think tanks to spread their ideas, and shaped the debate for decades. So when George W. Bush talks about "tax relief", Americans have a cognitive frame that jumps immediately to their minds. The cognitive frame is all about how taxes are a burden and wasteful and how anyone who wants to offer you "relief" from them is a good guy. And this frame appears because conservatives have spent 30 years hammering these ideas home in ads, press pieces, media appearances, white papers, and so on. Liberals think that conservatives have just hit on a good slogan, but Lakoff explains how that isn't just so - conservatives have worked hard to make the slogans resonate. And liberals need to do the same thing now. We need to invest money in think tanks, see the building of liberal infrastructure as important, clarify our values, and get our ideas out into the public, all so that our two word slogans will resonate in the same way, so we can make the world a more just and kind place.

Don't Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate--The Essential Guide for Progressives
George Lakoff
2004
Available from Amazon