Conservatives use more bluster because they have more to hide/lie about.

Grayson is more emotional because he is genuinely angry about the deaths of Americans. He probably went through his own period of quiet problem solving but reached a high level of frustration after seeing his efforts trounced by tools and frauds.

Got a letter today from the DNC signed by Obama asking for support and money. Wrote across it in red “no public option, no money, no vote.” What they are doing in highly immoral.

No one can cut through an argument like a litigator. Rep Grayson’s courtroom experience shines through. He is not intimidated by all the “authority” and “protocol” of “congress”. And it helps that he doesn’t need lobbyist contributions.

wtg, twain.

it involved breaking one of the unspoken rules of modern American politics. The rule is that conservatives talk about their causes in stark, moralistic terms and progressives don’

We tell the truth they lie we use facts they lie we are polite they are mean. We can’t use appeals to emotion or can we BWAHAHA

hi swopa, excellant and important post and I’ll tell you why;

I’ve been telling everyone they need to “bring to the republicans what they brung”

since they attack our patriotism we need to point out THEY are the traitors, when they claim they are for the economy we have to point out they WRECKED the economy, when they try to say they are “pro-military” we NEED to point out they ABUSE our armed forces and trade the blood of our soldiers for their corporate agenda.

few (if any) democrats get this, whitehouse gets it and feingold gets it, sanders is good too

but they are comming out against grayson because they don’t want others to “get it”, they don’t want new blood to “get it”

so they attack thinking this will stop others…it might, the democrats are fools when it comes to poker, chess and politics

grayson got it here, now we have to show him and other democrats that grayson’s tactic is the only thing that will work against the republican’s propaganda

Mr Garyson’s morality extends only so far. I did appreciate his remarks concerning the GOP and healthcare and thought they were spot on. I also believe that he carefully chose his moment for maximum fund raising. Mr. Grayson was vary happy to support the House resolution alleviating Israel of all responsibility for war crimes committed against Palestinians in Gaza. Health care for us, phosphorus for them. Unfortunately, Mr. Garyson’s courage only extends so far, as in safe ground and his righteousness is entirely self serving. Waiting for Mr. Grayson to take a truly moral stand, one that actually requires him to show some real courage. This is from someone who lives in his district.

It is sad that Alan Grayson’s remarks stand out at all. In effect, if not motivation, he’s correct.

GOP policies mimic the Ford Motor Company’s when it chose forty years ago to keep selling Pinto cars with faulty, too-easily-combustible fuel tanks – it was cheaper to delay and settle claims than to redesign and install adequately protected tanks.

Here, it is more lucrative to politicians on both sides of the aisle to keep things the way they are, to reform only at the edges and largely in name only so as to maximize private profits, indeed, to subsidize them with scarce tax dollars. The foreseeable consequences of ignoring the need for more radical change is that tens of thousands of Americans every year will suffer and die earlier than they would otherwise, because of their inability to obtain routine medical care.

That Alan Grayson is the only one pointing this out is as damning to Democrats as it is to Republicans.

To quote Al Davis, ‘ just win baby”.

I have been saying for a long time that the dem’s need to grow a set and get right in their faces and not back down.
Now that we have actually seen it and see that it works, I can only hope it will inspire the rest of these weak kneed Nancy’s to follow suit.

The best defense is a good offense and I sincerely hope they take great offense.
Bastards.

Too often, Democrats and other progressives treat politics as a courtroom or a classroom, where the most comprehensively documented and tightly reasoned case will carry the day. While that may appeal to our way of thinking, sadly it just isn’t so for everyone; many voters simply don’t have the time or the inclination to pay that much attention.

We got to appeal to emotional voters more.

ActBlue pages have raised nearly $125,000 for Grayson in the last two days.
http://www.actblue.com/entity/fundraisers/18665

But I think righteous indignation should pay.

No one gets to the top – in Congress, the courts or the executive branch or boardroom (for profit or non-for-profit) – without ambition. Mr. Grayson and every other member of Congress has considerable ambition and a personal agenda. His ambition is no less that Rahma & Bahma’s, no less than Grassley and Boehners’. It’s what they do with it that counts.

To put a fine point on it, the post is about the use of the language of morality, to stir up emotional support etc. It is about the effectiveness of this kind of rhetoric and why the GOP use it and dems don’t.

I don’t know if Grayson has moved the football forward, but it seems he’s been more effective at getting the message through than scores of other more experienced pols.

And so if he is only being politically expedient and yet saying what we hope more pols would say and he and the american people benefit, what is wrong with that?

Grayson isn’t the only one pointing this out. However, he’s the only one to put it in easily-digestible terms on the floor of the House, and then post his presentation to Youtube.

Grayson is shrewd, because he understands that Youtube Is Always On. The camera is always recording, and the internet is always awake.

Can we clone him, please?

Progressives are the problem.

They vote for Dems who sell out progressives who vote for Dems.

Why vote for a Repub?

To take out a bad Dem. To teach a lesson.

Otherwise, it’s going to be business as usual.

nice try.

I think its pretty safe to say that things are so far out of control on the other side of the aisle, that we need a dozen Graysons.

Apparently, rethug Congressional behavior is now bordering on the outright treasonous – the US government officially opposes the Honduran coup and supports the deposed President Zelaya. Congressional rethugs are now officially supporting the coup and chief coup plotter Michelleti. They are planning their own mission to that country to give the rump government (unrecognized by any government on earth, save for the US Republican Party and Fox News) aid and comfort. Congressional Dems are now trying to block that trip:

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-…..duras-trip

Rethug Members of Congress has just smashed any moral compass to bits under their jackboots. Something in rotten in WDC… really rotten.

You can say that, but I tell the truth.

We lost a roaring voice for the moral argument of universal health care when Teddy Kennedy passed away. Democrats need to step up to fill the void. While EMK may never have expressed himself the way Alan Grayson did, it’s great to see a Democrat pursue the moral argument: the other guys want you to not get sick, or die quickly.

It has the added advantage of being an accurate depiction of the position the GOP and its paymasters hold.

Thank you, Swopa, for this. We need to appeal to people’s emotions: if we can’t do that around life-and-death, when can we appeal?

There’s a pre-rational appeal that can be made that is not in conflict with rational argument. This is where progressives fail. They don’t understand that the pre-rational is included in the rational. In fact, when rational arguments fail to include pre-rational appeal, the argument is probably faulty even on a rational level.

That’s what Grayson did. He spoke the truth, but it was appealing on a pre-rational level as well; because it was true. It almost always works that way.

Thanks for the Great News:)

primaries.

And do you remember the ridiculous red, white, and blue paint job offered in ‘72?

False.

Primaries mean Dem1 vs. Dem2.

Both are in the pocket of big Pharma and big Insurance.

So why does the primary matter?

The Republicans are the party of birth and death. They don’t care what happens to people in between. Rep Grayson was astute enough to put in plain language what anybody reading this blog already knows. Perhaps his statements are clear enough to get the attention of people who don’t already know.

you’re such a funny fellow

progressives are the politicians who’ve saved this country time and agan throughout our history, beginning with jefferson

you can’t be funnier then your post, you made me laugh so loud

Instead, progressives talk about our causes in bloodless technocratic terms.

No they fucking well don’t.

Progressives use emotional language because they feel strognly about their cause.

Neoliberals like Yglesias use “bloodless technocratic terms”, which is how you can tell the difference between the two.

Here’s a hint, if you were too weak to even defend the term “liberal” as it was turned into a dirty word, you’re not a fucking progressive, now are you?

Grayson has lots of experience going after war profiteers – something that would raise the BP on a cement block. He also, for a guy from Da Brox, has a very pithy way with a turn of phrase (his campaign ads are full of ‘em). He knows that the American People have severe problems with attention span and that we need memorable stuff – ‘Die quickly’ is memorable. I’m now waiting for the Democrats in Congress to go after the GOP with ‘Where’s the Beef’ (they’ll have to ask Wendy’s first, though) in terms of a healthcare reform package. Grayson, in stark, amusing terms has let the American People know that the emperors have no clothes.

Dear perris,

You believe progressives want positive change.

What they want is change within the system.

Which means reinforcing the current power structure.

I so enjoy self contradictory statements.

Here’s a link to calitics which illuminates the techniques grayson uses – truth+passion+actualhumanexperience and why the progressive movement seems stalled, our so called leaders could use a strong dose of this.
http://www.calitics.com/diary/…..initiative

Positive change can’t come at all from the system? GOPers talk Revolution to save the oppressed rich and scapegoat the poor, dark, gay, woman anyone who was different.

He seems like a pretty sharp guy. And we do need more of them. Sheesh I’m so sick of the whole lot arguing over what music to dance to, when they’re all pretty poor dancers.

                                                      President Grayson

As SteveM and his perspicacious commenters at No More Mister Nice Blog point out, Yglesias is wrong about the reasons he gives as well, since A.) The poll he cites comes from Gallup, which has had problems with their methodology, and B.) If you actually poll ppl according to which policies they support, a lot more of them come down on the left than the right.

Part of the reason for B.) is the popular notion that liberals are so weak they won’t even take their own side in a fight, a trope that Yglesias reinforces.

Instead of “Big Media Matt”, A-listers should start calling him “Big Help Matt”.

In response to your question, no.

If you want change within the current system, vote for Barack Obama.

art, you keep going with the oposites, this is what concervatives do, they make believe one thing when it’s the complete oposite

well done but peddle this where it works, which means a neo con blog, (there are few real concervatives left, the neocons have highjacked that party)

progressives want the change that has proven time and again to rescue this country from the depravity of peeps like the party you endorse

Thanks for the nice link, Laura.

Yes, it comes down to marketing/advertising principles. A catchy phrase that’s easy to understand and on message.

Yes We Can
All the Way with LBJ
GOP Plan: Die quickly

I think many govt officials speak in paragraphs precisely to hide meaning. many dinos also play dumb and simply blog everything down.

It was nice to hear AG also use businessman Lee Iacocca’s slogan “you can lead, follow, or get out of the way”. booyah!

perris,

I despise them all.

I want a revolution.

I believe working within the current system is to reinforce the current system.

Is our children learning?

that’s what the gop is left with, those who hate the government and insist they work outside of it

interesting these people elect to office “politicians” who hate government

I think the ultimate goal for progressives should be to reframe the pragmatic value of pursuing real solutions to real problems as being just as morally grounded as (and, in fact, more genuinely so than) the latest sanctimonious Republican posturing.

If you realize that your safety is linked to the health of others, that we are not rugged individuals — but rather, very social critters incapable of feeding and clothing ourselves — then you realize that the health of the culture that you live in is important for your health.

Moralistic claptrap is all stick.
Carrots are generally more productive in the long term.

think many govt officials speak in paragraphs precisely to hide meaning. many dinos also play dumb and simply blog everything down.

I’m convinced that most of the GOP leadership (certainly in the House) is not intellectually capable of mastering the complexity and detail of something like the health insurance reform legislation.

Listening to Ensign and Kyl it was clear they don’t actually understand what they are talking about. It would be sad if it weren’t so dangerous.

And yes, off the top of my head: Cantor, Boehner, Inhofe, DeMint, McConnell.

no, we can see that

I sometimes feel that “progressives” (come on folks, nut-up: it’s okay to call ourselves “liberal” you know; it’s not a swear word!) need to be reminded, from time to time, that the founders — even the most conservative of them — were about a hundred miles to the left of today’s liberal.

You know, the ones that told the single greatest superpower of the day they could take a long walk off a short plank, thank you very much?

This country is a liberal experiment in liberal democracy that took liberals taking up arms against the largest empire of the moment. And then they beat them flat.

Being conservative means you fight and die for possession and control.

Being a liberal means you fight and die for principles. The original moral majority, those guys, regardless their shortcomings.

As these global corporatists, who only pretend to a loyalty to this country, continue their push to overthrow this current, popularly and duly elected government, I believe we all need to get in touch with our inner Founder spirit.

That is what I feel we see in Grayson. He demonstrates that the ideals of this country are worth fighting for, now as in the beginning, and these same global corporatists are making it increasingly clear they are against our form of government.

“They’re Nazis; get your guns!” “We should secede!” “A military coup is really okay!” “I’m a US senator and I’m going to go tell an illegal government in this hemisphere that they should not trust the US and should ‘resist’ the US government!”

What’s unclear? What is the definition of sedition? What is the definition of treason (Constitution, Article III, Section 3)? Are they stepping way over the line?

I suggest they are at the very least skirting and flirting with that line, and I applaud any liberal of conscience who calls them out. (And, after re-reading Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution, I’m just wondering if Congress or the DoJ might start thinking about exactly far into the deep-dark territory of treason DeMint has really traveled.)

I too wish more Dems would speak out like Grayson. But I do like consistancy. It was the use of the word morality that caused me problems. I expected more. Morality does have a meaning and it is not the same as expediency or opportunistic. I would like Grayson take a moral and principled stand against AIPAC and the GOP, consistancy. I am beginning to see that it is asking too much.

A few weeks ago I asked a couple of UMass undergrads who had interned on the Hill in D.C. this past summer, and had worked on health care, what had surprised them most. Answer: the number of congresscritters who did not know the difference between Medicare and Medicaid. Lord help us.

. We need to appeal to people’s emotions: if we can’t do that around life-and-death, when can we appeal?

Amen to that.

Nicely said.

Thanks Dosido, but really, the failure to remember that at our core, we individually and collectively understand a story – we can follow a plot and identify with a protagonist – and to use the awesome power of the narrative – is to leave fallow our most powerfull tool. Sound bites have replaced sound policy. Let’s work to reclaim it.

First the Magic get to the Finals now our very own Congressman gets famous! What a swell year for The City Beautiful!

Great lol title, Swopa .. always love your writing

Grayson really is rain on the parched earth of my thug-and-msm-battered-soul .. but people like Citizen Hamsher and us made him happen too .. the times are absolutely crying for some truth whoopass

Both recent Democratic Presidents got elected because they appealed to emotions. Both called on us to hope for a better future.

I think another significant difference between Republicans and Democrats to what was pointed out in the post is that Republican leaders excite their followers by playing to their followers’ FANTASIES about what the world is and how THEY THINK it should be, and then, once in power, they go behind the scenes to make the world worse than their followers could ever imagine it really is. It’s an endless circle, seeing how the reason the Republican base thinks that government is good for nothing is parlty because their Republican leaders abuse the power of government and make it seem good for nothing.

Meanwhile, the Democrats overall want their base to see the problems for what they are and then, first, to think about how to fix them, and, second, to get motivated to do what needs to be done. I don’t think it’s technocratic, exactly, but it is a different approach to stirring people to action.

Here’s the bottom line:

The Democrats got the House and Senate back in 2006 because the Republicans lost, having proven that they couldn’t govern, which was especially true during their last six years in the majority.

And in 2008 Barack Obama successfully identified the problems, defined them well, and especially stirred people’s emotions.

So what are the Democrats going to do in 2010? It’s already going to be an unfair fight, as midterm elections always give an advantage to the opposition party.

When Obama tries to help Democratic candidates for Congress, what’s he going to stump on? That he and the Democrats sure did a great thing when they instituted a few token regulations on the insurance companies and then handed a ridiculous amount of money to them in the form of subsidies?

“But,” he’ll say, “we sure did try,” wink, wink, “to get you real reform with a public health insurance option.”

Maybe he can just tell all of us who have wanted to support him that we should try our best to ignore the big, wide red stripes that are all over far too many of the Democrats in Congress and, for that matter, in the White House, you know, maybe he can try to sell us a FANTASY about who the Democrats in government really are and that we should trust him when he says that the Democrats, when they go behind the scenes, aren’t really just blowing us off in favor of corporate interests.

Yeah, that’ll get out the base in 2010!

Progressives are the problem.

I would say that the other pees, publicaners, are the problem

They don’t have an agenda or plan or anything, they are absolutely terrible at governing for that very reason.

They have to lie or stand on propaganda meant to separate people from their own best interests. Instill fear in whatever form they can come up with.

Their only raison d’tre is to fill the pocketbooks of those that have, all the rest is bullshit.

Progressives on the other hand have gotten 40 hour workweeks, unions, better education, social security etc. etc. etc.

And they certainly don’t support the financial system as it is.

Go get a fucking education that’s more than eleven degrees in width

Yes BFL – I remember when Alan Grayson was here at Firedoglake in Jan 08, running for Congress and talking to folks here. As someone who lived for years in Orlando it was so great to converse with him – even then we could tell that he had mojo.

He done good!

I dig what Grayson said because he boils it down to the blood and bone. Christ! People are dying! They’re suffering. They’re being turned into paupers or homeless due to medical bankruptcy. And when he apologized to the dead I thought “Yes! Gawd how morbidly pungent.” Gimme ‘mo dat shit.

I like this guy, I like his smile when his foes go after him. Get Ned Lamont in the senate and these
two would make a good template for future Democrats.

The hypocrisy of the Republicans is truly priceless. Virginia Foxx, Michelle Bachman, and cloud of other imbecilic buffoons that make up elected Republicans spout the most mendacious, insane, demagogic, and inflammatory rhetoric for months, and single utterance of an intentionally hyperbolic response sends the Republicans into fits of spasmodic hyperventilation.

Grayson’s choice of the word “holocaust” was unfortunate and inappropriate, but the essential substance of his remarks was hard to assail on the basis of facts. I haven’t heard a single bit of criticism from ANY Republican that has been even remotely rational. There are many legitimate reasons for which they could oppose the D’s healthcare reforms, unfortunately, they have only chosen imbecilic reasons.

It is apparent that they have no substantive objections other than it offends their corporate paymasters, for whom they have been busily whoring throughout this entire debate.

kudos to grayson for saying in plain language what the republicans stand for.

the republicans say if you are sick to go to the emergency room for treatment, but the fail to mention that if you are going in for a non emergency treatment like you are sick to the core but you don’t know why, and thus have to have some followup to see what is wrong with you SORRY!, that is not an emergency and you are told to go home. told to go home with what? pre colon cancer, or some other major illness that won’t show up in full force until weeks or months later. this does not represent health care.

lets us be honest in this country we have a health insurance system not health care system

many folks dont know who grayson is but if you wikipedia him you will find some interesting info.

He is very intelligent harvard grad and a lawyer specializing in filing law suits against bad military contractors in Iraq

Alan Grayson is a welcome and refreshing breath of fresh air. As any good trial lawyer knows, passion is a necessary part of the art of persuasion. An argument mired in details, numbers, and statistics may be accurate, but it’s boring and unpersuasive because people fall asleep waiting for a punchline that never comes.

People will remember his punchline long after all the statistics that support it are forgotten.