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Progressives Lack a Limbaugh-Like Voice (George Lakoff)
San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 4/19/09

Posted on 04/19/2009 11:25:32 AM PDT by nickcarraway

You turn the AM on and there's Rush, or Savage, or another of the army of right-wing radio talk show hosts. You may not be listening hard, just working, driving, doing busywork or the laundry. Yet if you listen day after day, year after year, your brain will begin to change.

Words, even those heard casually and listened to incidentally, activate frames - structures of ideas that are physically realized in the brain. The more the words are heard, the more the frames are activated in the brain, and stronger their synapses get - until the frames are there permanently.

All this is normal. It is how words work. And the right-wing message machine has found a way to take advantage of it - activating, as it were, a conservative system of thought.

The problem is, those thoughts on the radio are hate city. Savage rails against what he calls "the weakening of the military" by "affirmative action," "illegal immigrants," and "Marxist politicians." What proves it? The submarine accident in the Gulf of Hormuz.

Tune in to Rush. On the one hand he's pitching "rugged individualism," "liberty," and the absolute free market against Obama's call to unity and a sense of national responsibility.

Then he's hammering the AIG bailout and its bonuses, not mentioning that it was the conservative destruction of reasonable regulation that lay behind our economic disaster.

One diatribe after another, the crucial facts left out or lied about, day after day, city after city. It has an effect.

Where are the progressives? Largely absent. Or talking issue by issue, not about general themes. We have some icons: Rachel Maddow, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert. But they only talk to us. They are not omnipresent.

(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Extended News; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 111th; bho44; liberals; liberaltalkradio; minitrue
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1 posted on 04/19/2009 11:25:32 AM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway

Rhymes with...


2 posted on 04/19/2009 11:27:11 AM PDT by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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To: nickcarraway

“Then he’s hammering the AIG bailout and its bonuses, not mentioning that it was the conservative destruction of reasonable regulation that lay behind our economic disaster.”

Oh, BS!


3 posted on 04/19/2009 11:28:50 AM PDT by vladimir998 (Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ. St. Jerome)
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To: nickcarraway

The liberal ‘rats own 90% of the television and print media, and they squeel like stuck pigs because conservatives have a voice on 10%.

They intend to redefine all conservative opinions as “hate speech” and outlaw them by increments. Just watch.


4 posted on 04/19/2009 11:29:22 AM PDT by Travis McGee ("Foreign Enemies And Traitors" will be ready the first week of May.)
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To: nickcarraway

The libs are good at slogans, bumperstickers etc. In a format that is long form and requires a more in depth examination of ideas they simply falter.


5 posted on 04/19/2009 11:29:43 AM PDT by Straight Vermonter (Posting from deep behind the Maple Curtain)
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To: nickcarraway

Lackoff has a bug in his bonnet about Rush for years.

This is nothing more than liberal hand-wringing that they can’t attract an audience in any media.


6 posted on 04/19/2009 11:29:45 AM PDT by Erik Latranyi (Too many conservatives urge retreat when the war of politics doesn't go their way.)
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To: nickcarraway

But more to their detriment, they also lack a Limbaugh-like set of ideological principles.


7 posted on 04/19/2009 11:29:51 AM PDT by reasonisfaith (Liberals have neither the creativity nor the confidence to understand the truth of conservatism)
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To: nickcarraway

So where’s the barf alert?

First thing that the “progressives” need to do is drop that false label (you call this progress?) and instead name themselves Commie Radio. That’s guaranteed to pull in a lot of publicity and listeners just on shock, provocateur values. :)


8 posted on 04/19/2009 11:30:07 AM PDT by RepublitarianRoger2
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To: nickcarraway

Sounds like someone is not too confident about their liberal stranglehold on stupidity.


9 posted on 04/19/2009 11:30:25 AM PDT by HighWheeler (The higher the concentration of libs, the bigger the tragedy that follows.)
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To: nickcarraway
Words, even those heard casually and listened to incidentally, activate frames - structures of ideas that are physically realized in the brain. The more the words are heard, the more the frames are activated in the brain, and stronger their synapses get - until the frames are there permanently.

Yeah. Its usually referred to as getting smarter.

10 posted on 04/19/2009 11:31:30 AM PDT by Wissa (I despise the liberal media.)
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To: Wissa

these people must be attending the Jeanene Garafalo medical school


11 posted on 04/19/2009 11:33:29 AM PDT by GreatDaggar
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To: vladimir998

“Then he’s (Rush) hammering the AIG bailout and its bonuses, not mentioning that it was the conservative destruction of reasonable regulation that lay behind our economic disaster.”

- — - —

I’m betting that Rush will give George an earful about this tomorrow; unfortuneately Georage doesn’t have any memory retention. So he’ll stay stupid.


12 posted on 04/19/2009 11:34:29 AM PDT by HighWheeler (The higher the concentration of libs, the bigger the tragedy that follows.)
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To: nickcarraway

I love the new label: “progressive”. It’s a lot like cancer.


13 posted on 04/19/2009 11:35:54 AM PDT by LiberConservative (0bama is to the presidency what Kenny G is to jazz.)
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To: nickcarraway
We have some icons: Rachel Maddow, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert. But they only talk to us.

Comedy gold.

Synopsis: Anyone who listens to "right wing talk radio" is a robot programmed to hate, while Rachel Maddow, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert listeners are super smart and loving human beings.

14 posted on 04/19/2009 11:37:09 AM PDT by spodefly (This is my tag line. There are many like it, but this one is mine.)
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To: vladimir998

This George guy doesn’t listen to Rush at all it seems.


15 posted on 04/19/2009 11:38:12 AM PDT by RatsDawg
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To: nickcarraway
Yet if you listen day after day, year after year, your brain will begin to change.

Words, even those heard casually and listened to incidentally, activate frames - structures of ideas that are physically realized in the brain. The more the words are heard, the more the frames are activated in the brain, and stronger their synapses get - until the frames are there permanently.

Oh, yeah?

If that is true, then why are there any Conservatives when we are treated to a steady diet of MSM crap?

Nice try, Jackoff.

16 posted on 04/19/2009 11:39:47 AM PDT by SIDENET ("You knew the job was dangerous when you took it, Fred.")
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To: mylife

“Rhymes with?”

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17 posted on 04/19/2009 11:40:12 AM PDT by Dr. Bogus Pachysandra ( Ya can't pick up a turd by the clean end!)
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To: nickcarraway

“Where are the progressives? Largely absent. Or talking issue by issue, not about general themes. We have some icons: Rachel Maddow, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert. But they only talk to us. They are not omnipresent.”

And you know WHY they are “absent”? Because no one listens to them and advertisers aren’t going to waste money on people NO ONE LISTENS TO. I realize this is a concept far above the intellectual powers of those on the left- it’s called the free market, stoopid!

The left spews nothing but hatred of conservatives and Christians, take cheap shots at those they don’t agree with and have not one argument to support ANYTHING they believe. No one wastes their time on a one-trick pony.

They will NEVER get this.


18 posted on 04/19/2009 11:40:35 AM PDT by 13Sisters76 ("It is amazing how many people mistake a certain hip snideness for sophistication. " Thos. Sowell)
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To: Straight Vermonter

Progressives Lack a Limbaugh-Like Voice

.
no, it’s the truth and honesty that voice speaks they lack


19 posted on 04/19/2009 11:40:45 AM PDT by Son House (Make A Bad Situation Worse, Raise Taxes, Increase Government Spending, Thanks Øbama)
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To: nickcarraway

Simplified version: reason penetrates the brain far more easily than hate. The bile-spewing hatred of Lefty radio hosts like Al Franken and Jannene Garofilo bounce-off the sane mind.


20 posted on 04/19/2009 11:41:19 AM PDT by pabianice
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