« previous | TPM CAFÉ READER POSTS HOME | next »
A Must-Read for This and Future Campaign Seasons: Drew Westen's The Political Brain
Do yourself a favor. Buy and read a copy of Drew Westen's The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation, which is just out in paperback.
Westen has gotten the attention of shakers and movers within the Democratic party--Howard Dean, Bill Clinton, Robert Kuttner, and the Obama and Clinton campaigns reaching all the way to the very top among them, as he describes in the postscript to the paperback edition in an appropriately graceful and modest way.
As a clinician and researcher, Westen is eminently qualified to apply what has been learned about how the human brain functions to one of his passions, electoral politics. A committed Democrat who is every bit as frustrated as most of us have been with our party's propensity to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in too many elections, Westen explains in easily accessible terms results of many psychological experiments which have great relevance for how Democrats communicate with voters.
He analyzes selected communications--TV ads and speeches in particular--from recent Democratic and Republican campaigns, in light of these findings. And--in what for me are the most fun but also the most regret-inspiring sections--he tells you what he would have recommended that the candidates say.
Wow! For all of you out there, and I am certainly one of them, who is sick and tired of being sick and tired of having Republicans drive campaign narratives and define us instead of having us define ourselves as who and what we know we stand for, this book will give you a stimulating and practical guide on how you might make your own advocacy efforts more effective.
As someone who has been engaged in public affairs and politics for 25 years now, after reading this book, I conclude there were things I thought I knew about campaigns that I now think I did not know.
In particular, as one who was earlier urging Obama to be more specific on his policy proposals (partly because I, personally, as a very atypical voter, wanted to know more specifics), I now conclude I was simply wrong about that. Obama was right to ignore the MSM calls along the same lines for more policy specifics.
When past Democratic presidential candidates have acceded to such urgings and satisfied their Inner Wonk, that has been an electoral kiss of death. I have thought of myself in recent years as something of a recovering wonkaholic who occasionally lapses into bad old habits in contexts where I should be thinking differently about how and what I am communicating. I realized while reading Westen's book this was one such incident.
Obama will of course need to be able to get more specific on his policy proposals, and I am hopeful that he will, at the appropriate time and in the appropriate forum and way.
Michael Tomasky cuttingly described Democratic political professionals in his NY Review of Books review of Westen's book as "insular and arrogant", with "an explanation for everything".
As to whether the Democratic political pros will go beyond going through the motions of appearing to heed Westen's message and actually apply its lessons--and whether, if they fail to do that, major candidates will have the self-assurance to fire or simply not hire them in the first place--well, I defer to one of my newly acquired heroes. As the Phillip Seymour Hoffman character in the movie "Charlie Wilson's War", "Gust", says to Wilson: "Yeah, well, we'll see..."
Comments (14)
First, thanks for taking the time to recommend the book.
Re:
I have/had exactly the same preferences as you. But as someone with a lifelong fascination with marketing, I instinctively felt it wise for him to do the wonk thing too heavily. (Bill Clinton, to me, is still one of the most amazing politicians ever in that he is superb at making wonkiness not just palatable but a highly mass marketable feature; he is an extremely rare bird.)
But what I felt uncomfortable about in Obama's early campaign was that he played letting those listening project their own interpretation onto him, an intentional inspirational vagueness. This is not the same thing as the smart sound bite winning politician. In the past, the successful sound-biter defines himself, he doesn't let his audience do it any which way they want (Reagan is a good example.) When you don't define the "product" well, and lead the audience to think that the product is going to solve all their own personal problems, you are bound to have discord and disappointment later as people find out what the actual product is and does. I think his vagueness at the start was successful attracting a new base believing that he was their personal be-all and end-all product. That was very risky, it left him open to letting others define him. I saw this as an intentional and knowing risk taking. He was letting others define him as an intentional tactic, that's very dangerous. It's worked out so far ok, but will it continue to? (One thing he has is his books, but they can also be cherry-picked for bites and spun by enemies like any other text.)
An example of what I see is his handling of Rev. Wright. He disinvited Wright from his announcement, and is on the record as fulling admitting at that time that Wright might be trouble for his image. But he tried hard to avoid having to define that relationship further, put it off as long as possible, swept it under the carpet, keepinig it intentionally vague as long as possible so as not to alienate anyone. The successful sound-bite politician doesn't do that, they make clear iconic statements about where they stand, they don't do so much nuance and avoidance, even if it might get them in trouble with certain demographics; it's often skillfully pre-calculated.
Did you see the following recent Reader Blog post? It makes some interesting points on topic:
Obama's Circumlocution
By Will*M - May 10, 2008, 6:30PM
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/2008/05/obamas-circumlocution.php
May 13, 2008 4:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
artappraiser, thanks for your comment. Point very well taken.
In fact, I think even if he does define himself much more clearly, there is going to be a great deal of disappointment in him should he be elected. I think that is just a given, given the major theme of his campaign (unity; anyone want to take bets on when the first major shows of partisan opposition show up on the White House doorstep after he is sworn in?), the factor you point out, which is that he has left the definition of him overly open to others so far, and the hope so many are investing in him.
As he fills in some of those blanks, inevitably some who think he is with them on the things they care about most will find that he may not be, entirely. Hopefully that will not prove to matter too much. But he will also establish a necessary foundation for not only combating the attempts that already are being made to define him negatively, but to lead if he is elected.
Really, any politician who inspires the kind of hope he is marketing (and which JFK and B Clinton also sold) sews along with it the inevitable seeds of disappointment, as any sort of familiarity with the postmortems on both the JFK and Clinton presidencies suggests. It seems to me that this is because human beings are human beings. We almost never live up to our own fondest hopes for ourselves, other than on occasional moments. Nor do we find those hopes entirely fulfilled by others (that being a most unwise emotional investment to make in any other human being).
Many of us protect ourselves from feeling hope as a defense mechanism: we know there will be disappointment. Robert Kuttner wrote about Obama shortly after Obama gave his Cooper Union speech and you could see clearly (last two paragraphs), in this grown man who is probably 60 years old I am guessing, this phenomenon. Based on the Cooper Union speech, Kuttner expressed heartfelt hope that Obama might, just might go beyond what Kuttner sees as the minimalist agenda he was offering at that time. Kuttner was beginning to feel a sense of great hope about Obama while also stating in his article that one doesn't want to get one's heart broken. (again)
How un-Kuttnerlike. I've never seen him write like that before. I think of him as a kind of uber-wonk. Surely this was a sign Obama has touched even his steeled heart.
It sounds as though Westen would advise Obama to identify just a few of his core beliefs and ideas to illustrate and reinforece his own definition of who he is, which will be rolled out for really mass public consumption at the Democratic convention.
This would be a la Bill Clinton, The Man From Hope. That's what I remember from the '92 convention more than any policy specifics. Westen is clearly a huge fan of B Clinton and uses things he did to illustrate examples of what successful candidates do.
Thanks also for pointing me towards the reader blog post, which I thought was excellent.
May 13, 2008 4:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
It was most welcome for me to have your feedback, not in the classic blog comment sense of "oh you agree with me, you're a friend not foe" but in that no one wants to talk about this stuff, they all want to propagandize or read something partisan into bringing it up. And I wonder if I am the only one thinking these things. :-)
A few of my own thoughts bouncing off of yours about 1992. I think the "man from Hope" theme was fine, ok execution of an emotionally touching theme, but it wasn't meant to grab a large contingent, it was targeted especially for the classic Democratic base, it was to get people like my bleeding heart liberal mother who loved JFK Camelot as a youth.
That wasn't the Clinton main plan for winning, though. It's like they had to placate that base, but what they wanted was to win back some of the Reagan Democrats.
It helps to go back to "The War Room" and to "Primary Colors," both works I like a lot, to refresh the memory of what was played most strongly, and it wasn't "The Man from Hope," it was "it's the economy, stupid." And not just "it's the economy, stupid," but the more ferocious than ever before message discipline that the Carville team introduced in working that message.
If you read the more sophisticated media background on Clinton at the time, his work for years in the DLC and "third way," his reformation from "old-fashioned liberal" into a "third way" centrist since his loss of the AR governorship as a young governor was constantly pushed. If you didn't read the more sophisticated media, you got him meeting with Reagan Dem working class or small business people and "feeling their pain," just like in the opening scene of the movie version of Primary Colors," it was like "he gets it about the pocketbook, and crime and security, a politician that finally gets it."
Of course, it is quite difficult to show proof of this in actual poll or vote numbers because of Perot's phenomenal part in the race. His main message, too, was "it's the economy, stupid," but with different proscriptions. When he was dropping out this day and dropping back in another day, that confused the issue. Still, on one of those drop-out days, he said "well, the Democratic party finally has it's act together," which I am sure helped some go over to Clinton. I do think rejecting certain tenets of classic liberalism was important at the time, either through Perot or through Clinton's "third way," otherwise Bush Sr. may have won. The "Man from Hope" was simply there to placate the liberals.
One thing that really impressed me as historic change, which was Clinton's team following up on their discipline, I will never forget it. Between the election and inauguration, he held those economic conferences with CEO's and labor, and where health care was addressed as a major contributor to the economic problems for all. You never saw a Democratic candidate ever do that before, never, it really was "third way," new, different.
Now it didn't work out as planned, not at all, but what was ironic is that those conferences and the wonky primetime interviews Clinton did between election and inauguration, what I think they did was actually give people some "hope," not Camelot hope but real practical hope. And it was about Clinton and Gore not being the same old Democratic politicians. So that's sort of rejecting a comparison to JFK, no?
So I don't give up hope that some wonkiness can inspire. It can if done correctly. With Clinton, too bad that didn't last very long in his first term, where they got waylaid by all kinds of minor stuff like "don't ask don't tell" because of his fear of being labeled weak on security. My opinion of the reason is that they were neophytes and naive about a lot of things, including the bureaucracy and the GOP, and that, in the end, is the main reason I now remain nervous about Obama. :-) The U.S. and global economy now, stupids, is in vastly bigger more complicated shit than anytime in history, and makes 1991 look like child's play.
Yes we can? Can do what? I want to scream, please finish the sentence! If he plans on using that "we" power, let's hope he eventually plans on telling the "we" what they need to focus on, and they the "we" agree with that goal. It's kind of scary watching a politician amass a coalition many of whom are going on the presumption that his priorities are theirs, when there is no communication going on between leader and followers on that at all. I don't think a lot of people voted for Clinton thinking "give that young man a chance because he's charismatic like JFK," rather it was more like "give that young man a chance to try out his new ideas about fixing the economy and thereby the related problems of poverty and crime."
May 14, 2008 2:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Interesting. I saw James Carville asked on camera (it was in the movie that came out maybe 3 years ago about the role of US-based campaign consultants, including Carville, in a Bolivian, I think, presidential election a few years ago) what was the "message" of the '92 Clinton campaign.
His answer: "Putting People First". Which was also the title of the book Clinton issued during the campaign with many of his policy proposals.
Carville said this message was reflected in everything the campaign and the candidate said and did, prominently including Clinton's warm interpersonal style on the campaign trail. The visuals and the emotional side of the equation projected and indeed greatly amplified this verbal message so that the people who weren't into policy just read the body language and thought "this is someone who, if he does not actually care about people like me, is doing the best damned impersonation of someone who *does* that I will ever see in my lifetime."
Re Clinton/JFK comparison, it seems to me that JFK to this day has much crossover appeal and the felt necessity of some modern-day Democrats to identify themselves as a different kind of Democrat wasn't a factor.
Liberals I know who like JFK don't think of him as some "third way" politician. And folks who see themselves as more middle of the road or non-ideological don't seem to see him as the type of liberal they worry about, either. Former gung-ho Cold Warriors seem to feel that he fully "got" the stakes in the Cold War, even if some of them might have favored a more aggressive rollback approach towards Soviet influence in central and eastern Europe. It sure helped him with the macho types that he was perceived as having stared down his Soviet opposite number.
At the time JFK was running for president there wasn't then in existence a huge, massively organized and funded effort to try to discredit the Democratic party and the liberal "brands".
During that era Democrats running for president did not feel compelled to distinguish themselves as being "different" kinds of Democrats because the memories of Truman and especially FDR were not far distant and generally positive, and the organized, relentless efforts made by movement conservatism had not yet come into play. These were the days when Daniel Bell was writing books called The End of Ideology. Post-WWII liberalism was, and was seen as, the dominant ideology with which Eisenhower Republicans felt compelled to make their peace. Eisenhower never ran on privatizing Social Security or dismantling the welfare state or any of that aggressive hard-right anti-government agenda that came later under Reagan and Bush II.
It was the legacy of what they saw as the far too accommodating "me-tooism" of the Eisenhower wing of the Republican party (including Rockefeller) that movement conservatism--which saw its first major modern public display in the '64 Goldwater campaign with Reagan making his first prominent entrance on the national stage during that campaign--was primarily rebelling against and defining itself in opposition to within the Republican party.
May 14, 2008 1:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh yeah, duh, now that theme comes back to me. Dang, now you've got me rethinking everything! :-)
On JFK, I must admit my interpretation is highly influenced by my mother, so it's skewed to the idolizer contingent, and it not objective. She was a young married with a high school education, a child of immigrants who always wanted to be cool. She fell real hard for Camelot, real hard, Jack and Jackie both, she thought they brought life and air and "change" and it was all so exciting. She would explain to people "you just don't understand what it was like then, how wonderful the change was." What happened later is she continued to read and self-educate, and as she learned all about the Kennedy family and wealth and power, and continued to be fascinated by them, but she also learned about the actualities of what Kennedy and his successors dis, and cynicism about politics along the way and, I thought, by her 50's, became a very good judge of American politics. She learned via this method that the JFK she idolized as a twenty-something was not at all a liberal like her, not in foreign nor domestic policy. Interestingly, though FDR was president during her childhood and early teen years, she had no interest in him or Eleanor and never developed any.
In any case, from her, I totally "get" what was with the pictures of JFK alongside Jesus on the living room walls of some homes I must admit I hae not studied as much what his appeal was to other demographics.
Certainly from what I have read, I get the impression that at the time the Dems are liberals v. GOP conservative was very much in play, with Dems as progressive and new thinking and GOP the stodgy Chamber of Commerce and Rotarians guys with crew cuts. Hawkishness went across party lines because of the nature of the Cold War (Digressing: which in my opinion, was another example of the eternal incidence of mass pychosis which often leads to war, as we learned later what really was going on in the Soviet Union. I don't want to imply that I think anyone could have done anything about it, to blame anyone for not foreseeing that, as it grew out of the chaos following the largest war in history of the planet; even worse things could have happened.)
May 14, 2008 3:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've been mulling this over for about 50 years. Run-of-the-mill Republicans, the only ones I would reasonably meet, are basically apolitical. As a result, they readily latch on to a phrase, a catchy slogan, an epithet hurled at the Dem Party or its representative by the Republican machine. End of story - Kerry's a flip-flopper etc. answers all their questions, decides their vote against him.
Foreinstance now, Republicans I know have decided to vote for McCain if Obama is his opposition because Wright damned America.
So when Democrats, which they seem most prone to do, start 'explaining,' justifying, rationalizing, whatever Wright's damning, his connection to Obama etc. means or doesn't mean my Republican friends aren't listening. Because they're not really interested.
May 13, 2008 6:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
On another thread, I just put down some thoughts related to the "Obama not willing to define himself too strongly" theme:
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/2008/05/obamas-true-feelings-fathers-a.php#comment-2814149
Possibly of interest here, possibly not, but there is a link to Bill Clinton that I am seeing.
May 14, 2008 3:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
You're right--this was often said about Bill Clinton.
It was also often said about FDR, to the point where some of those seeking to influence his decisions in a decisive manner felt that if only they could be the last person FDR talked to before he had to make up his mind, they felt they could prevail.
FWIW, my support for Obama at this point is hardly dewey-eyed. My reservations about him include several of those you have expressed in this and other threads.
If asked at this time to offer a prediction as to how an Obama Administration would play out if it comes to pass, I think he is likely to have a better chance of being able to move a progressive agenda than Kerry or the 2000 version of Gore. But only marginally so. And I am not at all sure that he necessarily is committed to trying to do that on the domestic side especially. I am more optimistic about the chances for undoing some of the damage of recent years caused by the Bush-Cheney foreign policy, perhaps even including some creative problem-solving of the sort many here including me seem to favor.
I would expect some rookie mistakes his first year especially and can only hope these aren't politically ruinous for his credibility and longer-term effectiveness. Our system quite simply is weighted against the odds of passing major new legislation or programs, and all of the means at the disposal of such a determined minority as I expect the Republicans in Congress to be come next January are likely to be as available to them then as they are now.
At this point it appears possible to me that the Democrats will get to 60 Senate seats. The smart money will be bet against that happening, though.
The hope, and that is all it is for me, that I feel with Obama is based on perceptions that he a) is a talented communicator who has a chance of establishing a pretty good relationship with the American public and b) is someone who I see as possessing the necessary flexibility of mind and temperament to be capable of growing a lot in the job.
Under the worst case scenario I am able to envision with him, I feel the country is at less risk than were McCain to be elected, however.
May 14, 2008 5:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Great nuanced comment.
I agree with you that legislation is not where the effect can be greatest. It is the executive powers that are key with a first term president of a different party. And you have to be savvy at that, and he has no great experience in that vein in either the political world or privat, though lack of experience is not proof that he's not capable.
I myself pray his cabinet decisions would be heavily slanted to Clintonites, despite his "change" promise, as for me, that is the key to efficient cleansing of the Bush-infiltrated civil service after 8 years of blatant, blatant politicization of the civil service in virtually all of the departments. This is the most important and effective thing the new president can do, clean the executive branch by getting in the first 100 days with people who know how to do it, not neophytes who can be walked all over by their underlings. We do not need "fresh" naive people in those posts, the Bushthink is heavily, heavily ingrained.
With all her down sides (and there are many) for me this was Hillary's main selling point at this point in time in government (she's got it in her blood, her first week as first lady, it was "how do we get our people into the White House travel office." :-) I've been impressed with her ability to rip the head off of a Pentagon appratchick in Senate hearings, and I "hope" that Obama's post-partisan, "play nice" beliefs do not extend to his theories of how to operate as a boss of a huge executive branch.)
May 14, 2008 11:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh and meant to add that Bill Clinton did make these mistakes in his first term, and one can only hope Obama has studied that. As I see it, it wasn't as big of a deal then and it will be now if it happens again. We are in much deeper shit than we were in 1992.
May 14, 2008 11:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, I am optimistic that Obama will not bring a "you served with the Clinton Administration, so don't bother applying for a job with my Administration" kind of mentality to the White House if he is elected. It does not seem in keeping with his dominant temperament, which does not appear to be vengeful, prideful or vindictive.
I agree with you that undoing the damage that has been done within the Executive branch is a crucial task for the next Administration. As a non-political appointee my wife has experienced some of this firsthand. The clear priority in her area of expertise was for the WH to appoint ideologues with breathtakingly little basic knowledge about, and interest in learning about, the policy issues in question. Very Nixoninan kind of dynamic of "Us vs. Them" (where the political appointees see the career people as unambiguous enemies.)
[aside: Charlie Savage in his book Takeover does a magnificent job of documenting the even broader manifestation of this dynamic--the Bush-Cheney WH having a very deliberate policy, across multiple substantive policy areas, of centralizing power not simply in the Executive Branch but more specifically in the White House. While reading the book I felt torn between alternating bouts of despair about the magnitude of the damage done and what it will take to undo it, versus hope that this has now been comprehensively documented in a way that is widely available to anyone who chooses to pay attention to it.]
Also as an aside, I attended a talk by Ted Sorensen last night in a DC bookstore about his newly published memoirs, Counselor. The single most important factor he cited as a qualification for the presidency is judgment. His protege, who on account of the poor vision Sorensen's stroke 7 years ago left him with, did a great deal of pulling together of documents to help Sorensen write the book, is a speechwriter for Obama. Although there is no other single person to whom I internally give carte blanche to tell me what I should think about a given matter, I take some comfort in Sorensen's assessment of Obama as one of the two individuals he has been privileged in his lifetime with the gifts necessary to provide extraordinary leadership for our country.
Hopefully, in this case, w/o all of the appalling private extracurricular decisions JFK made--the damage from which, the historical evidence now strongly suggests, was hardly contained solely to his private life.
Had tickets been available to be a fly on the wall during some of the instances where Jackie confronted her husband, I think they'd have sold well. My intuition is that Michelle Obama might just simply skip the rhetorical stage and proceed directly to Lorena Bobbitt mode. :
May 15, 2008 9:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
You made me laugh, cause: me too. :-) In my mind, this would be a feature, not a bug, in a first lady if she is as we suspect. Matter of fact, I did think about her when Carville was raising the testicle issue, as in, now that's the one you should be using that metaphor on. We are lucky that this thread is now hidden way off from the madding crowd, if it wasn't, our own genitals might be in danger. :-)
May 16, 2008 12:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
P.S. I appreciated hearing the Ted Sorensen report as I had recently read a very interesting story on the writing of the book with the young assistant that is now a speechwriter for Obama. It went into a bit of detail about all the horrible health problems Sorensen has had, it is like the story of Job, particularly the stroke damage that affected his visual understanding abilities and reading abilities and how he managed ro cobble back together an ability to use his intellect again with combinations of dictation, magnification, special lighting, and the assistant's help. Would have liked to link to it, I thought it was in the New York Times, but I guess I am wrong, as I can't find it there.
May 16, 2008 2:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
You wrote: "We are lucky that this thread is now hidden way off from the madding crowd, if it wasn't, our own genitals might be in danger. :-)"
Yes, that was very much on my mind as I weighed whether to post the comment... :
May 16, 2008 10:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Post a Comment