So, what can we learn from this disaster movie? (The one I laid out for you in excruciating detail in parts one, two and three.) I’ve gone ahead and overreached a bit to tease out a few important lessons, and one hard truth. (Click-baity!)
1. Tell us a story. The lesson to learn from What Just Happened is not that we shouldn’t shape political and social-issue message into persuasive narratives. Ironically, being members of the reality-based community makes it really, really hard for people on the left to internalize a blindingly obvious reality: As we’ve seen time and time again, facts don’t win elections. We can talk all we want about people voting against their own interests and keep yelling “don’t they get it?!?” at the tv, but it won’t matter. Consumers and voters (same thing, right?) don’t rely on logic to make decisions; we pick and choose facts to confirm choices based in emotion and feeling. We like to think that our worldview is constructed out of things we know to be true, but more often than not the process works in reverse.
And this is not always a bad thing. Sure, we’ve erred way too far in the direction of treating people’s votes as a personal statement rather than a utilitarian exchange (my casting a vote is really not about my feelings), But as much as I didn’t want to have a beer with W., Obama did give me hope, and he painted a very compelling picture of what this country could be. That’s important. Voting may be a functional act, but it’s a means to a more fulfilling end.
Just as important, the things that really divide us in this country are not based in factual disagreements. There are different philosophies about government, different hierarchies of moral values, different belief and nonbelief systems, differing ways to assess the worth of people and places. Again, it’s not as if exposing people to “the facts” would erase these differences; people choose to believe or disbelieve facts based on these differences.
So we need to present people with a compelling story, one that makes sense with their understanding of the world. This doesn’t mean a lowest-common-denominator story designed to offend no one and appeal to everyone. It doesn’t mean sweeping racism/misogyny/etc. under the rug. It means first thinking long and hard about who we really can and want to reach — it’s difficult to tell a good story if you don’t know who you’re talking to — and then finding the intersection between what we believe and what they’re interested in. And then articulating a story that begins in that intersection. And then hitting repeat.
And voilà! We have an effective, compelling storyline. One that’s both based in a simple truth that voters can understand, and reflects directly and positively the values of (whoever gets to make decisions for) the Democratic party.
Oh if only it were really that easy. The real world is much messier. In the absence of a national election to rally around, there will be multiple stories, good and worthy stories, competing for attention. These stories need to be told, and many of them can’t or shouldn’t come from a candidate or party. “Oh, they’re normal people just like us” paved the way for marriage equality. “It’s not fair that my family can’t survive on the minimum wage” is fueling the Fight for $15.
We all have stories to tell. Can they all be grouped under an umbrella super-story that makes it clear what “the left” stands for? Short answer: Yes. Longer answer: They have to be, if we have any hope of counteracting the story that the right has been telling about us for the past 50 years. Which leads to:
2. Keep talking. Stories take a long time to percolate. The best ones, in an electoral sense, articulate and get out in front of already emerging shifts in the political and social landscape. Sometimes this can be credited to fortuitous timing, or a particularly astute campaign manager. But often these seemingly inexorable transformations are the result of years, decades, of careful, deliberate, painstaking work to leverage public opinion and political capital. Republicans and their allies on the right are masters of this. They know how to play the long game.
Follow the lineage back to the Goldwater era and you can see exactly how we got where we are, thanks to billions of dollars spent convincing white middle America (and others) that government is both completely ineffective and incredibly successful at destroying sacred American values; that some “other,” usually of color, is both inherently inferior and amazingly capable of getting, taking or stealing benefits that are rightfully theirs; that coastal elites are effete liberal socialists cowering in the face of crime, guns and “Real America,” and yet still able to exert full control over banks, the media and entertainment. It takes a long time to lay out a story like that, and have it stick.
As part of this concerted, consistent effort, Republicans have learned to use the levers of power and politics amazingly well. See: neutering a governor in a shameless fit of sore-loserhood. Fortunately, they also know how to overplay their hand at times. See: trying to privatize Social Security. (They also have a weird penchant for over-the-top names for things.)
As hard and boring as this work is, Democrats and allies on the left have to do the same, on both the storytelling and machinery sides. The endgame played out with dramatic speed, but marriage equality did not happen overnight. The battles over abortion rights and gun control have gone on for decades, and unfortunately will continue. The infrastructure is growing, but it’s nowhere near an equal counterbalance yet, particularly when it comes to media mouthpieces. (We’ll save the discussion of the left/right split on fake news for another time.)
3. Duck. As we’ve been reminded in the past couple of weeks, it’s difficult to remain appropriately outraged when you can’t even recall all of the things you’re supposed to be outraged about. I described it as whack-a-mole, but it’s really more akin to dodge ball — a punishing, one-sided version where those red rubber balls never stop coming toward your head, because Trump has the automatic ball machine perfectly tuned to his specifications and running like a dream.
So while it’s been nice to see at least a few Congressional Democrats respond early and often, we’ve seen how this tactical approach plays out in the longer term. Being an opposition party gives Democrats the ability — the obligation — to oppose, but there has to be discipline and consistency.
Whether he knows what he’s doing or not, Trump can continue to use his Twitter feed to make progressives (in and out of office) dance to whatever tune he chooses. Unless progressives learn to resist his siren song.
Responding to every outrageous Trumpian act with heartfelt but haphazard outrage is back to whacking moles. With so many to hit, how do you create a compelling story of resistance? (We saw how well that worked for Hillary.) It will take a hell of a lot of willpower, and quick thinking, and strategic brilliance, to step off that particular treadmill. Stay disciplined. Be proactive. Channel the outrage. Control the story.
The good news is, some of the people on Capital Hill are at least aware of the issue.
4. Suspend disbelief. The bad news is, I think we’re just becoming aware of the epic scale of the story we’re now living in.
Which brings us to the bear shitting in the room.
Russian hacking and interference in the presidential election is maybe the biggest, most portentous story of the moment. But honestly I don’t know how to think about it. The peek behind that particular curtain gives me vertigo. Because it really sounds like a made-up story — a dystopian sci-fi vision of the near future. Or a not-quite Manchurian Candidate; more of a Tempertantrurian Candidate, one who blinds us to the truth not by presenting as his own opposite but by filling the sky with so much chaff we can’t see what is true or real anymore.
I’m not sure how to counter that, or even respond to it. Partly it’s my natural rational instinct to disbelieve conspiracy theories. (Damn you, reality-based community!) Partly it’s the implications that follow: How does one superpower respond to a former superpower meddling in the basic foundations of its governing structure? Escalation could happen very quickly if the people making decisions can’t be trusted to keep their heads....
In this particular case, Trump’s instinct to lash out, smear the messenger and deny, deny, deny may not serve him well — while, with any luck, avoiding doing irreparable global damage (if he can manage to keep his wrath aimed at domestic critics).
I don’t think he will be able to brush this under the orange rug and move on. That doesn’t mean he won’t try, by distracting us with some other Twitter-based inanity. (Maybe by picking a fight with...China?) And it doesn’t mean the GOP won’t quickly fall in line and try to banish this episode down the memory hole. (Thanks, Paul!)
Or maybe I still don’t get it. Maybe he’ll be wildly successful — at least as far as his audience of true believers (the only one he cares about) is concerned. Maybe he’s not spinning and spitting lies because he doesn’t know or care about the truth; he’s doing it to reinforce his story.
I’m willing to bet that Trump knows his Electoral College margin was tiny. I’m willing to bet that he knows that there weren’t three million illegitimate voters. I’m willing to bet that he knows Russia was trying to help him. He’s not concerned with facts or evidence; he’s focused on framing the story for his followers. Fact-checking, shmact-checking—that’s something the MSM does and elites care about. Trump is tweeting bald-faced lies to give his followers cover, to give them something they can believe that won’t reduce their faith in him.
And that kind of thing doesn’t stop with an election; it’s now being baked into the operation of government itself. The story of a campaign is becoming the story of our country. And the fact that it pisses off libtards makes it that much sweeter (or for a lot of his base, is actually the point).
Something must be done. Right? We can’t let election-shaking shenanigans imported from overseas be allowed to stand. Right? Have we, finally, really lost all sense of decency?
I don’t believe it’s too late to duck. But many of us have been numbed by the onslaught of norm-smashing and “nothing-like-this-in-our”-histrionics and are a little too dazed at the moment to clearly think things through.
That leaves me at the hard truth which is really the real starting place, and ultimately the most important lesson.
5. Pay attention. Remember. Never normalize.
It’s not much. But it’s everything.