Reply #85: This debate is certainly contained entirely within the left half of...

[AP]

...the political spectrum.

The problem is that when I think of what's going on in the world, I don't think the primary problem with America right now is that we need to protect ourselves from enemies outside the country.

I'm not saying this isn't a critical issue. It's just not the issue within which I frame all the problems in America. In fact, if pushed, I might say that America really had to go to extreme lengths NOT to defend itself from enemies abroad. But that's a different tin-foil-hat discussion.

I think the umbrella issue has to do with which direction wealth and power is flowing. Under Democrats it flows down to the people and outwards. Under Republicans it flows up to the top. Democrats' frame is practically defined 100% by the desire to see power flow down to the people. Republicans, on the other hand, use the fear of external threats as the excuse for not letting power and wealth flow down to the people.

Once you define the flow of power as the frame -- as FDR did -- then you have the antidote to fear, and you set the public on the course for a stronger democracy that isn't so easy for the RW'ers to topple.

I'm not so sure what will happen if the democrats run on the idea that, indeed, fear of external threats is the defining political issue. Where do you go from there? I just don't think people can develop the sort of Rooseveltian revolutionary consciousness that you need to withstand red scares and political assassinations and still keep America on a Democratic course for 50-70 years before it starts to weaken again.

(Can you tell that I want FDR to come back from the dead and save America?)