Marketing gurus, public relations experts, crisis counselors, and especially political consultants understand how vital it is to frame the message.
In today’s whirlwind society, it is increasingly difficult to frame messages amid the omnipresent white noise of modern life. The rise of social media and distrust in the mainstream media has also degraded the ability.
However, message framing is still a powerful tool that has been used nearly forever, particularly when it comes to rallying against an enemy.
Thomas Paine framed the message that the British were an antagonist to liberty before the Revolution. President Abraham Lincoln framed the message that slavery was abhorrent before the Civil War began.
In the late 1930s, FDR, the media, and most major institutions framed the message that the Axis Powers were the bad guys long before Pearl Harbor.
After World War II, the media and most major institutions framed the message that communism was a manmade menace as the Cold War began.
Today, the mainstream media and institutions like academia lack the moral clarity to simply state that the political rise of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is an existential threat to the United States of America.
I’ll go one step further. A few weeks after the United States celebrated its monumental 250th anniversary, there is a strong effort to whitewash the DSA, mischaracterize their aims, and obscure their odious policy agenda.
The DSA, “the largest socialist organization in the United States,” claims its chief “commitment” is “to fight for reforms that empower working people.”
According to the DSA website, its central objective is to help “working people” and promote policies that advance the interests of the “working class.”
In mid-July, the DSA released its official policy platform, the “Workers Deserve More!” program, which includes “thriving working class communities,” “working-class foreign policy,” and “working-class democracy.”
But attaching the term “working-class” to policies that will severely harm working people is an insult to the intelligence of the American people.
The DSA claims paid family leave for all workers, a four-day work week with full pay and benefits, free pre-K, free college, canceling all student loan debt, universal healthcare, housing for all, reparations, a universal basic income, abolishing the police and prison system, and the Green New Deal (GND) are pro-worker policies.
In truth, those policies would burden the working-class with more taxes, crime, poverty, and misery.
The vaunted GND alone would crush the working class with higher energy bills and unreliable electricity.
On the front of foreign affairs, the DSA asserts that workers will benefit from defunding the Department of War, closing all overseas military bases, “a free Palestine,” abolishing ICE, “amnesty for all immigrants,” and terminating all caps and quotas on legal immigration.
Of course, this absurd agenda does not adhere to the interests of working people, who value a strong military they disproportionately serve in.
What’s more, the DSA’s open border posture is anathema to the working class because it depresses wages, raises housing prices, and overwhelms systems like public schools, healthcare, and welfare programs.
The most repugnant element of the DSA platform is what it calls “working class democracy.”
Under the pretenses of “democracy for all,” “real democracy,” and “economic democracy,” the DSA has determined that workers will finally possess political power if Congress becomes a unicameral chamber; all permanent residents, prisoners, and criminals can vote; the Senate, Supreme Court, Electoral College, and Presidency are abolished; “public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries” is established; and “aggressive wealth taxes on the richest individuals and corporations” are enacted.
I wish the DSA would explain very slowly exactly how fundamental changes to the American governing system, like no more checks and balances, separation of powers, federalism, and republicanism, help workers.
I need specific evidence of mass nationalization programs that have been successful. I also need convincing and compelling proof that widespread wealth confiscation and redistribution will increase economic mobility for the working class. Lastly, I demand that the DSA present indisputable data that proves economic and political centralization certainly makes the working class better off.
To be safe, I will not hold my breath for an avalanche of facts to confirm the DSA’s platform is indeed worker-friendly because no such evidence exists.
On the other hand, we have more than an avalanche of evidence from the Soviet Union, Cuba, and North Korea that socialism is the last thing workers want or deserve.
All workers deserve dignity, liberty, and choice. The free-enterprise system rewards merit, hard work, innovation, and perseverance. The socialist system lacks freedom and incentivizes idleness.
Over the past 250 years, limited government, low taxes, and the spirit of American individualism have generated the wealthiest and most prosperous nation ever. The rags-to-riches stories are legendary.
The message is clear: The workers of America ought to unite against the DSA.
Chris Talgo (ctalgo@heartland.org) is editorial director at The Heartland Institute.