A brand expert gives advice to Biden

December, 2019. The headline for a Guest Post by Tony Farrell:

"I believe the only winning ad strategy is to signal empathy for non-college whites in swing states who remain on the fence."
          Tony Farrell, Brand Strategist

That Guest Post stands up well under the test of time. Farrell gave advice to Biden's 2020 campaign. He urged Biden to avoid demonizing Trump. Instead he should position himself as the candidate of the electable, moderate center of the Democratic Party, as distinguished from its progressive left. Farrell said he believed "that radical progressiveness is the greatest threat to a Democratic win, embodied in the far-left stances of Warren and Sanders." Farrell is a Democratic centrist. He thought a "calming, fair-minded leader" was what would win the Democratic primary and then the general election.

Farrell is again giving campaign advice to Biden. This time he sees the GOP candidate's weak spot as abortion.

Republicans are committed to the losing side of the argument, so hammer on that point. Farrell was a classmate at college, a graduate of its Business School. He had a long, successful career as a brand strategist at The Gap, The Nature Company, and The Sharper Image. He is a longtime fan of Emmylou Harris.

Guest Post by Tony Farrell

 Is It Time for Biden to Sell Like Trump?

In some worlds, it seems flattering to be told one is “ahead of your time” but, in my world, that’s about the worst slur ever tossed at a marketer or salesman. Being right on timing is everything; ahead or behind is not valued at all. Now is not the time for Biden to be selling. 

Biden is correct to stand back and let the Republicans wrestle with their much more difficult issues. As of now, Biden has no opponent!

I believe Biden is doing a masterful job as President, from guiding NATO in support of Ukraine to swiftly enlisting bipartisan support for his infrastructure bill. His State of the Union address proved he can credibly convey empathy for the white working class that, today, supports Trump. Diehard Trump supporters are largely intractable but nonetheless should not be demonized. Polls are disappointing, but no matter. Biden has a great team (compare State and Justice to what was there before!) and there’s time enough for selling. The question is, sell what to whom?

The time will be ripe when the Republican team is chosen. And what a mess that choosing is going to be! I assume the nominee will not be Trump because of legal troubles and, more importantly, Trump the salesman is no longer able to credibly promise anything, now that he’s had his four unproductive years as President, plus the 2020 loss. In 2016, his brilliant selling skills (e.g., “making no small promises” and “speaking plain, understandable language”) worked to run circles around marketing-challenged Hillary. I doubt Trump will get another bite at the apple, but if he does, Biden can relax and Republicans will be wiped out in the general.

For the sake of this post, let’s assume DeSantis wins the nomination; let’s say Haley joins him as VP candidate. Once nominated, that’s when the ghost of Roe v. Wade will dominate to an overwhelming degree. Many have commented that the abortion ruling was the ultimate “dog catching the bus” event, and now, for Republicans, such a losing hand. Not every election turns on a single issue but I believe 2024 will turn on how the new morality state intends to enforce and punish those who engage in anything touching abortion. 

It’s not a good look. Pressing questions on abortion directed at Republicans will generate an embarrassment of riches for Democrats. Regardless of the deep, serious questions about the morality of abortion, most Americans (and certainly a majority of women) will see this election as a singular referendum on the actions of the state in this realm. The turnout to fight for abortion rights will be huge, while the MAGA crowd (without Trump) will sulk at home, and not vote.

If it’s Biden who’s running, he just needs to keep doing what he’s doing and make it as clear as possible to all reasonable voters what the stakes are. 

Taking off my marketing hat and putting on my bloviating-blogger cap, I believe Biden is too old to run again, despite his brilliant success as President. I also believe Harris is a losing proposition, especially if voters believe she’s likely to assume the Presidency before the term ends. I’m one of those rare voters (I guess) for whom a candidate’s choice of running mate can be determinative. The VP choice reveals judgment, and picking a Sarah Palin or a Dan Quayle is fatal, to me…unless the alternative is clearly horrible. So, ease Harris into another job before Biden steps aside for a stronger Democratic candidate, like Gavin Newsom.

Meanwhile, let’s just watch the Republican food fight. Democrats need to know their opponent, and there is time enough.

 

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Navigating death.

"What's it all about, Alfie?
Is it just for the moment we live
What's it all about
When you sort it out, Alfie?"

       Bert Bacharach and Hal David, promoting the movie "Alfie," 1966

In 1997 Oregon enacted a law that allowed terminally ill people to end their lives by taking a drug prescribed by a physician. I helped my friend, Bob Warren, through that process just before his 96th birthday. He was uncomfortable. He was in decline and he knew all his problems would get worse. He had had enough.

Bob Warren

The two posts I wrote about helping him die are among posts that have drawn the most attention and readership. One described his decision; the second described the process of death. For Bob, what "it" was all about wasn't spiritual. In the end he had a purpose, to make sure other old, sick people could leave on their own terms. He died surrounded by caring people, medical people, but no chaplains. He wanted nothing to do with religion. Raz Mason read those posts.

Raz Mason is a chaplain--and educator and advocate. She has a degree in mathematics from Bryn Mawr, a Master’s in Pastoral Studies from Seattle University, and a Master’s in Divinity from Harvard Divinity School. In 2023-24 she will serve as the Puget Sound VA’s Mental Health Chaplain Fellow, assisting on the locked psychiatric unit. She writes “Power-with Perspectives” on Substack.

Guest Post by Raz Mason

Mason

 In April, Peter wrote movingly about his friend Robert Warren’s assisted death, and journeying with him to the end. In case you missed it, I recommend Peter’s powerful post, especially the last two paragraphs.

Peter writes, “We were born knowing how to die.” This is a simple yet immensely difficult truth to understand. Peter invited me to share my thoughts as a chaplain and how I have cultivated skills to accompany people into death.

Prelude: What Is a Chaplain, Really?

Maybe you’re unsure or skeptical about what chaplains do. Professional chaplains provide spiritual care to people of any faith or no faith. Most work in hospitals. Others work in the military, police departments (where positions must be unpaid), prisons, nursing homes, and increasingly in workplaces.

Professionally-educated chaplains, ones credentialed to work in hospitals, go through at least 800 hours of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE), a rigorous and structured training process that is half spiritual care practice and half various forms of instruction and group reflection on patient interactions and one’s personal development. If we have not wrestled with issues of life, death, loss, and life’s ultimate meaning ourselves, we cannot offer care to others mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

A good chaplain offers a non-anxious presence, invites reflection on a person’s inner resources, and offers or facilitates spiritual support as requested via prayers, readings, or religious services in the faith tradition of the one being served. They could be a patient, family member, or staffer. Chaplains respect that many are “spiritual but not religious,” nourished by sources other than “God.” It is taboo to a professional chaplain to attempt religious conversion. Our focus is on the actual reality of the person we are helping—each is a unique and complicated individual, even though health crises or death do bring common concerns.

It's powerful for individuals to have a discussion partner capable of emotional presence for the hardest of topics. Not only does this help people feel less alone, but invites reflection to tell the story of one’s life. Many craft a unifying narrative that makes sense of both struggles and triumphs.

The Political

This need is not only individual.

Readers of Peter’s posts come for political commentary. I am one of his avid followers and a political participant. Last year I ran for the Oregon State Senate. I lost, but earned 41% of the vote. That experience, and much political engagement before and after, has highlighted the parallels between chaplaincy and politics.

It takes courage and practice to be lovingly present, as was Peter at the end of his friend’s life, to illness and death. Not unlike facing death, we all need to cultivate the ability to consider current, potential, and/or looming losses. They can be things like physical and social threats from climate change, threats to civic stability and democratic institutions, global resource limitations, economic problems, the possibility of war in Ukraine escalating, and social injustices.

Without knowing it, it’s natural to defend ourselves emotionally by avoiding contemplation of possible losses and challenges. But the structure of the universe includes both positives and negatives. Our families, communities, and society are desperately in need of mature leaders firmly able to work with the diverse contours of reality, whether a given situation can improve, stay the same, or seemingly worsen.

Together, if we face and work through feelings of fear and grief, we will be much better positioned to take wise next steps and identify hopeful moments, even during immense loss.

 

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The big picture in Europe

In the long run, big things shape the little things.

In matters of war and peace, our attention from day to day is on events. A breakthrough by Ukraine forces might cause Russia to change tactics and strategy. But the war exists in the first place because of national interests of Russia, Ukraine, Europe, the West, business, culture, religion, and human nature. The big things.

My blog post of two days ago reflected on how the war in Ukraine might end. Russia had a vital interest, I wrote, which explains their occupation of Crimea and the eastern provinces of Ukraine and the risk they took in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The easy and simple way to explain Russian actions is the "Hitler-model," -- an armed robber out to steal another's land. I think most Americans see it that way. This is 1938 again.

Russians have another view of it. Americans don't need to agree with the view, but they need to understand it. Americans can discount it, saying it is a result of relentless propaganda fed Russians, but that does not make it any less real or politically potent. (Fox News and Trump express a relentless story of Trump's righteous innocence. A huge number of Americans believe it, including one of two political parties. Believers have super-majorities in many states and nearly all rural parts of every state.) 

Putin says Russia is under attack. Russians believe that. Putin explains that Ukraine is Russian. The Ukrainian language has the same roots as Russian, and there are lots of people in Ukraine whose first language is Russian, not Ukrainian, especially in the places Russia now occupies. Russians think Ukraine is being seduced by the West. They think it is being corrupted by a secular, commercial, Godless, wicked modernism away from traditional Orthodox Christian virtues -- an argument with salience here in America. 

Putin says Ukraine and Russia "are one people. Kiev is the mother of Russian cities. Ancient Rus’ is our common source and we cannot live without each other."

Russians believe that their country's vital interests are at stake. Russia has oil to sell. Germany and Europe need its oil, and they were doing good business until the USA meddled. Russia needs friendly countries to its northwest -- Belarus and Poland -- so they cannot be held hostage by them in transporting oil. They need Ukraine to be friendly, or better yet, fully Russian, for transportation of Russian oil and wheat across Ukraine or through the Black Sea and to the world. Russia cannot have hostile neighbors to the west.

One way for Americans to think of this is to say "Tough luck, Russia. We win, you lose." That is what Russians perceive from us, which energizes and justifies their sacrifice in this war. Russians think they are the innocent party here, fighting to preserve their country. Are they wrong? They don't think so.

George Friedman's Geopolitical Futures takes the long view of history. He analyzes the behavior of nation states in the manner of a chess game. Countries have national interests which shape their behaviors, even as specific leaders or popular majorities come and go.  To better understand the path to peace in Ukraine, read in more detail what Friedman thinks animates Russian actions. 

Click here for PDF

The quick and easy thought for Americans is to perceive Russia as a failed state, losing population, its people dying young, corrupt, a has-been country. This war in Ukraine is an opportunity to crush Russia, not accommodate it. The sooner it is irrelevant and dissolved, the better for us and the world. It is a good sound bite for a candidate. Sound tough and dismissive. That sound bite is in Russian ears, too, and it stiffens their resolve. The Russian people, language, religion, and culture have been around since the 9th century. They lost some 25 million people preserving that culture in WWII. They have national pride. They have nuclear weapons. It makes sense to know what they want and what they fear.

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Easy to be hard

"Try to see it my way,
Only time will tell if I am right or I am wrong.
While you see it your way
There's a chance that we may fall apart before too long.
We can work it out,
We can work it out."

     John Lennon and Paul McCartney, 1965

The song title is "We can work it out." The means to that agreement, the Beatles sang, was for her to see things his way. Yeah, right.

Today's post, like yesterday's, is about stepping out of one's own frame of reference and seeing what problems the other person -- or other country -- faces. It requires empathy. It requires seeing oneself in the position of the other person. To cite lyrics from another song of the same era, from the rock musical Hair, it is 

"Easy to be hard.
Easy to be cold. . . .
Easy to say no
Easy to be proud."

Herbert Rothschild is a former college professor, now retired, in apparent good health. He recognizes his own good fortune and privilege. He steps outside his own frame of reference to write about affirmative action and privilege. For decades, he has been an advocate for peace, justice, and the environment.

Amazon

Guest Post by Herb Rothschild.

In 2015, when I was writing a weekly column for The Daily Tidings (RIP), I took the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to reflect on affirmative action. I ended the column with the following prediction: “Next term the U.S. Supreme Court will end all affirmative action programs based on gender, race, and ethnicity but leave the ADA requirements intact.” My prophecy was seven years premature, but unfortunately accurate. Here is that column. I’ve added a new ending.

Like the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the ADA forbid discrimination against specified groups of people, but it went much farther. It required covered employers to make reasonable accommodations for employees with disabilities, and imposed accessibility requirements on public facilities. In other words, it mandated affirmative action.

Such affirmative action was extraordinarily expensive. Buildings had to be retrofitted with electric lifts to accommodate the physically challenged. Sidewalk curbs had to be cut for the same reason. Colleges and universities had to hire helpers for their visually and hearing impaired students. Those were just some of the adjustments. The list is lengthy.

I’m not complaining. It was fair and intelligent public policy. It corrected past injustice, and it brought hitherto wasted talent into schools and workplaces. Interestingly, few people challenged that view. I never heard any public complaints about this affirmative action program despite its enormous cost.

Contrast that with the earlier resistance to affirmative action for women and especially for people of color, resistance that frequently reached into the courts.

The charitable view of the contrast is that we White men couldn’t see the analogies. It was obvious to us that we had created a world tailored to those without physical or mental disabilities, so we knew we couldn’t “level the playing field” (a much-used phrase in affirmative action discussions) for the blind or the paraplegic, say, just by declaring that we would no longer hold their condition against them in hiring, promotion, or admissions decisions.

But far too many of us didn’t realize that we lived in a tailored to White men, a world which couldn’t change meaningfully just by declaring that from now on we would be gender- and color-blind. Long before the nation was founded, a thorough-going affirmative action program had existed for us. We created it, we maintained it—since we were the ones making almost all the hiring, promotions, and school admissions decisions—and we hugely benefited from it.

                                      ---   ---   --- 

Readers have noticed a higher than usual number of Guest Posts. I am grateful to Guest Post authors. We get by with a little help from our friends. I have been busy and distracted getting baby Cabernet, Malbec, and Pinot Noir grapes up and alive. And in doing so, working alongside young men and foolishly trying to keep up, I re-injured an old hernia, yet another distraction.

Pinot Noir

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Spheres of Influence

I am pro Ukraine.

I favor an independent Taiwan. 

But big powers demand spheres of influence.

If Americans dare look in the mirror we might open up the possibility of a negotiated and lasting peace in Ukraine and Taiwan..

James Monroe to foreign powers, 1823: Back off. Don't meddle. The Americas are ours.

[We] declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety.

That has been our policy for 200 years. We can meddle; other powers cannot. In 1962 we considered Russian missiles in Cuba to be an existential threat to the U.S. Now China and Cuba are in negotiations over a joint military training facility on Cuba's north coast, sparking alarm in Washington.

Meanwhile pundits are celebrating the addition of Sweden and Finland to NATO. Finland has an 830 mile border with Russia. Our inclination is to consider this another "win."

Politico: "Sorry, Russia."

Wins are dangerous. A Western "win" validates Putin's description of the situation in Europe. He says the West, led by the USA, is invading them. We are celebrating. We should be cautious. 

Meanwhile, in the Western Pacific, U.S. bases surround China. One way to look at this is as a sign of our strength. We win. China loses. Sorry, China.

We should be cautious here, too. Our Navy is a mortal threat to China. In peacetime China has ample access to the world's markets. But China has some of the same problems as the U.S. if Cuba is in hostile hands. Cuba is at a choke point into and out of our Gulf Coast. There are narrow choke points both east and west out of China. China's expansion into the South China Sea is their effort to deal with that strategic weakness. 

From the U.S. point of view, Taiwan is the simple story of a feisty, successful democracy attempting to be free and independent of China. For China, it is a breakaway province, whose independence is encouraged by the West as part of its grand strategy of encirclement. China not wrong. We are spending tens of billions of dollars on the strategy of encircling China.

The U.S. is doing what great powers have done for all recorded history. We advance our own strategic interests and we confound the strategic interests of rivals. That behavior has a history. Great powers are continuously involved in wars at the boundary of the empire, punctuated by total wars that re-set the grand balance. We are in the post-war era of the World Wars of 1914-45. The U.S. has been fighting those predictable wars in Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Granada, Iraq, Serbia, Iraq again, and Afghanistan.

This is a dangerous game. Russia is a declining power and invasions from the west through Poland or Ukraine remain fresh in Russian memory. Russia has an interest in avoiding hostile powers at its borders, just like the U.S. does. An end to the war in Ukraine will almost certainly require that Russia get something. Putin wanted a re-unified Rus. Ukraine didn't want it. The West doesn't want it. Zelenskyy says Ukraine wants into NATO. It is something Ukraine could give up. Americans may want to open their minds to that.

China is a rising power. They are safer as a trading partner than as an enemy. I question whether it is in America's interest to surround China with an implied threat of naval blockade. We demand our sphere of influence. China does as well. Insofar as Americans perceive Taiwan as a Western outpost of our democracy and a reproachful finger in the eye of communist China, we invite the next proxy war. China feels threatened. We should avoid threatening China. Taiwan can be independent, but it must be independent-and-Chinese. It cannot be independent-and-Western, unless we want to go to war with China. And we don't. Americans should open their minds to that, too.

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Easy Sunday: Guest Post by Benjamin Franklin

In 1744 the government of Virginia colony offered the local Indians the opportunity to send a few of their young men to college at William and Mary. 

They respectfully declined. And made a counter-offer.

Benjamin Franklin tells the story.

From: "Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America," 1784:

Savages we call them, because their Manners differ from ours, which we think the Perfection of Civility. They think the same of theirs.

An Instance of this occurred at the Treaty of Lancaster in Pensilvania, anno 1744, between the Government of Virginia and the Six Nations. After the principal Business was settled, the Commissioners from Virginia acquainted the Indians by a Speech, that there was at Williamsburg a College, with a Fund for Educating Indian youth; and that if the Six Nations would send down half a dozen of their young Lads to that College, the Government would take Care that they should be well provided for, and instructed in all the Learning of the White People. It is one of the Indian Rules of Politeness not to answer a public Proposition the same day that it is made; they think it would be treating it as a light matter, and that they show it Respect by taking time to consider it, as of a Matter important. They therefore deferred their Answer till the Day following; when their Speaker began by expressing their deep Sense of the Kindness of the Virginia Government in making them that Offer, for we know, says he, that you highly esteem the kind of Learning taught in those Colleges, and that the Maintenance of our young Men while with you, would be very expensive to you. We are convinced therefore that you mean to do us Good by your Proposal, and we thank you heartily. 

But you who are wise must know, that different Nations have different Conceptions of Things, and you will therefore not take it amiss if our Ideas of this kind of Education happen not to be the same with yours. We have had some Experience of it: Several of our young People were formerly brought up at the Colleges of the Northern Provinces; they were instructed in all your Sciences; but when they came back to us they were bad Runners ignorant of every means of living in the Woods, unable to bear either Cold or Hunger, knew neither how to build a Cabin, take a Deer or kill an Enemy, spoke our Language imperfectly, were therefore neither fit for Hunters Warriors, or Counsellors, they were totally good for nothing. 

We are however not the less obliged by your kind Offer tho’ we decline accepting it; and to show our grateful Sense of it, if the Gentlemen of Virginia will send us a Dozen of their Sons, we will take great Care of their Education, instruct them in all we know, and make Men of them.

Original full text.

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Biden: New! Improved!

"Trouble, trouble, trouble (oh)
Oh, oh
Trouble, trouble, trouble
I knew you were trouble when you walked in
Trouble, trouble, trouble."

              Taylor Swift, "I knew you were Trouble," 2020

This is the summer of our discontent, but Joe Biden didn't start the trouble. Like Taylor Swift sings, it was there when Biden came into office. Attitudes are still stuck in the Covid-era past. That is over. Times are good.

Biden's job is to get people to feel that in their minds and hearts.

American has been losing its cultural glue, its cohesion. It isn't just government, where voters give Congress an 8% favorability rating. Every institution -- religious, academic, police, business, banking -- has seen a decline in support and trust. 

Pundits speculate why the negativity. Some point to the successful message tactic of Newt Gingrich, led by the linguist-strategist Frank Luntz. They advised Republicans, don't refer to Democrats as opponents; call them enemies. Don't say they are wrong; say they are disgusting. The tactic worked. It coarsens American politics. 

Others point to the failure of bipartisan faith in markets. In this construction, the Clintons, Al Gore, and Obama are approximately equal participants with Reagan, Gingrich, and Romney. They all believed in Wall Street Journal capitalism, the righteous verdict of the bond market, free trade, NAFTA, and open borders. Free markets create a problem for democracy. There are too many losers, too many people squeezed by hard bargains. Angry, frustrated people don't quietly disappear. They suffer, they look for someone to blame, and leaders come along who address that frustration. Leaders on the left point to corporate elites who get wealthy at the expense of the forgotten people. Leaders on the right point to foreigners, immigrants, fake media, and to elections where the wrong candidate wins. 

Others blame technology. Everyone can communicate to the world. Facebook, Twitter, Craigslist, and blogs like this one means the glue of information curation disappeared. Of course Americans believe wild conspiracies. They are in our news feeds.

Joe Biden won office by being the plausible alternative to Trump. Biden represented a return to "normalcy." In fact -- and this is hard to see amid the fog of political vitriol and misdirection -- Biden is a departure from the Reagan-Clinton-Romney-Obama world. He adopted Trump's economic message, deleting the xenophobia and authoritarianism. Trump talked about an America-first industrial policy but didn't change industrial policy. The CHIPS Act does change it, for real. Against criticism that America is "picking winners and losers," which it is, it is using the government to re-establish a vital industry back in the U.S. and putting it in rustbelt places, Ohio and upstate New York. The U.S. government is rebuilding transportation and broadband infrastructure amid charges of "Socialism!" and "Wasteful spending!" Democrats don't see it and Republican politicians don't admit it, but Biden has largely adopted Trump's border policy as regards sham asylum seekers. 

Meanwhile, the economy has rebounded. We are back to pre-Covid normal. Unemployment is low and inflation is abating. The economy is good. Yet discontent remains. Economic confidence is at the level of 2008 when there was, indeed, a profound crisis. Banks were toppling, money funds stopped being reliable storehouse of value, the economy was shrinking. There was good reason to lose confidence. Yet we are back near those levels according to Gallup polling. 

By a three-to-one margin people think things are getting worse for America's economy:

Americans aren't generalizing from their own eyes and ears. Look at the disconnect:

Joe Biden does not look or sound like a change agent, but he is one. He is re-steering the economy toward industrial policies intended to return high-value-added manufacturing to the U.S. It is the Trump story, implemented by Biden. But change isn't Biden's brand. One cannot separate the message from the messenger. An old man cannot be cast in the role of Juliet. He wouldn't be believable. Biden will have a hard time communicating to voters that he has already changed American economic policy, but that is his task in the months ahead. 

He is an old dog implementing new tricks. 

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