Last Night's Democratic Debate: Marianne Williamson and Elizabeth Warren Gave Two Apocalyptic Visions of America

Each of the candidates in last night’s Democratic Primary Debate expressed a vision of America, framed as the vision that they thought would help win the election and defeat Donald Trump. It was, like the last two Democratic primary debates, a miserable spectacle. But I would like to take a minute to look at two visions of America: that of Marianne Williamson, a long-shot candidate of no obvious credentials, and the high-polling Elizabeth Warren. Although their policies are much different, their tone was ever-so-much like that of Donald Trump: both women talked about a nation in crisis. Fear. Impending disaster. Doom is upon us. 

If they don’t win the White House, they could probably both get jobs as end-times preachers on television.

One of the USA's Founders

Let’s start with Marianne Williamson's opening statement. Like many liberals, she started by hearkening back to the nation's founders: “In 1776 our founders brought forth on this planet an extraordinary new possibility. It was the idea that people, no matter who they were, would simply have the possibility of thriving.” But, alas, she said, the nation has now turned away from those ideals and has fallen into “an amoral economic system” that “has turned short-term profits for huge multi-national corporations into a false god. And this new false god takes precedence over the safety and the health and the well-being of we the American people and the people of the world and the planet on which we live.”

Williamson rejected political norms: “Conventional politics will not solve this problem because conventional politics is part of the problem.” Pretty harsh, is it not? Because, sounding like a radical, she rejected the system that many people think has made the United States into a great nation. Similarly, during his campaign, Donald Trump said much the same thing: “Our country is in serious trouble.”

In case anyone missed the point, Williamson later talked about "this dark psychic force of the collectivized hatred that this president is bringing up in this country." 

Well, no surprise there. Most pundits feel that Williamson is the fruitcake candidate. But let’s look at what high-polling Elizabeth Warren said during her opening statement: after criticizing Trump, who she said “disgraces the office of president every single day,” she said that “our problems didn't start with Donald Trump. Donald Trump is part of a corrupt, rigged system that has helped the wealthy and the well-connected and kicked dirt in the faces of everyone else.” Warren rejected the system more emphatically than Williamson!

After promising to fix America’s political and economic problems, Warren concluded her opening statement like this: “You know, I know what's broken in this country, I know how to fix it, and I will fight to make it happen.”

Echoes of Donald Trump! Do you remember when Donald Trump said, “Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it?” Like Warren, Trump also talked about a “rigged system.” Warren was positively channeling Trump’s rhetoric. Do you remember Trump’s inaugural address? He promised that, “This American carnage stops right here and stops right now.” Williamson and Warren were promising much the same thing.

The soul of radical rhetoric is to say that the system is so bad that we can't fix it, but instead we need to overhaul it or get rid of it entirely. Williamson and Warren, like Trump before them, spotlighted a rhetorical vision; they told us about a country that was falling apart at the seams: a country that needs a hero to arise and put it back to rights. But people who have faith in our system and traditions, who cite the Founders, cannot, with any logic, then say that the system is broken, rigged, and doomed to destruction. And I am too old to think that one hero can fix everything. That path leads to disappointment or, worse, tyranny.

In part, the debaters were appealing to primary voters, who tend to be much more ideological than the public at large. In part, however, they are making self-fulfilling prophecies: if you tell people that things are terrible and then work to rip everything apart, you’re pretty much guaranteed to make things terrible, and then you get to say that you were right. Former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper proposed more conventional solutions: “What we focused on was making sure that we got people together to get things done, to provide solutions to problems, to make sure that we—that we worked together and created jobs.” But he is near the bottom of the polls. In last night’s debate, the apocalyptic visions carried the day: Warren is edging up in the polls, while Williamson dominated social media.

Image via Wikimedia Commons

Were Trump's Tweets Racist? They Were (Sort of) Deniable Dog Whistles

Were President Donald Trump's tweets asking four minority Democratic Congresswomen, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and Ayanna Pressley, to "go back to the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came," racist? Liberals say yes, President Trump and his ever-loyal supporters say awful things and deny that you said them is a rhetorical trope. It was an odd trope, since only Omar was born outside of the United States, and she came to the United States as a child.



During the last week or so, we have heard several instances of national figure saying things that sounded innocent but which many people (including me) perceived to be bigoted. Some people call this dog-whistle politics, but it goes farther. It stops open conversation.

The idea of a dog whistle is that a dog can hear it but people can’t. Sometimes in dog-whistle politics a politician can say something that his or her followers understand perfectly well, but that other people might overlook. Presidential candidate Mitt Romney said in his 2012 Acceptance Speech at the Republican National Convention, “when the world needs someone to do the really big stuff, you need an American.” That sounded perfectly patriotic, except that the audience heard it as a dog whistle about the Barack Obama birth certificate conspiracy theories. At the same time, Romney could deny being racist. When Republicans call Democratic politicians “lawless,” Democrats probably hear an odd exaggeration. But a member of the Christian Right will instantly recall apocalyptic theology: “the lawless one is revealed” (2 Thessalonians 2:8 NRSV).

Bethany Albertson, a political psychologist at the University of Texas, calls this multivocal communication. “Multi” means “many” and “vocal” means “voice,” thus, speaking with more than one voice. She explains: “In political speech, multivocal communication reflects situations where the sender of the message sends a targeted appeal to an ingroup that understands the specific meaning of a particular phrase based on a shared history of past practice while an outgroup remains unaware.” Shared history is the point. Racial and ethnic minorities have heard through history: “Go back where you came from.” “Go back to Africa.” “Go back to Ireland.” Go back to wherever. One statement, two meanings, depending on how the audience hears it.

One reason that politicians use multivocal speech is so they can say awful things while denying that they said anything bad. Trump is past master. Liberals condemned Trump’s tweets as obviously racist. Trump himself denied it: “I don’t have a racist bone in my body.” 

Trump could deny that he was racist because his tweets were multivocal. He didn't use irrefutably racist language; he did not say in so many words that the four congresswomen should leave because they were minorities. He used an ambiguous message instead. He gave his supporters an opening to defend him. For example, conservative Mark Levin seemed quite happy to accept Trump’s denial. Levin said that Trump was complaining about the women’s character, not their ethnicity. That’s unlikely, but that’s the dubious magic of multivocal communication.

During the Cold War, diplomats aimed for “plausible deniability.” Say or do things that you can deny. Learn to deny them with a straight face. That is exactly what Trump did: he said something that was horribly racist but left himself room to deny. Was anyone fooled? Yes, you bet, plenty of his supporters swallowed his line – or pretended they did, which, with multivocal communication, amounts to the same thing.

If we want to have a healthy country, multivocal communication causes big trouble. It’s hard to confront evil if evil leaves itself room to wriggle and squirm away. We can’t talk about our differences if we pretend they don’t exist.

This wasn’t the only recent multivocal communication. I’ll try to write more in coming days.

"No Collusion, No Obstruction:" Not Really True, but Is Trump Persuasive?

Donald Trump speaking at Turning Point USA Teen Action Summit

If there is anything that you can count on President Donald Trump to say, it is, "No Collusion." He may as well embroider it on his tailored jackets. You can also count on him to say "No Obstruction." Persuasion by slogan: repeat the same simple points many times. Classic Trump.

The denials, "No Collusion, No Obstruction," refer to the two volumes of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report on Russian interference in the 2016 election campaign. The first volume identified many contacts between the Russian government and the Trump campaign, but did not prove criminal collusion or conspiracy. The second volume identified many efforts by President Trump to obstruct the investigation, but declined to indict because Trump is a sitting president.

Here's my question: President Trump himself has said very little other than to call the investigation corrupt and to repeat, over and over and over, "No Collusion, No Obstruction." Those are not arguments; they are claims. It is unclear, to say the least, that Mueller's report supports either claim. Does that mean that Trump's simple, bald, unexplained denials aren't persuasive? It does not. That is because when we hear something over and over we might begin to believe it simply because we've heard it a lot. Repetition does not always persuade people, however. Let's look at Trump's repetition. 

Trump's denials
President Trump beat his slogans into the ground during his recent speech at Turning Point USA's Teen Student Action Summit 2019. Speaking to a friendly, uncritical, conservative crowd, Trump said, about halfway through the speech, "No collusion, no obstruction." He neither explained nor offered evidence. He ridiculed the investigation for taking too long and costing too much money, but did not say why there was no collusion or obstruction.

Trump continued the theme a moment later: "Their collusion [sic], no collusion. They have no collusion." (Applause.) After claiming that the Constitution gave him unlimited power, Trump said that, "But I don't even talk about that because they did a report and there was no obstruction. After looking at it, our great Attorney General read it. He is a total professional. He said, 'There's nothing here. There's no obstruction.' So they referenced, 'No obstruction.' So you have no collusion, no obstruction, and yet it goes on." Again, he didn't explain why he thought there was no collusion or obstruction. He just repeated his slogans.

Arguments against Trump's conclusion would include that repeated contacts between his campaign and the Russians might not be collusion or conspiracy, but some people think they are fishy. No reasonable reader of the Special Counsel's report would think that there was no obstruction. But those would be arguments. Trump didn't give arguments. He just repeated: "no collusion, no obstruction." And, of course, "No Collusion" and  "No Obstruction" are all over Trump's Twitter feed: 

Repeated Points Can Be Persuasive
Why could such plain repetition persuade people? A theory of persuasion called the Elaboration Likelihood Model was devised by psychology professors John T. Cacioppo and Richard E. Petty. This model shows how audiences think about persuasive messages. 

Cacioppo and Petty's research found that persuasion could occur by two different routes. They called the first route the central route of mental processing, compared to the peripheral route that involves less mental processing. When something is important to us, when we have the time and tools to evaluate carefully, we tend to think about things carefully, evaluate the pros and cons of evidence, and reach rational decisions. That's the central route. When conditions like that don't apply, we tend to make decisions by peripheral cues. Peripheral cues might include whether we like the speaker, whether the speaker is attractive, and, yes, how often we have heard something. I suspect that Trump's Turning Point USA audience had no interest in critical evaluation or central processing because they were already emotionally committed to Trump's presidency. So, yes, under some conditions, repetition can be persuasive. But there are catches. 

Repetition Doesn't Always Do Much Good
The first catch is that persuasion through the peripheral route tends to be short-lived and have less effect on behavior. Persuasion that occurs in the central route – when we take the time to evaluate evidence and think things through – is likely to last longer and have more effect on behavior. So, something that we believe simply because it's been repeated may not stick in our brains very long and may not affect how we vote.

The second catch is that Cacioppo and Petty's research found that moderate repetition was the most effective. When an audience hears something over and over and over, they may get tired of hearing it and the persuasive effect can diminish. So, Trump may be overusing his catch phrases. They are getting old. I'm tired of hearing them. Aren't you?

Trump's Repetition: Pros and Cons
So, first, Trump can deal with the accusations against him by repeating his bald denials many times. However, first, these bald denials will not persuade people who make the effort to look into the facts. For example, no one who has read the Mueller report will take "No Obstruction" seriously. Second, since persuasion over the peripheral route has less effect on behavior, his denials might not change many votes. 

At some point, slogans aren't enough.  

If you want to read my earlier posts about the rhetoric of Trump and Mueller, here they are.


Image: White House YouTube channel

Greta Thunberg's Credibility to Speak about Climate Change: Her Youth Is a Big Plus. Maybe We'll Listen.

Credibility, Theodore Clevenger and my former persuasion professor Kenneth Andersen explained, has three main factors: expertise, trustworthiness, and dynamism. No sixteen-year old can be an expert in climate science. So what makes Greta Thunberg so persuasive?

Climate Change and Storms

Sixteen year-old Greta Thunberg, a Swedish climate activist, has been touring European parliaments to talk about climate change. She is making quite a splash. Her articulate speeches review the accepted scientific evidence about climate change, point out the tremendous power of big money in spreading anti-science propaganda, and plead for dramatic action. Her central point is to focus on nations' responsibility to protect their children's future. Her April 2019 speech to the British Parliament ended like this:

"We children are not sacrificing our education and our childhood for you to tell us what you consider is politically possible in the society that you have created. We have not taken to the streets for you to take selfies with us, and tell us that you really admire what we do.

"We children are doing this to wake the adults up. We children are doing this for you to put your differences aside and start acting as you would in a crisis. We children are doing this because we want our hopes and dreams back."

I'll spare you the vicious personal counter-attacks that some conservatives have used to rail against her. Not everyone finds Thunberg credible because not everyone wants to believe her message. And, yes, some people tell her to go away because they think she's too young.

She is, however, credible to people who are willing to listen because:

1. Climate science isn't being debated in scientific circles. On the contrary, media pundits, energy companies, and conservative politicians have created a dispute out of thin air. The debate about global warming is not a scientific debate; as long as we find science itself credible, we can find Thunberg credible. That's why she doesn't need to be an expert. The experts came before her.

2. Her speech delivery was varied, personable, and interesting, but she wasn't loud or frantic. She sounded calm but emotional. Her occasional hesitancy just reinforced her youth. 

3. Thunberg's point was that the future belongs to the young. A teenager pleading for her generation's future has special poignancy. She is pleading for herself.

I find it ironic that conservative politicians care so much about the children who are unborn, but seem to care much less about children who have already been born. Why is that? 

Most of the time, a speaker who is too young loses credibility. But Thunberg's youth gained her credibility. People are listening to her. Maybe she will make a difference. 

P.S. Over the years, I had several students who had Asperger Syndrome. They were some of the finest public speaking students I ever taught. Never think that a label defines you. 

Image: National Park Service

Russian Interference: Mueller Wasn't Talking about Impeachment. He Was Talking about Something Much More Important. Don't Miss the Point.

Robert Mueller, FBI photo

Pretty much everybody missed the point of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s July 24, 2019 testimony. But he made everything clear in his opening statement. His opening statement told us everything we needed to know. He emphasized his key point, which was Russian election interference.

When I was a freshman debate student at the College of William and Mary, my friend and upper-class teammate Kathy Shirley Micken kept telling me that emphasis was the key to effective debating. Put more time and emphasis on your main points, she said, the points that might win the debate, and spend less time on trivial issues. I learned that lesson slowly, although I think I eventually learned it well.

Mueller emphasized his main point sharply and clearly, but not everyone was listening. The Democrats on the Judiciary Committee and Intelligence Committee were looking for ammunition to use against President Donald Trump. The Republicans were looking for every opportunity to defend President Trump. Since they didn’t have much content to offer, the Republicans spent a lot of their time trying to smear Mueller and yell at him rather than talk about issues. Really, however, the members of Congress all had the same purpose: to win the next election. Politicians are simple beings and most of them only care about winning.

That purpose was not, however, Mueller’s purpose. His purpose was to defend the country, to protect the integrity of our national political process. It was not his purpose to help one side or the other win the election, and he bent over backwards – probably too far backwards – to avoid helping one side or the other.

His message came across in his opening statement, which told us everything we needed to know: Mueller made it clear that his first purpose was to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 election:

“The order appointing me as Special Counsel directed our Office to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. This included investigating any links or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump campaign. It also included investigating efforts to interfere with, or obstruct, the investigation.” The first point, in other words, was to look at Russian interference. The politicians are looking at the second and third purposes. The first purpose was the one that mattered. He offered the investigation’s main conclusion: “First, our investigation found that the Russian government interfered in our election in sweeping and systematic fashion.” That is very scary, and it is much more important than whether Donald Trump wins or loses the next election. A speaker's first point is automatically emphasized. Mueller's first point was about Russian interference.

Mueller's brief opening statement also talked about obstruction of justice and allegations of criminal conspiracy between the Russian government and the Trump campaign. He briefly defended his investigation’s integrity and explained why his testimony would be (to the politicians' disappointment) limited in scope. Fine.

The politicians, the pundits, and the analysts are all thinking about how Mueller’s testimony will affect the next election. Mueller was interested in that too, but not in the sense of trying to figure out whether Trump should or should not win. His goal was to prevent further Russian interference. While Congress was busy worrying about whether his testimony will help or hinder Trump's reelection effort, we are spending far too little time thinking about how to protect our election’s integrity.

The Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed a sweeping bill last month to protect election security. The Republican-controlled Senate has refused to take it up for discussion. The most important issue is not impeachment. The most important issue is not who wins the next election. The most important issue is election security, and that is what Mueller was talking about. That is what he emphasized. Near the end of his testimony, Mueller said: “It wasn't a single attempt. They're doing it as we sit here. And they expect to do it during the next campaign.” That is quite a warning.

The United States has survived bad presidents in the past. Andrew Johnson was drunk during his own inauguration as vice president; a short time later, Abraham Lincoln was dead and Johnson was president. Richard Nixon escaped prison only because Gerald Ford pardoned him. We can survive bad presidents. But can we survive the subversion of our electoral system? That is the question that Mueller wanted us to think about.

Mueller put his emphasis right where it needed to be. The members of Congress tried to shift the emphasis toward their political goals. For the most part, they failed. When he answered political questions, Mueller was fuzzy and insecure. But Mueller was as sharp as a brand-new single edge razor blade when he talked about Russian interference. That was the point with which he began and the point on which he ended. The other issues matter, and they matter a lot, but to Mueller they were secondary.

But are we listening? 

P.S.: Kathy Micken did well for herself after college. Here's her publication record.