What drives secular liberals/progressives? They all agree that Biblical Christian morality is not acceptable to them. That morality expects people to struggle (with God’s help) against their own sinful nature, and face God’s judgment when they fail. That is an intensely repulsive prospect for them so they deny God (and sadly, God’s forgiveness).

And, they deny their own sinful nature. But the sinful nature is still there, so they still sin. Where a “sin” is any  human choice whose consequence causes sorrow (to God or humans). So “sinners” are SORROW MAKERS. But they are loathe to admit that, so they deny their responsibility for the sorrows they have caused. They avoid interpersonal moral accountability, and skew their world view to avoid personal moral accusation by saying truth is relevant, or by claiming situations are too complex or ambiguous to hold them accountable.

Compensating for guilt, they posture as “the good people” and seek impersonal moral values upon which to claim moral superiority (thus Political Correctness and socialism). Seeing themselves as good, they expect that like-minded people are also “good”.  If everyone around is “good” there is no need for weapons among good folks.  And… ultimately… they see no need for the military.

Moreover, denying the sinfulness of human nature denies that evil can emit from deep within humans. The alternative is that evil has to come from outside human nature. So, if someone is acting badly, it must be accounted to some source of infuriating injustice from outside of that person’s nature. Maybe we could remove that injustice and the bad behavior would cease. Maybe we could just talk to the miscreant and work things out peacefully. Sometimes that is true, but sometimes it is not, and there the deniers of sinful human nature fail to appropriately respond to the evil they perceive. For example, underestimating the threat of terrorism.

Wisdom’s FOG

Can We Trust

George Lakoff?

A partial critique of George Lakoff’s Book: “Thinking Points”

We show that Lakoff employs

carefully crafted language to obscure

his real objectives.

Wisdom’s F.O.G.

George Lakoff has become one of the primary spokesmen for the Progressive movement. A Google search on Lakoff’s name reveals his extensive influence. George has written several books and advocates crafting language that puts progressive values into a more positive light. He calls it “properly framing the issues” while ignoring the fact that historically frames primarily evolved from attempts to describe reality, not to obscure reality with deceptive language for political purposes. The material that follows illustrates more of George’s deceptive language as it appears in the text of Chapter 5 of his book: “Thinking Points”.

:: A CLOSE LOOK AT CHAPTER 5 OF “THINKING POINTS”

Apparently, Progressives are a very trusting folk, at least, trusting of other Progressives. Evidence to that effect is clear in George Lakoff’s “Thinking Points” book. What follows is a brief look at the Progressive ideals described by George that depend upon people being trustworthy as they discharge their Progressive administrative responsibilities.

According to Lakoff the guiding principle of Progressivism is “The common wealth for the common good”.(See Chapter 4 under “The Common Good Principle”) That sounds fine, until you realize that in the mind of Lakoff and Progressives the “common good” is not just the cost of infrastructure and today’s mercy provisions, but also a host of new government socialistic services. (Far more than those already covered by current taxes.)

In chapter 5 of “Thinking Points”, in the “MORALITY AND THE MARKET” section, George says that “Markets are the institutions for the exchange of ‘goods and services.’”  But markets are not institutions! Not in the taxable sense, no more than are black markets taxable institutions. So by “markets” George is speaking collectively of businesses and other institutions that buy and sell “goods and services” in a market environment.  To certify that that is his meaning, Lakoff says “Even one’s labor is conceptualized as a product that one, or one’s union, sells in a labor market.”

In Chapter 5’s “PROGRESSIVE MORALITY” section Lakoff asserts “And those (businesses) that benefit from markets have a moral obligation to replenish the common wealth” and “Progressives see markets (businesses) as serving a moral purpose—a progressive moral purpose. And they recognize a truth that conservative ideology hides: Markets (businesses) can’t thrive and serve the common good without the constructive role of government.” … where the bold case, underlines and the word “(businesses)” were inserted here for clarity. Here, George makes it sound like businesses can’t thrive without the “constructive role of government”. 

But American Markets thrive when American businesses thrive, as they are doing right now (circa 2005-2007). And they are doing that without the Progressive “constructive role of government” in force.  So the appended “and serve the common good” phrase explains what George is really talking about.  When businesses thrive, it is the “common good” that “can’t also thrive” without “the constructive role of government”. Just how government might be “constructive” to the market (businesses) and help them “thrive” is not mentioned, because that is not precisely what Lakoff is saying! A careless reader might think Lakoff intends Progressive policies to be help businesses thrive.  But alas… since businesses are already thriving, he can only mean that it is the “common good” that is to “thrive” from “the constructive role of government”.  You may need to go back and read that sentence again!  This is language crafted to be misleading at its best. And, there is more of that to come.

Notice that “…conservative ideology hides” nothing here. Conservatives simply do not want government to make them give more money to the Progressive “common good”.

When Lakoff says that all businesses have a “moral obligation to replenish the ‘common wealth’” of its host society, that is OK with conservatives. Many corporations currently volunteer to do exactly that. It is worth mentioning in this context that many corporations and conservative individuals view the paying of taxes as paying their fair share for the society’s infrastructure and mercy services from which they benefit. There is of course some debate about what constitutes a fair share.

However, if business’ contribution to the “common good” is determined by government, it becomes involuntary and thus a hidden tax on society.  That confuses the debate on what constitutes a fair share!

Nonetheless, Lakoff goes on to passionately assert government should do exactly that.  As he says: “Progressives are focused on where markets depart from the idealization, where markets fail to meet expectations, and where government is necessary.”  Clarifying this sentence with parenthesized additions to explain the contextual implications”, this sentence reads like this: “Progressives are focused on where markets (businesses) depart from the idealization (of supporting the Progressive ‘common good’), where markets (businesses) fail to meet (our Progressive) expectations, and where government is necessary (to force* companies to meet those expectations.) Again, this is language crafted to mislead or at least to hide what is really being said. Did Arianna even notice this?

Mr. Lakoff is disingenuous when he does not use the word “force”*.  But instead says “… a government role to allow markets to function and serve the common good”. And “…progressives see as absolutely necessary government support for the success of markets” where “success” means: successfully supporting the “common good”. We added those underlines. Just how government would “allow” or “support” markets is not mentioned, since as above, it is not markets of which he speaks. He speaks of the “common good”.

* That “force” is a correct reading of the original version of this sentence above is confirmed in the next section in chapter 5 titled “GOVERNMENT VS. MARKET”.  There Lakoff states that “In the public sphere, decisions should be made through democratic institutions – who our elected leaders will be, where and how the government will spend its money, what our environment will look like, and what are acceptable standards for those participating in the market”.   (The underlines were added here).

The voting public determines “acceptable standards for participating in the market”?  That clearly speaks of government enforcing those standards! That has to mean that government personnel would have the power to pass judgment on businesses and shut down (deny permission to “participate in the market”) those businesses whom they judge to be less than “acceptable” relative to those “standards” in their contribution to the “common good”.  That constitutes “force” by the power and authority of government!

How do we estimate the trustworthiness of George Lakoff, given the evasive and overtly misleading language we have just cited? Why does he not directly say what he means?

We have just seen Lakoff using obscure language to propose a new role for government. One where “the constructive role of government” is to monitor the contributions of businesses to the “common good” (as progressives define the “common good”). And where those contributions are judged by progressives to “fail to meet expectations” relative to those “standards”, government would constrain their freedom to “participate in the market.” That is, prevent their buying or selling in their respective markets!

This is just old fashioned SOCIALISM! But George never uses that word. Why?

He knows that Socialism has a bad reputation. Socialism has often been tried before, and it has always failed in history. Even now it is slowly rendering several European countries toward impotency. Socialism’s economic slow death is always caused by human corruption and its lack of appropriate human incentives.

Yet, George Lakoff is still advocating that system, and in a stealthy fashion.

Well, if you are a Socialist, it appears thatyou can trust him to advance your cause.

But the rest of us who see socialism for what it is, can WE trust George Lakoff?

The material above was drawn from http://hidden-premise.blogspot.com, and from the section titled: EMPLOYING THE HIDDEN PREMISE.   The discussion there attempts to reveal that George Lakoff assumes the truth of a hidden premise, perhaps unwittingly.

The bureaucracy that George proposes is so laced with opportunity and temptation to corruption that it screams that Lakoff is assuming the trustworthiness of nearly all progressive people. And that is the point of that section. It certifies that George is assuming a premise that is often assumed by progressive (liberal) speakers.

That hidden premise has far reaching consequences, even being the pivotal issue between the conservative and progressive world views. And, that is the topic of the blog at  http://hidden-premise.blogspot.com.

Wisdom’s Fear Of God