The Occupy movement says big government is in bed with big business. But House Democratic Senior Whip Mike Honda [Japanese-American], who represents California’s Silicon Valley, says he advocates for the 99 percent. The six-term representative from the Golden State’s 15th District serves on the House Appropriations and Budget committees, is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and chairman emeritus of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. He recently spoke with U.S. News about his education bill, bringing manufacturing jobs back to the United States, and standing up for Muslim-Americans. Excerpts:
Are there jobs open in the Silicon Valley?
Oh yeah, lots of jobs. There are probably a couple of thousand at least. I talked to Oracle and they said they had something like 1,500 jobs globally, and a good part of that was located right in the Silicon Valley.
Can these positions be filled?
The kind of jobs we have available require more training and education.
Are the needs of the high-tech job market not being met?
There’s two things. One is how we view education, and that’s why the bill I’m pushing out there addresses making sure that our youngsters get exposed to science, technology, engineering, math [STEM] issues and processes. Two, the immigration system is so screwed up right now. Ever since 9/11 we have stopped inflows of graduate students, scholars, professors from other countries. People who wanted to go to our graduate schools are now opting to go to other countries.
What is the purpose of the STEM bill?
To produce youngsters who are STEM-ready, to start in pre-kindergarten and make sure that every child has an opportunity to understand that science and technology happens every day in our homes. When you freeze water or you boil eggs, you’re doing chemistry. When kids fix their cars, they’re doing physics, putting cars on bricks rather than using jacks. You’re doing science all the time and [kids] start to readjust their understanding of what they do on a daily basis, and all of a sudden science is not a mystery anymore, and that’s the key for STEM.
You have authored several federal education proposals. Meanwhile, some members of the Tea Party have advocated to shut down the Department of Education.
Of course they want to, because they don’t want an electorate that’s going to think, that’s going to be able to be more critical.
Is the Department of Education functioning the way that it should?
You know, [Jimmy] Carter started the Education Department because our society had reached a point where we needed to look at our public school system in a comprehensive way. We had achieved a society that’s able to communicate in real time across this country and yet we’re not achieving the equity that we need for each child. And now because it’s not been as successful, the Tea Party people want to give it up rather than achieve that dream that each child will have the right and exposure to equal opportunity education. And that should be our goal.
Is there a future for manufacturing in America?
Our companies started looking overseas to get cheaper labor and thinking that cheaper labor will give us cheaper products, and we can export our jobs overseas and then import the products. OK, that was a start, but also our country did not make [the business] environment the most productive and the most friendly because we were concerned about the environment and all that stuff. Well, we’re at a point where we understand all these things and so we can make it more streamlined.
How would you bring manufacturing back?
We can encourage manufacturers to stay in this country by providing tax credits for those companies that want to build their products here. And if we give them the proper incentives, they will stay here. If we make the environment in this country more amenable for manufacturers, then we should be able to do that.
Is this a realistic goal in an innovation-focused economy?
What Steve Jobs had done, and he’s a good example of keeping the innovation here, he created the iPod, then next came the iPhone, then next came the iPad. So he kept the innovation here, but the production of these things went overseas. So what would happen if we kept it all here—the innovation, the product development, and the manufacturing? If we kept it all here, then we’d have more jobs created here and we’d become more globally competitive.
How did the Congressional Progressive Caucus come up with the People’s Budget?
We went out and gathered information from all these viable polls that people took and we looked at it and we started hammering together a budget that was reflective of the needs of the people. Because a budget is a product and reflection of our values, and so those values are the motivation for putting the People’s Budget together. And so we put together our own budget and said this is a product that’s based upon the response of people.
Does it address entitlement programs?
We’re not going to minimize, we’re not going to voucherize, we’re not going to privatize the three things that people really don’t want to see touched. We don’t want to minimize, but strengthen Medicaid. We don’t want to voucherize Medicare, we want to build it up and make it stronger. And we don’t want to privatize Social Security. Those things remain intact because they are a contract between the people and its government.
Why is President Obama’s jobs bill stalled?
The Republican leadership don’t want him to succeed. That’s a quote from [GOP] Sen. [Mitch] McConnell. He says our goal is to make sure that President Obama is not successful. Well, if you have that in mind as the motivation, then people in this country are not part of their motivation. Their job is to make sure there’s a barrier and obstruction to what is good for this country. So everything that’s coming out of the Senate under their leadership, we can expect that it’s not going to be good. Because whatever’s good for the country is good for the president’s reputation, and something they therefore don’t want to support.
You’ve recently called attention to the congressional hearings on Muslim-American radicalization. Why?
The Japanese-Americans in 1942 were vilified because of the Japanese bombing Pearl Harbor. We became targets and they looked at us as enemy aliens. And they wouldn’t let us be in the military and they called us the enemy within. Now this is the same thing that [Rep.] Peter King is espousing through his use of this office and inciting fear, hysteria, and mistrust towards people who are different. A commission in 1986 said the reason why the Japanese-Americans were incarcerated was because of racial discrimination, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. And I’ll be damned if this happens under my watch.
Any advice for the 99 percent?
The people have to go to the polls to really exercise their franchise. Every citizen has that responsibility to make sure that they cast their vote, and their voice is going to be the conscience of this country.
U.S.NEWS WEEKLY | December 16, 2011
Friday, December 16, 2011
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Christmas and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir
With the Christmas season upon us, I, of course, watched the Mormon Tabernacle Christmas Choir on PBS tonight! As usual they were wonderful.... but, actually I have seen greater performances from them in earlier years. So guess you can’t win ‘em all. But even so, there is no other spectacular as spectacular as they! They are as perfect and as in unison as the cells in our bodies or as in the rest of nature.
I’m a Humanist. I know for certain that there is not a God as most religions envision. There is no creator nor more importantly, one who “watches down upon us” nor “cares for us”. ....sadly, nor is there a place for us after we die.
Yet.... there is a spirit, not terribly mystical, but which does bind us together as humans. It is simply us. Yes, us! Even as other animals herd do we, especially in times of trouble. We really are very little different.
We can read a book, see a play, watch a movie... and we respond as the book, play or movie touches our memories or feelings and aspirations... and we laugh, get angry or cry depending upon the story. We are all very much alike, you see. Yes I cry when the program says to.
So at Christmas time, the time of the winter solstace, when the nights are the darkest and the sun’s warming has ebbed, we humans band together not only for warmth, but for the light and sounds of our joy of new year and the reassurance of our survival.
The Mormon Tabernacle choir fills that need more than any other single effort for joy in humanities’s darkest hours. I love watching the show every year!
Try to have a merry Christmas, everyone and may your next year be better than the last!
I’m a Humanist. I know for certain that there is not a God as most religions envision. There is no creator nor more importantly, one who “watches down upon us” nor “cares for us”. ....sadly, nor is there a place for us after we die.
Yet.... there is a spirit, not terribly mystical, but which does bind us together as humans. It is simply us. Yes, us! Even as other animals herd do we, especially in times of trouble. We really are very little different.
We can read a book, see a play, watch a movie... and we respond as the book, play or movie touches our memories or feelings and aspirations... and we laugh, get angry or cry depending upon the story. We are all very much alike, you see. Yes I cry when the program says to.
So at Christmas time, the time of the winter solstace, when the nights are the darkest and the sun’s warming has ebbed, we humans band together not only for warmth, but for the light and sounds of our joy of new year and the reassurance of our survival.
The Mormon Tabernacle choir fills that need more than any other single effort for joy in humanities’s darkest hours. I love watching the show every year!
Try to have a merry Christmas, everyone and may your next year be better than the last!
Friday, December 09, 2011
The Animal In Us
A new model of empathy: the RAT
By David Brown, Published: December 8
My comments: [opinion]
At the very least, the new experiment reported in Science is going to make people think differently about what it means to be a “rat.” Eventually, though, it may tell us interesting things about what it means to be a human being. [primarily that we're not that different]
In a simple experiment, researchers at the University of Chicago sought to find out whether a rat would release a fellow rat from an unpleasantly restrictive cage if it could. The answer was yes. [the thing that is surprising is that the rat could figure out how to free the other rat - not that it actually wanted to]
The free rat, occasionally hearing distress calls from its compatriot, learned to open the cage and did so with greater efficiency over time. It would release the other animal even if there wasn’t the payoff of a reunion with it. Astonishingly, if given access to a small hoard of chocolate chips, the free rat would usually save at least one treat for the captive — which is a lot to expect of a rat. [if we accidentally step on the tail of one of our cats.... all of the others are very concerned]
The researchers came to the unavoidable conclusion that what they were seeing was empathy — and apparently selfless behavior driven by that mental state.
“There is nothing in it for them except for whatever feeling they get from helping another individual,” said Peggy Mason, the neurobiologist who conducted the experiment along with graduate student Inbal Ben-Ami Bartal and fellow researcher Jean Decety.
“There is a common misconception that sharing and helping is a cultural occurrence. But this is not a cultural event. It is part of our biological inheritance,” she added. [I think that we would actually find that our 'culture' would and does harden us to uncontrolled empathy very often... hence wars and casualties]
The idea that animals have emotional lives and are capable of detecting emotions in others has been gaining ground for decades. Empathic behavior has been observed in apes and monkeys, and described by many pet owners (especially dog owners). Recently, scientists demonstrated “emotional contagion” in mice, a situation in which one animal’s stress worsens another’s.
But empathy that leads to helping activity — what psychologists term “pro-social behavior” — hasn’t been formally shown in non-primates until now.
If this experiment reported Thursday holds up under scrutiny, it will give neuroscientists a method to study empathy and altruism in a rigorous way.
Do age and gender affect empathic behavior? Will a rat free a rat it doesn’t know? Is more help offered to individuals an animal is related to, either directly or as a member of the same genetic tribe? What are the genes, and their variants, that determine whether one animal helps another and how much? Answering those questions becomes possible now that there is an animal “model” for this behavior.
“The study is truly groundbreaking,” said Frans de Waal, a primatologist at Emory University who has written extensively about empathy. What is particularly interesting, he said, is there appears to be no clear cost benefit trade-off going on. [in other words, rats aren't capitalists! ....what else is new?]
“We are entering a distinctly psychological realm of emotions and reactions to the emotions of others, which is where most human altruism finds its motivation.”
Jeffrey S. Mogil, the McGill University neuroscientist who showed emotional contagion in mice in 2006, said that “what is amazing about this is that it shows empathy in such a robust way. This is not something that rats would otherwise be doing.” [really?]
A major question that needs to be answered next is whether the free rat liberates the captive one to relieve its own stress or the stress of the other animal.
“It’s more likely to be the former,” Mogil said. “But even if it is the former, I’m not sure that’s so different from humans.” [We usually call that "guilt"]
In the new experiment, the pairs of rats were put in the experimental condition for an hour a day for 12 days. (They had previously spent two weeks together in a cage and knew each other.) The rat opened the door to the trapped rat’s cage by chance the first time, usually freezing in fright when it fell over noisily. In an average of seven days, however, it had learned to open the door intentionally and was no longer spooked when the door fell over.
In 13 percent of the sessions, the trapped animal gave an alarm call, but vocalized distress was clearly not necessary to put the free rat to work. When the cage was empty or occupied by a rat doll, the free rat sometimes opened it, but over the course of days lost interest in doing so.
After liberation, the rats nuzzled and explored the experimental arena. But when the setup was changed so that the captive exited into a different area, the free rat still opened the door for the captive one.
When a cage with five chocolate chips was added to the arena, the free rat opened it, too. That animal consumed all the treats if the other cage was empty. But if it contained a captive rat, the free rat shared the chocolate about half the time, letting its compatriot have 11 / 2 pieces on average.
“To actually share food — this is a big deal to a rat,” Mason said. “I didn’t think they would do that.” [Capitalist!]
Mason sees two processes at work. The first is one animal’s ability to identify and share another animal’s stress. But equally important is the ability to control the “acquired” stress and keep from becoming overwhelmed. But that was something not every rat could do. All six female rats in the experiment learned to open the captive’s cage, but seven of 26 males never did. [guys never cry]
“I don’t think it’s because they didn’t have empathy. I don’t think they had the ability to down-regulate their own stress and act on the empathy,” she said.
Mason thinks that empathy and altruism evolved with females caring for helpless offspring. Natural selection favored those maternal traits, which then became generalized to both sexes. They helped forge social bonds that aided the survival of individuals and groups. She suspects the behavior is “sub-cortical” — closer to a reflex than a thought, and driven by ancient parts of the brain. De Waal, who in 2009 wrote a book called “The Age of Empathy” whose cover featured a chimpanzee shaking hands with a man, agrees up to a point. [Most of us function day-to-dat using only the ancient parts of our brains... yes, we can think on higher planes, but only when necessary or for entertainment]
“It is an intelligent response, but the motivation is, as in humans, an empathic process that is fairly automatic,” he said. [as I said before, it feels like guilt]
Jaak Panksepp, a neuroscientist at Washington State University who wrote an accompanying commentary in the journal, said that many people still doubt that animals have emotional lives that can be studied. [I feel sorry for them never having had animals for friends... even best friends]
“Some skeptics are bound to say that this interpretation is a bit far-fetched,” he said in an interview. “What this provides is reasonably good evidence for empathy, and a model system to study the underlying processes further.”
By David Brown, Published: December 8
My comments: [opinion]
At the very least, the new experiment reported in Science is going to make people think differently about what it means to be a “rat.” Eventually, though, it may tell us interesting things about what it means to be a human being. [primarily that we're not that different]
In a simple experiment, researchers at the University of Chicago sought to find out whether a rat would release a fellow rat from an unpleasantly restrictive cage if it could. The answer was yes. [the thing that is surprising is that the rat could figure out how to free the other rat - not that it actually wanted to]
The free rat, occasionally hearing distress calls from its compatriot, learned to open the cage and did so with greater efficiency over time. It would release the other animal even if there wasn’t the payoff of a reunion with it. Astonishingly, if given access to a small hoard of chocolate chips, the free rat would usually save at least one treat for the captive — which is a lot to expect of a rat. [if we accidentally step on the tail of one of our cats.... all of the others are very concerned]
The researchers came to the unavoidable conclusion that what they were seeing was empathy — and apparently selfless behavior driven by that mental state.
“There is nothing in it for them except for whatever feeling they get from helping another individual,” said Peggy Mason, the neurobiologist who conducted the experiment along with graduate student Inbal Ben-Ami Bartal and fellow researcher Jean Decety.
“There is a common misconception that sharing and helping is a cultural occurrence. But this is not a cultural event. It is part of our biological inheritance,” she added. [I think that we would actually find that our 'culture' would and does harden us to uncontrolled empathy very often... hence wars and casualties]
The idea that animals have emotional lives and are capable of detecting emotions in others has been gaining ground for decades. Empathic behavior has been observed in apes and monkeys, and described by many pet owners (especially dog owners). Recently, scientists demonstrated “emotional contagion” in mice, a situation in which one animal’s stress worsens another’s.
But empathy that leads to helping activity — what psychologists term “pro-social behavior” — hasn’t been formally shown in non-primates until now.
If this experiment reported Thursday holds up under scrutiny, it will give neuroscientists a method to study empathy and altruism in a rigorous way.
Do age and gender affect empathic behavior? Will a rat free a rat it doesn’t know? Is more help offered to individuals an animal is related to, either directly or as a member of the same genetic tribe? What are the genes, and their variants, that determine whether one animal helps another and how much? Answering those questions becomes possible now that there is an animal “model” for this behavior.
“The study is truly groundbreaking,” said Frans de Waal, a primatologist at Emory University who has written extensively about empathy. What is particularly interesting, he said, is there appears to be no clear cost benefit trade-off going on. [in other words, rats aren't capitalists! ....what else is new?]
“We are entering a distinctly psychological realm of emotions and reactions to the emotions of others, which is where most human altruism finds its motivation.”
Jeffrey S. Mogil, the McGill University neuroscientist who showed emotional contagion in mice in 2006, said that “what is amazing about this is that it shows empathy in such a robust way. This is not something that rats would otherwise be doing.” [really?]
A major question that needs to be answered next is whether the free rat liberates the captive one to relieve its own stress or the stress of the other animal.
“It’s more likely to be the former,” Mogil said. “But even if it is the former, I’m not sure that’s so different from humans.” [We usually call that "guilt"]
In the new experiment, the pairs of rats were put in the experimental condition for an hour a day for 12 days. (They had previously spent two weeks together in a cage and knew each other.) The rat opened the door to the trapped rat’s cage by chance the first time, usually freezing in fright when it fell over noisily. In an average of seven days, however, it had learned to open the door intentionally and was no longer spooked when the door fell over.
In 13 percent of the sessions, the trapped animal gave an alarm call, but vocalized distress was clearly not necessary to put the free rat to work. When the cage was empty or occupied by a rat doll, the free rat sometimes opened it, but over the course of days lost interest in doing so.
After liberation, the rats nuzzled and explored the experimental arena. But when the setup was changed so that the captive exited into a different area, the free rat still opened the door for the captive one.
When a cage with five chocolate chips was added to the arena, the free rat opened it, too. That animal consumed all the treats if the other cage was empty. But if it contained a captive rat, the free rat shared the chocolate about half the time, letting its compatriot have 11 / 2 pieces on average.
“To actually share food — this is a big deal to a rat,” Mason said. “I didn’t think they would do that.” [Capitalist!]
Mason sees two processes at work. The first is one animal’s ability to identify and share another animal’s stress. But equally important is the ability to control the “acquired” stress and keep from becoming overwhelmed. But that was something not every rat could do. All six female rats in the experiment learned to open the captive’s cage, but seven of 26 males never did. [guys never cry]
“I don’t think it’s because they didn’t have empathy. I don’t think they had the ability to down-regulate their own stress and act on the empathy,” she said.
Mason thinks that empathy and altruism evolved with females caring for helpless offspring. Natural selection favored those maternal traits, which then became generalized to both sexes. They helped forge social bonds that aided the survival of individuals and groups. She suspects the behavior is “sub-cortical” — closer to a reflex than a thought, and driven by ancient parts of the brain. De Waal, who in 2009 wrote a book called “The Age of Empathy” whose cover featured a chimpanzee shaking hands with a man, agrees up to a point. [Most of us function day-to-dat using only the ancient parts of our brains... yes, we can think on higher planes, but only when necessary or for entertainment]
“It is an intelligent response, but the motivation is, as in humans, an empathic process that is fairly automatic,” he said. [as I said before, it feels like guilt]
Jaak Panksepp, a neuroscientist at Washington State University who wrote an accompanying commentary in the journal, said that many people still doubt that animals have emotional lives that can be studied. [I feel sorry for them never having had animals for friends... even best friends]
“Some skeptics are bound to say that this interpretation is a bit far-fetched,” he said in an interview. “What this provides is reasonably good evidence for empathy, and a model system to study the underlying processes further.”
Wednesday, December 07, 2011
A Peaceful Revolution
I would really hate to see my nation involved in any form of armed rebellion. It was necessary for us to become independent from the British Empire but I think we were unwise not to allow the Confederate States to secede from the United States if they so wished... I think they had the right and the societal differences between the North and the South were very great! So now I worry that there is much too much power in the hands of those who promote the idea of unfettered Capitalism... otherwise known as pure Greed... where the few gain at the expense of the many.
Fortunately, I don't think this will come to military action where as in our Civil War, families were split apart depending upon which side mirrored their beliefs. There is the peaceful power of passive resistance exercised by Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and for example the demonstrators in Egypt, which simply, through discipline and numbers, allowed justice to prevail!
I think the hope for our present economic crisis can be settled by the Occupy movement which is gradually maturing and learning to walk and speak. Eventually, I think it will prevail and I hope our president is wise enough to support the effort. I found the following very enlightening piece posted on Yahoo News:
Yahoo News:
ORLANDO, Fla. -- The Republican Governors Association met this week in Florida to give GOP state executives a chance to rejuvenate, strategize and team-build. But during a plenary session on Wednesday, one question kept coming up: How can Republicans do a better job of talking about Occupy Wall Street?
"I'm so scared of this anti-Wall Street effort. I'm frightened to death," said Frank Luntz, a Republican strategist and one of the nation's foremost experts on crafting the perfect political message. "They're having an impact on what the American people think of capitalism."
Luntz offered tips on how Republicans could discuss the grievances of the Occupiers, and help the governors better handle all these new questions from constituents about "income inequality" and "paying your fair share."
Yahoo News sat in on the session, and counted 10 do's and don'ts from Luntz covering how Republicans should fight back by changing the way they discuss the movement.
1. Don't say 'capitalism.'
"I'm trying to get that word removed and we're replacing it with either 'economic freedom' or 'free market,' " Luntz said. "The public . . . still prefers capitalism to socialism, but they think capitalism is immoral. And if we're seen as defenders of quote, Wall Street, end quote, we've got a problem."
2. Don't say that the government 'taxes the rich.' Instead, tell them that the government 'takes from the rich.'
"If you talk about raising taxes on the rich," the public responds favorably, Luntz cautioned. But "if you talk about government taking the money from hardworking Americans, the public says no. Taxing, the public will say yes."
3. Republicans should forget about winning the battle over the 'middle class.' Call them 'hardworking taxpayers.'
"They cannot win if the fight is on hardworking taxpayers. We can say we defend the 'middle class' and the public will say, I'm not sure about that. But defending 'hardworking taxpayers' and Republicans have the advantage."
4. Don't talk about 'jobs.' Talk about 'careers.'
"Everyone in this room talks about 'jobs,'" Luntz said. "Watch this."
He then asked everyone to raise their hand if they want a "job." Few hands went up. Then he asked who wants a "career." Almost every hand was raised.
"So why are we talking about jobs?"
5. Don't say 'government spending.' Call it 'waste.'
"It's not about 'government spending.' It's about 'waste.' That's what makes people angry."
6. Don't ever say you're willing to 'compromise.'
"If you talk about 'compromise,' they'll say you're selling out. Your side doesn't want you to 'compromise.' What you use in that to replace it with is 'cooperation.' It means the same thing. But cooperation means you stick to your principles but still get the job done. Compromise says that you're selling out those principles."
7. The three most important words you can say to an Occupier: 'I get it.'
"First off, here are three words for you all: 'I get it.' . . . 'I get that you're angry. I get that you've seen inequality. I get that you want to fix the system."
Then, he instructed, offer Republican solutions to the problem.
8. Out: 'Entrepreneur.' In: 'Job creator.'
Use the phrases "small business owners" and "job creators" instead of "entrepreneurs" and "innovators."
9. Don't ever ask anyone to 'sacrifice.'
"There isn't an American today in November of 2011 who doesn't think they've already sacrificed. If you tell them you want them to 'sacrifice,' they're going to be be pretty angry at you. You talk about how 'we're all in this together.' We either succeed together or we fail together."
10. Always blame Washington.
Tell them, "You shouldn't be occupying Wall Street, you should be occupying Washington. You should occupy the White House because it's the policies over the past few years that have created this problem."
BONUS:
Don't say 'bonus!'
Luntz advised that if they give their employees an income boost during the holiday season, they should never refer to it as a "bonus."
"If you give out a bonus at a time of financial hardship, you're going to make people angry. It's 'pay for performance.'"
Fortunately, I don't think this will come to military action where as in our Civil War, families were split apart depending upon which side mirrored their beliefs. There is the peaceful power of passive resistance exercised by Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and for example the demonstrators in Egypt, which simply, through discipline and numbers, allowed justice to prevail!
I think the hope for our present economic crisis can be settled by the Occupy movement which is gradually maturing and learning to walk and speak. Eventually, I think it will prevail and I hope our president is wise enough to support the effort. I found the following very enlightening piece posted on Yahoo News:
Yahoo News:
ORLANDO, Fla. -- The Republican Governors Association met this week in Florida to give GOP state executives a chance to rejuvenate, strategize and team-build. But during a plenary session on Wednesday, one question kept coming up: How can Republicans do a better job of talking about Occupy Wall Street?
"I'm so scared of this anti-Wall Street effort. I'm frightened to death," said Frank Luntz, a Republican strategist and one of the nation's foremost experts on crafting the perfect political message. "They're having an impact on what the American people think of capitalism."
Luntz offered tips on how Republicans could discuss the grievances of the Occupiers, and help the governors better handle all these new questions from constituents about "income inequality" and "paying your fair share."
Yahoo News sat in on the session, and counted 10 do's and don'ts from Luntz covering how Republicans should fight back by changing the way they discuss the movement.
1. Don't say 'capitalism.'
"I'm trying to get that word removed and we're replacing it with either 'economic freedom' or 'free market,' " Luntz said. "The public . . . still prefers capitalism to socialism, but they think capitalism is immoral. And if we're seen as defenders of quote, Wall Street, end quote, we've got a problem."
2. Don't say that the government 'taxes the rich.' Instead, tell them that the government 'takes from the rich.'
"If you talk about raising taxes on the rich," the public responds favorably, Luntz cautioned. But "if you talk about government taking the money from hardworking Americans, the public says no. Taxing, the public will say yes."
3. Republicans should forget about winning the battle over the 'middle class.' Call them 'hardworking taxpayers.'
"They cannot win if the fight is on hardworking taxpayers. We can say we defend the 'middle class' and the public will say, I'm not sure about that. But defending 'hardworking taxpayers' and Republicans have the advantage."
4. Don't talk about 'jobs.' Talk about 'careers.'
"Everyone in this room talks about 'jobs,'" Luntz said. "Watch this."
He then asked everyone to raise their hand if they want a "job." Few hands went up. Then he asked who wants a "career." Almost every hand was raised.
"So why are we talking about jobs?"
5. Don't say 'government spending.' Call it 'waste.'
"It's not about 'government spending.' It's about 'waste.' That's what makes people angry."
6. Don't ever say you're willing to 'compromise.'
"If you talk about 'compromise,' they'll say you're selling out. Your side doesn't want you to 'compromise.' What you use in that to replace it with is 'cooperation.' It means the same thing. But cooperation means you stick to your principles but still get the job done. Compromise says that you're selling out those principles."
7. The three most important words you can say to an Occupier: 'I get it.'
"First off, here are three words for you all: 'I get it.' . . . 'I get that you're angry. I get that you've seen inequality. I get that you want to fix the system."
Then, he instructed, offer Republican solutions to the problem.
8. Out: 'Entrepreneur.' In: 'Job creator.'
Use the phrases "small business owners" and "job creators" instead of "entrepreneurs" and "innovators."
9. Don't ever ask anyone to 'sacrifice.'
"There isn't an American today in November of 2011 who doesn't think they've already sacrificed. If you tell them you want them to 'sacrifice,' they're going to be be pretty angry at you. You talk about how 'we're all in this together.' We either succeed together or we fail together."
10. Always blame Washington.
Tell them, "You shouldn't be occupying Wall Street, you should be occupying Washington. You should occupy the White House because it's the policies over the past few years that have created this problem."
BONUS:
Don't say 'bonus!'
Luntz advised that if they give their employees an income boost during the holiday season, they should never refer to it as a "bonus."
"If you give out a bonus at a time of financial hardship, you're going to make people angry. It's 'pay for performance.'"
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