Firstly… I only engage Booman on this out of respect. From my point of view we are using the classical philosophical/scientific/intellectual dialogue method. When Einstein said, “God Doesn’t Play Dice” in criticism of Niels Bohr’s theory, it was out of respect… he didn’t debunk the nutty theories of just anyone. When Bohr said “don’t tell God what to do”… the debate was very clarifying. The issues are still not really resolved, but the dispute is a part of the argument, helping to illuminate the dispute still.
Well… we’re not Einstein and Bohr, but my point is… I take contrast with Booman because I think it’s worth it. Booman’s position is relevant, it’s clear, it’s intentional… it’s well thought out (but mistaken), all good things in a position used to contrast its anti-pode.
Framing is about ideas, the ideas are everywhere, they are the engines behind what we say… to say “don’t frame, just do” is to say “don’t have an engine in your car… just go”… frames are the programs of the mind. To say, “don’t frame” is to say, “don’t run a word processing program… just word process”.
You cannot speak without framing.
The simplest perspective to have on framing is to understand that frames are made of the metaphor we think with, from which we draw conclusions.
Asking progressive to frame is asking us to think about which metaphors we use, to know why we use them, to create new metaphors and refine those we use, and to never use metaphors rigged against us. That last one is important, the advice is to recognize rigged, dishonest metaphors, when we see them.
Booman is actually quite good at this! So I have sought out the frames in his good work at dkos debunking the “defense” of the WH by the WSJ.
The Wall Street Journal editorial board has presented Karl Rove and Scooter Libby’s defense. If this all they’ve got, they are going to be doing hard time. The WSJ should carefully consider testing their kool-aid, because I don’t think the best defense for lying to a grand jury is to lie to a trial jury. Let’s take a look at how many lies the WSJ is putting forth:
Already two frames are invoked in the traditional home for the frame… above the fold.
Firstly, the WSJ is framed in the “true believer” frame invoked by “kool-aid”… they are not rational, but “true believes”, aka “kool-aid” drinkers.
Also they are framed as “liars”… accurately let’s note, but still as a frame, they are cast as such liars they fix their lies with more lies. We KNOW that lying in a trial is bad… proving that is not the purpose of that text, of course, the point is that these “true believers put lies on top of lies”.
Don’t get confused here, I like Booman’s essay, a lot, but I like framing as well, because it’s a conscious traversal of metaphor.
That claim is a frame, the trial in question has yet to run… this is invocation of a frame. The Administration and WSJ are being cast as something… not something in itself, but something from metaphor, as “kool-aid drinking lie addicted true believers”. That’s before the facts are presented, and why? because you need a frame to interpret facts. Put your facts first and they fall to the ground, with nothing to hold them, just so many dead symbols.
You have to put your facts into a framework, a metaphorical (or metaphor-like) framework ready to find place for said facts.
The assumption here, is that the decision to bypass the traditional vetting of intelligence by stovepiping raw intel into the VP’s office, and then using that raw unvetted intel to push forged documents on Congress, the United Nations, the IAEA, and the public…all to trump up false rationales for a war of aggression…all of that is beyond the scope of the law. All of that is merely a policy fight and/or political differences. Okay. Let’s be generous and grant them their assumption.
I am tempted to go into the fact that the “stovepiping” language is also part of a frame, and will… but note again… it’s an accurate one… we use that metaphor, both left and right, because it makes clear what’s really going on in a situation involving sensitive information… information is not going through “channels”… it’s being fed directly to source. Sometimes this is good, “getting information where it needs to be”, sometimes bad, for it may be “missing reality checks” along the way.
We can’t think without metaphor, metaphors help us understand the real world… ideally honest metaphors allow us to draw various conclusion, and are not overly rigged. I think “stovepiping” is certainly such a metaphor.
That is an agreed on metaphor, but Booman also decides to accept the frame presented by the WSJ that this is all “merely” a policy fight… Booman doesn’t think this, nor do we, but it’s for the sake of argument, a fair enough concession to make. We do accept some frames, even questionable ones presented by opponents (e.g. “it’s just politics) as worthy, if imperfect, fields of battle… we have to, because only if you are accepting the same frame can you actually engage… otherwise you are in different worlds entirely.
Judith Miller was stonewalling
Judith was stonewalling, but is not actually made of stone. It’s like a metaphor we use to understand that Miller was being obstinate. I think it’s fair to frame that as stonewalling… others like to frame it as “journalistic integrity”… which metaphor is more honest? Should we stick to the “fact” that she was “protecting a source”..? or was she “stonewalling” an investigation? There are “facts” to fit in either frame… I prefer that latter of the two as more accurate, more apt… as a frame that leads to conclusions more in line with all the facts, with the complete situation.
Amid an election campaign and a war, Bush administration officials understandably fought back. One way they did so was to tell reporters that Mr. Wilson’s wife, CIA analyst Valerie Plame, had been instrumental in getting him the CIA consulting job. This was true — though Mr. Wilson denied it at the time — as a bipartisan report by the Senate Intelligence Committee documented in 2004.
This all depends on what the meaning of ‘instrumental’ means. Joe Wilson took a trip to Niger for the CIA in 1999. At that time, his wife may have suggested him for the job. But in 2002, she was asked whether he was willing to go, asked to write up his bona fides, asked to raise the matter with him, and then introduced him to the meeting at headquarters, before recusing herself. She did not authorize him to take the trip. She didn’t have that authority. She had newborn twins at home, and the Niger job payed nothing. How could it have been a ‘boondoggle’, as Rove or Libby told Walter Pincus it was? How is any of this relevant in any way?
VERY CLEVER framing here… you see, this draws similarity (that metaphorical basis) to another famous phrase… does it not? “depends on what the meaning of ‘instrumental’ means”, I think it’s fair to note this is really invoking the “depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is” frame. Booman is framing the WSJ as partaking in ridiculous levels of parsing, not merely by saying “you are partaking a ridiculous level of parsing”… but by invoking a well known frame, complete with years of back and forth thus invoked, and knowing the conservative position in that past battle, doing so pointedly to have impact, to say, “you are hypocritical”. I don’t think this is a dishonest way to say “you are hypocritical”… it’s a fair way. But it’s framing, fully. It is using a frame to make that accusation. Then, the facts presented have somewhere to sleep.
This is the new line the GOoPers have been pushing this week.
Frame: The GOP are talking point distribution automatons… this week, here is their mindless mantra. Then Booman provides the facts to fit into this frame which detail how the assertion is false, and the frame then does the heavy lifting of explaining why they are saying something clearly false, simply false, easily shown false: because they have weekly talking points and they go to battle with the talking points (“new lines”) they’ve got.
Mr. Wilson’s original claims about what he found on a CIA trip to Africa, what he told the CIA about it, and even why he was sent on the mission have since been discredited. What a bizarre irony it would be if what began as a politically motivated lie by Mr. Wilson nonetheless leads to indictments of Bush Administration officials for telling reporters the truth.
This is such horseshit.
Ok, that’s not framing… that really is horseshit, literally. It came from a horse, and it’s shit.
Mr. Fitzgerald may have recognized this problem early, because in February 2004 he asked for permission for much broader investigative authority. It was granted by the man who appointed him, his friend and then Deputy Attorney General James Comey. (Attorney General John Ashcroft had recused himself, in what looked to us then, and still does today, as an act of political abdication.) Mr. Fitzgerald’s office only recently created a Web site and has posted Mr. Comey’s letters — an act of odd timing, at the least.
Let me get this straight.
Ok, stop. Even this is framing. It’s also a common rhetorical device. Why? Because framing is how we think, and common rhetorical devices have evolved due to how we think. Before I go to the next sentence, I know that Booman is going to say that the argument quoted is overly confusing… that it’s self contradictory, that he will lay out the same details and draw another conclusion. The sentance doesn’t spend even a MOMENT implying it’s literal meaning… which would be that Booman is going to follow their argument as they have made it, straight to the conclusion they’ve drawn.
To the contrary, when Booman says, “let me get this straight”… we are certain to not find him subsequently “getting it straight”… but rather, instead, he’ll most likely be “drawing the opposite conclusion”… iow, “they don’t have this straight, let me straighten it”… a more literal statement would have been, “wait, let me PUT this straight”… and invoking this frame, really, is to point a finger and say, “they have reasons to make this convoluted, they wish to draw the erroneous conclusion for their own interests, not because their argument really leads in the direction they would like to claim.”
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Summary: if you think I’m criticizing Booman you don’t understand… so here is the syllogistic form (framing my argument as logical), and note it’s not about Plame or Booman’s excellent points on the Plame affair… it’s about framing.
( ) Booman told the truth and was honest.
( ) Booman used framing.
(therefore) Framing can be truthful and honest
see?
Also Posted at MLW