Are We Playing Their Game?

At times it appears to me that those who control the direction of our country may be intentionally distracting the opposition from the real issues we should be confronting. As long as they can keep us engaged in defending the strawmen they set up we will have less time and energy to plan our positive progressive strategies.

I know the argument, I've made it myself, that we cannot afford to allow any of their distorting and fabricated attacks to go unanswered. But I am less sure of the wisdom of this logic every day. I am doubting whether we are wise to let the other side pick the battle ground and the weapons to be used.

Maybe I am coming at the same issue that Lakoff addresses when he talks about the importance of framing. 

I would like some of you to reflect on this issue, please don't respond by simply repeating what we have already said to each other. I have heard those arguments. I am trying to stimulate us to revisit the issue of strategy and maybe do some outside the box thinking.

  John

John E. Cleek, Ph.D., President

Board of Education, USD 416

Louisburg, Kansas

johncleek@mac.com

 "What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child, that must the community want for all its children. Any other idea for our schools is narrow and unlovely; acted upon, it destroys our democracy."  John Dewey