Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and his entourage are working from a script that UW Professor William Cronon says was penned thirty years ago in part by Paul Weyrich at the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative think tank. I suggest looking back forty years earlier, to the apolitical Edward Bernays and his 1928 book “Propaganda”.
Bernays begins: “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in a democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.”
Bernays’ central concept was to control the message in order to influence behavior. He did it so well that he is widely considered the father of the field of Public Relations. His portfolio of industrial and government clients included President Calvin Coolidge, Proctor & Gamble, CBS and General Motors. Bernays helped make women into smokers. He helped topple governments. He fueled coups. He helped subscribe Americans to the automobile and to the credit card. He called his Sigmund Freud-inspired technique the "engineering of consent." (Freud was his Uncle.)
Among other tricks, he created false crises. He used fear and anger to his client’s advantage. When he didn’t have fear or anger, he created it, by labeling some groups enemies.
The technique was noted by Joseph Goebbels, and became central in the development of the Third Reich.
Goebbels sidestepped Bernays’ Judaism and enlisted Bernays’ ideas to create a power vacuum into which Hitler stepped. He started by making Jews the enemy. Using all media and social outlets, they spewed vitriol and false claims, calling Jews greedy, subversive, well-organized, selfish and incompetent. It only took a few years to recruit a vast army and a nation’s full backing to commit mass murder.
But here we are, in 2011, calling public school teachers greedy, subversive, well-organized, selfish and incompetent.
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If Paul’s assertion is correct, then how does he explain that America’s 100 year old public school system has consistently produced a population that is about a third leaning right, a third leaning left and a third proudly independent?
Michelle Bachman adds "I am so tired of the establishment telling us that they know best. We know best." How does Bachman, a tax attorney, propose to teach chemical engineering, medical science or Chinese, should her kids need it?
And Tennessee Senator Jim Summerville reportedly told cheering tea partiers that “We will bend public education to our awe, or break it all to pieces.” I'm wondering if he'll be returning his two degrees from public universities in Iowa and Tennessee.
Vilifying people who have committed their lives to the betterment of the children of the nation isn’t just Orwellian, it’s Goebbelescque. Attacking the establishment of public instruction, without question a primary feeder for our great military and our innovations, our strong markets and our global leadership, is a bit like attacking our own bodies.
Wisconsin’s Walker administration is in lock step with Paul, Bachman and Summerville ideologically, while using Bernays’ process as well as Goebbels did.
The campaign began with lies to make enemies of friends. It drums on with endless provocation: on-again, off-again threats of pink slips, military interventions, disregard for laws, newly imposed rules and financial penalties to create panic and increase stress. It intimidates those who disagree or stand in the way, like Professor Cronon and now, a Wisconsin judge doing her work.
And by blatantly ignoring open meetings rules to force through the law against collective bargaining, Republican Senators working with the administration appear to have deliberately started a series of controversial legal maneuvers to grab and hold headlines in order to fuel more public anger and frustration, drawing neighbors to school board meetings and hearings to shout at each other over what amounts to about 32 cents a day per person, if you consider $900M in pending cuts to education in the proposed biannual.
While neighbors, friends and family viciously attack each other, the Republican legislature fills the void with new rules that centralize major decisions with the office of the Governor, even as local leaders in both parties protest.
We’re fighting about pittances like small health care contributions and tiny tax consequences, instead of working on real solutions. Attacking teachers is part of a modern plan to consolidate power in Wisconsin. And teachers are the new Jews.
That we're fighting in this way speaks to the power of Bernays' ideas and Walker's ability to exploit them. But there is an antidote to Propaganda, and it is Truth:
- Literacy is the tap-root of the American Dream. Teachers are the creators of freedom and prosperity, not its enemies.
- If we expect to attract talented teachers, then the profession needs to be attractive to talented people.
- People move to places where there are great schools. If we can build great schools with current tax revenues, fine, but if we have to tax more to make great schools, we should.
- We invest less in our children’s education than nations whose children are better educated and where economies are more resilient. We should invest more, not less, if we want to matter on the world stage again.
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Copyright, Nicholas Hayes 2011, All rights reserved.
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