Democrats in Congress have introduced a proposal called
the Green New Deal:
a plan to tackle climate change by
overhauling our transportation system,
upgrading our power grids,
and shifting to clean energy like wind and solar.
There's a lot of cool stuff in here,
but I am not an energy policy expert,
so I have questions.
How would these ideas work in practice?
How quickly could we get them done?
Are they enough to avoid the
impending heat death of the planet?
So to find the answers,
I did what every American does
when they want to know more about public policy.
I tried to watch the news.
The so-called Green New Deal.
Why do those three words create such
anger for Republicans and even some
anxiety among Democrats?
Even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had concerns.
Republicans aim to make the Green New Deal
a key 2020 campaign issue.
You say Democrats are in a way
helping Donald Trump.
The Green New Deal is going to be a flash point.
Did Democrats give Republicans a huge 2020 gift?
The Republicans see it as a key to victory for them.
Is it?
Goddamnit.
I have watched hours of segments
about the Green New Deal,
and none of them actually explained
how it might work.
Instead, they focused on the politics.
Is it going to pass?
Does Pelosi like it?
What did Trump tweet about it?
Everything except "is it a good idea?"
Are you concerned the perception
of the Democratic Party is going to move too far to the left?
Turns out there's a name for this type of news coverage.
It's called “tactical framing.”
And it's making us all too cynical
to solve big problems before it's too late.
This Sunday, the Democratic divide.
Some progressives are pushing hard
for a Green New Deal, but other Democrats
worry they're being impractical.
Is there a risk that Democrats maybe
overplay their hand or rile up
the Republican base and you say
“Look socialism” and, you know,
some of these unrealistic ideas?
Tactical framing sounds like when
you crop your problem areas out of a Tinder photo.
But it's actually an approach to news coverage
that focuses on strategy over substance.
So instead of asking:
“Is this new policy proposal a good idea?"
Tactical framing asks:
"Is it popular?"
"Can it pass?"
"How will that play in the next election?"
The discussion is focused on the players
and the implications for them and their political careers,
not the policy or its capacity to solve a problem.
Kathleen Hall Jamieson coined the phrase "tactical framing,"
and she argues that this obsession with strategy
is making it hard for us to understand big policy ideas.
Ask yourself how much of the coverage
of the Green New Deal has told you
what specifically is in it.
Other Republicans said the plan sounded
more like communist economic doctrine.
You probably have no idea what the Green New Deal is.
You probably have some sense that it has to do
with climate and climate change, but you probably
don't know much beyond that.
It is hard to argue with her.
Look at some of the headlines
from the Green New Deal debate:
Is Green New Deal smart politics for Democrats?
Green New Deal divides Democrats on climate change.
Seven reasons Democrats won't pass a Green New Deal.
We're talking about the fate of the human race here,
but the focus is still on the politics.
Could the fight over this plan divide the Democratic Party?
Will Republicans succeeded in painting it as an unrealistic boondoggle?
Notice when you're saying that you're not asking:
"Well, what is the problem they're trying to address?"
"Is this a viable solution?"
This framing makes us less informed,
but it also makes us more cynical.
Jamieson and her research partner ran an experiment
where they gave people three different types
of news stories about a Philadelphia mayoral race.
Don't tune out.
I will make this quick.
The first group got stories that focused on the issues:
What problems were the candidates trying to solve,
and how did they propose to fix those problems?
The second group got stories that focused on tactics:
how the candidates were trying to win over voters.
And the third got a mix:
stories that started with a tactical frame
and then discussed substance.
Their findings were ... woof.
In the second and third groups,
the ones who got tactical framing,
the news had activated their cynicism.
They were more likely than the first group to say
that the candidates were promising things they couldn't deliver
or that the situation was hopeless anyway.
There were also less likely to remember
basic information about the policy proposals,
even if what they saw included real policy analysis.
We find that even with that good information there,
the public is less likely to learn it
because the tactic frame creates a lens on it that says
“they're” not actually going to do it anyway.
This is really all about politics.
Now trust your political instincts based on your ideology.
Jamieson and her research partner published
a book about their findings called the Spiral of Cynicism.
Which is surprisingly not a book about my dating life.
In it, they argued that this cynicism lingers
even after the tactical framing is gone.
A few days after the experiment,
the participants were asked to react
to an excerpt from a debate between the candidates.
But the ones who had been exposed to tactical framing
still reacted cynically.
And what that said to us was that the stimulus in news
was so strong that when you got no more cues to be cynical,
to be tactical,
nonetheless you were seeing the race through that lens.
Now maybe your reaction is "so what?"
Of course watching the news makes you cynical.
Congress is too gridlocked to get anything done.
Hopelessness is the correct response.
But tactical framing makes it harder
to break that gridlock
by causing us to look at policy through a partisan lens.
Most of the time we're not partisans.
I know that sounds surprising,
but most of the time we're not.
But I can activate my sense of my partisanship
and the partisanship of an audience
by focusing on a frame that makes that more important.
A huge amount of the coverage of the Green New Deal
has focused on how Republicans might
gain an advantage with voters by attacking it in 2020.
This may not play well among some of the voters.
The Republicans can use this as a weapon.
If you look at the political implications
it is easy to see why Republicans see advantage in this.
And all that might be true.
But it also begs the question:
If the only thing voters know about a bill
is that Republicans hate it and Democrats love it —
The Republicans painting this as unworkable socialism.
Loony socialist fever dream —
they're more likely to react to that bill along party lines.
In an environment in which news covers things
through a political lens, Republicans versus Democrats,
left versus right,
it makes it harder for people who might be trying
to find common ground in the middle.
That tactical frame ends up becoming
a self-fulfilling prophecy.
It's covered through a partisan lens,
so we react through a partisan lens,
which makes partisanship the only thing that matters.
It makes us political analysts.
It makes us pundits, but it doesn't make us very good voters.
This exact thing happened on Meet the Press a few weekends ago.
Trump had tweeted a bullshit claim that the Green New Deal
would somehow ban cars, cows, and the military.
How would you ban a cow?
This would have been a great chance to explain
what the Green New Deal actually does.
To let voters decide for themselves if
upgrading our power grid
or modernizing our transportation systems
is a good idea.
But Chuck Todd wanted to talk about 2020.
David, obviously, the president's team sees
a reelection opening.
Oh yeah.
I mean, it's huge and it's a real big pothole
I think for the Democrats.
And then ...
You've got Donald Trump and the
“Make America Great Again" slogan
against, the way he brands it, “Make America Socialist
For The First Time.”
That is powerful, especially with those
white, middle-class, blue-collar Democrats.
A lot of Republicans and moderate Democrats
might actually like what's in this thing.
But we'll never know because the batshit segment on TV
is telling them this is a debate about socialism.
It was 'yes we can.'
But I'm wondering if now it's
'yes we can become a socialist country.'
And I know that sounds alarmist.
I have met the press, and I was deeply disappointed.
You can't smoke in here.
Look, maybe things are hopeless.
Maybe we're too angry and divided
to stop the planet from overheating.
But we won't actually know that
until people understand what our options are.
Until we're given a chance to judge solutions
on their merit rather than their political popularity.
If we set up a coverage structure that minimizes
the likelihood that the public will actually understand
enough about the substance to register informed opinion,
we minimize the likelihood that it will pass at all.
The point of political journalism should be
to snap us out of our cynicism.
To remind us of the magnitude of the problems we face.
Most people who are thinking about their children right now,
I'm sorry I'm getting emotional, but
this is an emergency in this country.
It's an emergency on this planet.
And to teach us what our options might be.
Is the New Green Deal going to solve the problem?
We can't say it's too aspirational.
It's the planet.
That's a really important conversation.
Our planet depends on it.
But it's one that gets shut down
every time a newsroom decides to focus on tactics.
What you're seeing, though, I mean,
this is the pull of the 2020 Democratic primary process.
This is where it's headed.
Hey guys!
Thanks for watching.
If you want to know more about the substance
of the Green New Deal,
I put a link to an in-depth explainer
in the description.
And if you ever wanted to ask me a question
about Strikethrough, now is your chance.
I’m going to be doing a live Q&A for Video Lab,
our membership program.
It’ll be Tuesday, March 19, and it will be
moderated by this sentient bag of wet hair.
Feel free to leave your questions in the comments below.
And if you can’t make the live stream, don’t worry.
All members will have access to a recording of it once it’s over.
Did I deliver this whole thing weird?