About this item
Highlights
- Since September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has relentlessly invoked the word "freedom.
- About the Author: George Lakoff is the author of Don't Think of an Elephant and Moral Politics, as well as many seminal books on linguistics.
- 288 Pages
- Political Science, Political Ideologies
Description
About the Book
Lakoff, an adviser to the Democratic party, shows that the conservative revolution has remade freedom in its own image and deployed it as a central weapon on the front lines of everything from the war on terror to the battles over religion in the classroom and abortion.Book Synopsis
Since September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has relentlessly invoked the word "freedom." Al-Qaeda attacked us because "they hate our freedom." The U.S. can strike preemptively because "freedom is on the march." Social security should be privatized in order to protect individual freedoms. The 2005 presidential inaugural speech was a kind of crescendo: the words "freedom," "free," and "liberty," were used forty-nine times in President Bush's twenty-minute speech.
In Whose Freedom?, Lakoff surveys the political landscape and offers an essential map of the Republican battle plan that has captured the hearts and minds of Americans--and shows how progressives can fight to reinvigorate this most beloved of American political ideas.Review Quotes
"One of the most influential political thinkers of the progressive movement." --Howard Dean
"In the battle of ideas, George Lakoff is one of the progressive movement's Five-Star Generals. Here he shows what we must do to take back precious ground lost to the Right--the concept of 'freedom, ' on which America's very foundation is built. Read this and arm yourself." --Robert B. Reich, former U.S. Secretary of Labor "[Lakoff] makes a very persuasive argument that Democrats have allowed Republicans to hijack words such as 'freedom' and 'liberty' in fundamental ways that have undercut Democrats' credibility." --Chicago TribuneAbout the Author
George Lakoff is the author of Don't Think of an Elephant and Moral Politics, as well as many seminal books on linguistics. He lives and teaches in Berkeley, California.