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Join us on Thursday evening, March 19, 6PM, at the Craftsman Pub in Middleton for Open Mic Night. We’ll be discussing “Speaking Our Values: The Key to Effective Political Speech.” Good music, good food, good beer, and great conversation! Continue reading
When talking politics, it’s useful to be aware of the participants’ motives (both your own and your conversation partner’s). This blog post explores how to identify and respond to the types of motives people often bring to political conversations. Continue reading
Larry Orr was not born to speak for peace. One of his first, strongest memories is of being a 3-year-old playing in his back yard in Muscatine, Iowa when two P-38 fighters flew over at treetop level. Their deafening noise … Continue reading
George Lakoff was in Wisconsin for the past few days lecturing at several different events. While I didn’t hear him say anything that wasn’t in at least one of his books and don’t agree with everything he teaches, the question-and-answer … Continue reading
Main point: It’s useful to learn about ‘messaging’ and ‘framing’ for one-way communications like letters to the editor, and so that we know when polished political spin is being used to manipulate us. But speaking in the phrases recommended by … Continue reading
I have been reading, studying, practicing, and blogging about interpersonal political conversation techniques for going on a year now. Talking politics: If we don’t learn how, our American civic discourse will consist of nothing but political messages crafted on Madison Avenue … Continue reading
Members of my local grassroots club have better-than-average political conversation skills. That’s not surprising: Anyone who willingly attends weekly political meetings gets more practice than the average person. And yet last week’s meeting was derailed by an all-too-common pitfall. When … Continue reading