But it all depends on how we define values in the end.

For example, my value system dictates that I am not lied to. However, on the public airways I am lied to every day. By politicians, by talking heads, by industry, by special interest groups, etc.

Now who can I complain to about that?

Spider - Good question.

Part of my discussion of Values Talk is to shatter the very concept of "values" or "family values": no one owns values, and no one has the monopoly on defining them.

I'm sick to death of Values Talk. I stuck my head in the sand for a while, but now I feel ready to fight back, even if I'm only armed with a soap box and a squirt gun.

Eric Berlin
Dumpster Bust: Miracles from Mind Trash
http://dumpsterbust.blogspot.com

I'm sick to death of Values Talk.

Unfortunately, you're going to have to absorb yourself in it, if you want to convince people of your ideology. The Left and the Right will both tell you that.

It doesn't just include family values either. Consider the platform that Bush ran on, determination, preseverence, macho cowboy with vision, 'you know where he stands', etc.

Public relations had built up the man who owned all these values. Then came the debates, not one but three, in which America clearly saw who the intelligent, determined, fully capable commander in chief really was. Not once, but three times, Kerry is considered to have won the debate. Bush smirked, showed impatience, misspoke, and did not make himself out to be the man of value that people thought him to be. But public relations kept up, and Bush won the election on 'these' values.

People thought Bush had cornered these values, even when their own eyes told them otherwise. This is the hold that 'values' now has to the mainstream. It runs so deep that perception can overshadow reality.

It's going to take at least through the 2006 election, probably beyond, to shatter the co-opting of values that the Right has gotten. And the whole time, they are still putting it out 24/7.

Values though, in terms of voters, goes just beyond family values. That's the neatest catch phrase though, it bundles up so many emotions. But the value of leadership, the value of faith in the White House, etc. the whole value thing is very broad.

Eric, the problem is older than this election, last year's SuperBowl or even Howard Stern's first fine.

When the SC opened the door to community-standards-based value definition (1973, Miller v. California, in which the Supreme Court defined obscenity as "that which the average person, applying contemporary standards, would find appeals to the prurient interest as a whole..."), they threw this whole issue back to the voters, so to speak.

So none of us should be surprised when the current definition and the election numbers are closely coupled.

Steve - I agree that Democrats and those on the left must take part in the Values Talk debate or lose by forfeit. That's why I've been talking for a while now about the great and critical need to take on the Conservative Media Machine. The PR war was and is waged on many fronts, but the ability of the right to funnel rumors, innuendo, slanted stories, and the occasional good piece of analysis or commentary from Drudge and the right-leaning blogosphere up through Rush, Hannity, Savage, and finally The Washington Times and Fox News was a major factor in Bush's re-election. Exhibit A: Swift Boats.

The Dems are in-the-woods now, and must build their own Media Fortress. This will take years, but thankfully the work has already begun.

DrPat - I think that Supreme Court decision was a terrible one. No one has been able to define obscenity or "community standards" in the years since, so you're right in saying that this debate dates back a good number of years.

I do think that "values" and, to an extent, religion are playing a greater role in politics and political life than at any time in the last twenty years, as I talk about a little bit here.

~ Eric B.

I'm always made a little nervous by the rush from either side to attach the "values" label to their arguments. In that, I agree with Steve S. (Surprise!)

Just as the community-standards argument had unanticipated consequences, culminating (parhaps) in the triumph of the Republicans this year, the reliance on religiosity - or anti-religion - to justify decisions is a good way to release a backlash.

Even with no backlash, as an atheist I don't fit easily into either category. I have to find a different way to justify what I have already decided to do. [grin]