Hey could we have our name back? Thanks.

I do not generally subscribe to the notion that re-framing is a solution for any policy issue on which a particular party is failing, as was put forth in George Lakoff’s book “Don’t Think of an Elephant.” But I do think that words matter in politics.

Our goal should be, at minimum, to own the words that describe who we are. In an earlier life, as a journalism student covering a summer of sometimes racially-charged violence in Columbia, Mo. In 1989, I remember trying to step through the minefield of racial identification brought on by the political correctness movement at the moment when “black” gave way to “African-American” in newspaper descriptions.

There were strong opinions on both sides about whether the hyphenated construction really described many of the people who would end up being described by it.

I worked for the first black (his preferred term) editor of the Missourian, and he taught us something very valuable. He asked us to get involved with the community we were covering, listen to the descriptions they used, and when appropriate actually ask people how they would like to be described. He told us to “call people what they want to be called.” I think he believed there was a certain empowerment reflected in the paper’s willingness to let the labeling happen from the bottom up.

So, that admonition always has stuck with me as I moved into political and public policy work. If the description is coming from outside the group of people being described . . . look out. In that sense, all of our policy development and rhetorical work involves politics – reaching out to people to figure out how they talk about the things that matter most to them.

It is in that spirit, then, that I want to respectfully ask for the name of my party back.

I am a member of the longest continuously existing political party in the world. The name of the party is the “Democratic Party.” You may notice that conservatives, in the media, on blogs, and with increasing frequency from the stump, refer to the party as the “Democrat Party.” They have dropped the “ic” from common parlance.

Why did they do this? What is important about this? Well, presumably, they don’t want to acknowledge that one party is more democratic, more of the people, more suited to the needs, interests, wants and desires of the American people than the other. I don’t blame them. If I lived in a democracy and had to run against a party that called itself “democratic” I would be freaking out.

This would be especially applicable if my party were advancing the interests of corporations, the top 1 percent of income earners, and the military. Not a lot of democracy on any of those fronts. (You say shareholders make corporations democratic? Another post for another time.) Further, I would be freaking out if a whole lot of people in my party held as a value the fact that the country is NOT a democracy, but a Republic in which individuals elect leaders to speak for them. (Which it is.)

These circumstances would make me want to say the word “Democratic” as infrequently as I could afford to.

So, my Blue Warriors, get out there and challenge this construction! When you see it or hear it, correct the source. Tell them to get it right. Make them squirm. And if this usage doesn’t go away soon, I am going to launch a campaign to lop off two letters from the Republican Party, and we’ll just start calling them “publicans,” as in the licentious immoral scum of the New Testament.

Turnabout is fair play.