Note: Originally posted on January 24, 2007. The colorization scheme is slightly out of date; however, it’s a close enough match to my current preferences as to be worth a look.
Following is a transcript of US Senator Jim Webb’s Democratic response to President George W. Bush’s State of the Union address for 2007, including Whole Writing markup. The Whole Writing method employs Kronology, a 12-station model of human nature and development based on the AQAL Integral Framework. The text of the address is displayed in white; Whole Writing markup is displayed in multiple colors; and my commentary is displayed in turquoise.
We have seen that President Bush’s State of the Union speech contained values rhetoric often appealing to Democratic-friendly Station 5 (and rarely, Station 6) political approaches framed in terms of the Republican-friendly values orientation of Station 3 and Station 4. His overall concerns and strategies were dominated by values at Station 2, Station 3, Station 4, and Station 5 with an average center of gravity at approximately Station 3.75.
Senator Web’s speech begins with a personal note evoking conventional political rhetoric of patriotisml/9, L/3 and economic prosperityl/9, L/4.
Good evening.
I’m Senator Jim Webb, from Virginia, where this year we will celebrate the 400th anniversary of the settlement of Jamestown — an event that marked the first step in the long journey that has made us the greatestl/9, L/3 and most prosperousl/9, L/4 nation on earth.
As Senator Web turns to policy concerns, he highlights the domestic issues of energy independence, economic well-being, and other middle-class concernsQ4, l/9, L/4. Then he evokes keywords and buzz-phrases such as “sharing (i.e., redistributing) wealth,” “alternative energy,” and “fair trade,” that are commonly associated with the yellow, green, and teal value frameworks.
It would not be possible in this short amount of time to actually rebut the president’s messagel/9, L/3.75, nor would it be useful. Let me simply say that we in the Democratic Party hope that this administration is serious about improving education and healthcare for all Americans, and addressing such domestic priorities as restoring the vitality of New Orleans.
Further, this is the seventh time the president has mentioned energy independencel/9, L/4 in his state of the union message, but for the first time this exchange is taking place in a Congress led by the Democratic Party. We are looking for affirmative solutions that will strengthen our nation by freeing us from our dependence on foreign oill/9, L/2, and spurring a wave of entrepreneurial growthl/9, L/4 in the form of alternate energy programsl/9, L/6. We look forward to working with the president and his party to bring about these changes.
There are two areas where our respective parties have largely stood in contradiction, and I want to take a few minutes to address them tonight. The first relates to how we see the health of our economy — how we measure it, and how we ensure that its benefits are properly shared among all Americans. The second regards our foreign policy — how we might bring the war in Iraq to a proper conclusion that will also allow us to continue to fight the war against international terrorism, and to address other strategic concerns that our country faces around the world.
When one looks at the health of our economy, it’s almost as if we are living in two different countries. Some say that things have never been better. The stock market is at an all-time high, and so are corporate profitsl/9, L/4. But these benefits are not being fairly sharedl/9, L/5. When I graduated from college, the average corporate CEO made 20 times what the average worker did; today, it’s nearly 400 times. In other words, it takes the average worker more than a year to make the money that his or her boss makes in one day.
Wages and salaries for our workers are at all-time lows as a percentage of national wealth, even though the productivity of American workers is the highest in the world. Medical costs have skyrocketed. College tuition rates are off the chartsl/9, L/5. Our manufacturing base is being dismantled and sent overseas. Good American jobs are being sent along with theml/9, L/2.
In short, the middle class of this country, our historic backbone and our best hope for a strong society in the future, is losing its place at the table. Our workers know this, through painful experience. Our white-collar professionals are beginning to understand it, as their jobs start disappearing also. And they expect, rightly, that in this age of globalizationl/9, L/6, their government has a duty to insist that their concerns be dealt with fairly in the international marketplacel/9, L/7.
The Democratic response to the State of the Union address evokes historical analogies to drive home additional themes stressing yellow, green, and teal values. Senator Web expresses the philosophy that government should step in to regulate capitalist markets in the interest of aiding the poor in entering the middle classl/9, L/5 (e.g., by raising the minimum wage). Instead of highlighting narrowly partison rhetoric, Webb justifies government intervention in markets on the basis of an Integral approach of flexibility within the flow of multiple value frameworks (e.g., “get the right things done, for the right people and for the right reasons.”)
In the early days of our republic, President Andrew Jackson established an important principle of American-style democracy — that we should measure the health of our society not at its apex, but at its base. Not with the numbers that come out of Wall Street, but with the living conditions that exist on Main Street. We must recapture that spirit today.
And under the leadership of the new Democratic Congress, we are on our way to doing so. The House just passed a minimum wage increasel/9, L/5, the first in ten years, and the Senate will soon follow. We’ve introduced a broad legislative package designed to regain the trust of the American people. We’ve established a tone of cooperation and consensusl/9, L/6 that extends beyond party linesl/9, L/7. We’re working to get the right things done, for the right people and for the right reasonsl/9, L/7.
With respect to foreign policy, this country has patiently endured a mismanaged war for nearly four years. Many, including myself, warned even before the war began that it was unnecessary, that it would take our energy and attention away from the larger war against terrorism, and that invading and occupying Iraq would leave us strategically vulnerable in the most violent and turbulent corner of the worldl/9, L/2.
Although Senator Webb doesn’t explicitly appeal to many amber values in the policy section of the speech, he uses personal statements to highlight amber-altitude concerns with family, virtue, patriotism, and national servicel/9, L/3.
I want to share with all of you a picture that I have carried with me for more than 50 yearsQ/2, l/3, L/3. This is my father, when he was a young Air Force captain, flying cargo planes during the Berlin Airlift. He sent us the picture from Germany, as we waited for him, back here at home. When I was a small boy, I used to take the picture to bed with me every night, because for more than three years my father was deployed, unable to live with us full-time, serving overseas or in bases where there was no family housing. I still keep it, to remind me of the sacrifices that my mother and others had to make, over and over again, as my father gladly served our country. I was proud to follow in his footsteps, serving as a Marine in Vietnam. My brother did as well, serving as a Marine helicopter pilot. My son has joined the tradition, now serving as an infantry Marine in Iraq.
Like so many other Americans, today and throughout our history, we serve and have served, not for political reasons, but because we love our countryl/9, L/3. On the political issues — those matters of war and peace, and in some cases of life and death — we trusted the judgment of our national leaders. We hoped that they would be right, that they would measure with accuracy the value of our lives against the enormity of the national interest that might call upon us to go into harm’s way.
In the final sections of the speech, Senator Webb occasionally invokes red, amber, and orange values and repeatedly invokes green values. He also twice notes the importance of performing a sort of “moral calculus” to arrive at the wisest approaches to public policyl/9, L/7. In discussing war concerns, Webb offers a formula for justifying war based on teal, orange, amber, and indigo values. He employs an Integral calculus when he cites historical examples of presidents who took the “right kind of action, for the benefit of the American people and for the health of our relations around the world.”l/9, L/7.
We owed them our loyalty, as Americans, and we gave it. But they owed us — sound judgmentl/7, L/8, clear thinkingl/7, L/4, concern for our welfarel/7, L/3, a guarantee that the threat to our country was equal to the price we might be called upon to pay in defending itl/7, L/9.
The president took us into this war recklessly. He disregarded warnings from the national security adviser during the first Gulf War, the chief of staff of the army, two former commanding generals of the Central Command, whose jurisdiction includes Iraq, the director of operations on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and many, many others with great integrity and long experience in national security affairs. We are now, as a nation, held hostage to the predictable — and predicted — disarray that has followed.
The war’s costs to our nation have been staggering. Financiallyl/9, L/4. The damage to our reputation around the worldl/9, L/3. The lost opportunities to defeat the forces of international terrorisml/9, L/2. And especially the precious blood of our citizens who have stepped forward to serve.
The majority of the nation no longer supports the way this war is being fought; nor does the majority of our military. We need a new direction. Not one step back from the war against international terrorism. Not a precipitous withdrawal that ignores the possibility of further chaos. But an immediate shift toward strong regionally-based diplomacyl/9, L/5, a policy that takes our soldiers off the streets of Iraq’s citiesl/9, L/6, and a formula that will in short order allow our combat forces to leave Iraql/9, L/6.
On both of these vital issues, our economy and our national security, it falls upon those of us in elected office to take action.
Regarding the economic imbalance in our country, I am reminded of the situation President Theodore Roosevelt faced in the early days of the 20th century. America was then, as now, drifting apart along class linesl/9, L/6. The so-called robber barons were unapologetically raking in a huge percentage of the national wealthl/9, L/2. The dispossessed workers at the bottom were threatening revoltl/9, L/2.
Roosevelt spoke strongly against these divisions. He told his fellow Republicans that they must set themselves “as resolutely against improper corporate influence on the one hand as against demagogy and mob rule on the other.” And he did something about it.
As I look at Iraq, I recall the words of former general and soon-to-be President Dwight Eisenhower during the dark days of the Korean War, which had fallen into a bloody stalemate. “When comes the end?” asked the General who had commanded our forces in Europe during World War II. And as soon as he became President, he brought the Korean War to an end.
These presidents took the right kind of action, for the benefit of the American people and for the health of our relations around the worldl/9, L/7. Tonight we are calling on this president to take similar action, in both areasl/9, L/7. If he does, we will join him. If he does not, we will be showing him the way.
Thank you for listening. And God bless America.
In conclusion, we have seen that Senator Webb’s response to the President’s State of the Union speech contains policy approaches often appealing to Democratic-friendly Station 5, and Station 6; however, he employs largely orange, amber, and red rhetoric to frame his message. His overall concerns and strategies reflect an average center of gravity at approximately Station 5, a level emphasizing the role of community in elevating market forces to bring them more into harmony with widely-held values such as economic fairness. Even more promising is the Democratic Senator’s nods to truly Integral approaches involving flexible and fluid decision-making, complex and balanced leadership, and multi-tiered solutions to global problems.
When comparing and contrasting President Bush’s speech and Senator Webb’s speech, bear in mind that it is not necessarily the case that a Station 3.75 approach is “worse” or “inferior” to a Station 5 approach. Although the Democratic response clearly evidences a relatively higher, more evolved, approach to domestic and foreign policy matters, it remains considerably less than “fully Integral.” [Edited to add: In my view, the goal of a political speech is not to be "fully Integral"; however, a political speech can reflect a worldview that is more closely Integral because it integrates messages, values, and policies from a variety of "lower altitude" stations. Contemporary public policy does not reach an Integral expression in its implementation; however, policy can be based on more or less Integral approaches. It is very important to note that while it is generally true that a more Integrall/9, L/7, L/8, L/9 the policy, the better; however, it is NOT true that "higher altitude" policies are "better" than "lower altitude" policies. An Integral approach stresses flexible and appropriate applications of a variety of values and worldviews, not an elitist, indiscriminate preference for policies based on "higher altitude" values ]Another way of highlighting the similarities and differences between the Republican and Democratic approaches is to examine their basic style or type. In Kronology, Station 4 (Repubican) 
is characterized as masculine, Ascending, and fixed. Station 5 (Democratic) 
is seen as feminine, Ascending, and mutable. Both political parties share a common orientation towards bringing values and principles to bear in raising the national character (Ascending type). Republicans tend to be more focused on the maintenance of the status quo (i.e., fixed type) whereas Democrats tend to seek more flexible and balanced solutions to problems (i.e., mutable type). Another key type difference is one of agency v. communion. Seen from this angle, party differences are largely a Mars/Venus, male/female thing. The Republican type tends to focus largely on masculine or agentic styles of achieving its goals; however, the Democratic type speaks in a more feminine and communanitarian voice.
Judging the “better” or “superior” politics is not simply a matter of weighing values based on a comprehensive evolutionary model; rather, the best judgments will assess the values flexibly based on an evaluation of the relative suitability of Republican v. Democratic values in the solution of specific problems facing our nation at this point in time. If society faces problems best handled at a lower rather than higher Station, then there may be much to recommend leadership offering solutions more suitable for the national challenges. Additionally, a truly Integral approach will look beyond the valuesQ/3, l/9 expressed in the speech to the wisdom of concrete economic and political agendas for reformQ/4, l/9.
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Joe Perez is a writer striving to take Integral approaches to issues in ordinary life, culture, politics, sexuality, and spirituality. A graduate of Harvard University and The Divinity School at the University of Chicago, his books are 
(Integral Books, 2007) and 
(Lulu, 2006). 
My doctor says I can induce laughter even if I don’t feel happy or joyful or want to laugh. Even if nothing’s funny. Then we sat for a while and did the hee-hee-ha-ha-ho-hos in the office. She showed me that it’s possible to make my body go through the motions of laughter, and begin to change my state conscioussly.