To the editor: Linguist George Lakoff’s claim that “Hillary Clinton never said what her values were” bewilders me.

Maybe her values don’t fit on the front of a baseball cap, but if you heard even one of her hundreds of campaign speeches, you would know what they are. Allow me: affordable healthcare, economic opportunity, racial and gender equality, easier access to education, foreign diplomacy, pathways to citizenship for immigrants, gun control, fighting climate change and supporting the LGBTQ community, among other things.

We know now what kind of forces were at play to undermine her candidacy, yet Lakoff seems to imply that if only the candidate had framed her message better, she might not have lost the election.

This was an election, remember, in which she received nearly 3 million more votes than her opponent.


Laura Owen, Pacific Palisades

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