When it comes down to effective communication--the type that actually motivates people to take a certain course of action--truth by itself is almost irrelevant. Any type of "information," whether it is based on facts or not, if it is presented in a compelling way that connects at a visceral level with a target (or intended) audience, will have more of an impact that information presented without the proper narrative, or messaging.
You have to understand the audience... For example, the average Republican is a retrograde who holds all kinds of biased and based beliefs. Some of them find the root on deep-seeded racism, the fear of "others," religious fundamentalism, and other character deficiencies accentuated by ignorance, including a propensity to be jingoistic.
To a certain extent, these people are victims, and pawns. They are the "What's the matter with Kansas?" type; the useful idiots of the ruling class, who through fear and propaganda, are manipulated into voting against their own interests, and the interests of the rest of society. That's how you get cretins, war criminals, and profiteers, like the ones that permeated much of the Bush administration, into power, opening the doors for the wholesale looting and pillaging of the country.
And that's how you get the current crop of utterly debased clownish, but dangerous crop of Republican presidential candidates.
All the Koch brothers-funded groups, including the corporatist-fascist ALEC, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, NRA, etc., understand this very well. And they hone in their manipulative messaging and story-telling to reach their audience, perfectly.
The Left needs to understand that in order to be able to compete in the battle of ideas, and propaganda, having the facts, the science, reason, empirical evidence, and intellectual heft on our side is just not enough. That's just the starting point. It's an ingredient. A useful ingredient, of course, but barely enough.
Much, much, more important is the story-telling, the narrative, the compelling, gut-wrenching, emotionally-charged narrative.
At a personal level, I get frustrated when I see the extraordinary amount of effort people on the Left spend on trying to answer every lie, every deception, being put forward by the dominant corporatist-fascist right wing.
It's akin to trying to reason with a lunatic. You can't.
The first rule of effective communication is to know your audience, and work on messaging for that particular audience. Those who want to compete for the attention of the ignorant, low-information voter, need to understand what motivates them, their biases, their values, their fears--most of all, their fears.
And then, work on a narrative, on messaging that "exploit" those attitudes; that pushes the right buttons; that connects at a visceral, emotional level, and prompts people to act--the way you want them to act.
It is true that when your agenda is to try to bring about a better society, a just society, a virtuous society, that tasks becomes much more difficult than that of the propagandist that's motivated by basest instincts like greed, and power lust (as in the case of the corporatist-fascist ruling elite), but that's why that task becomes much more important.
When your Republican father-in-law forwards you an email message full of bullshit lies, and propaganda, encouraging you to make sure you read it "before it's taken down," replying with a bunch of facts, links, studies, etc., is an exercise in futility, for the most part.
The Left needs to engage in guerrilla (as it were) propaganda tactics, and come up with our own messaging, and narrative that reaches down into the shallow, fear-driven psyche of the ignorant low-information voter. It's a nasty exercise, but one that cannot be ignored. If we do, we do so at our own peril.
Think about it... That's how today, the majority of the country opposes "Obamacare." And they can't even articulate why, other than to say that they oppose "mandates." That should tell you everything you need to know about this topic.