Why do Democrats often seem so poor in political messaging? Why do they seem so often willing to go after one another on issues rather than Republican’s, Conservative’s, and the greedy plutocracy. I think it was Will Rogers who when asked which political party he belonged to responded, “I belong to no organized political party, I’m a Democrat.”
While that openness to debate, convictions and interests makes the party what it is and why I am a Democrat, we are at a time in our democracy so perilous that perhaps it is time to distinguish between ideological debates to set policy and messaging to win elections.
Perhaps It is time to change the way the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates campaign. Frankly messaging by the Democratic Party and its candidates for the most part sucks. The time for presenting elaborate plans and programs to the electorate during elections has passed, at least for the time being. We are in the midst of a national existential crisis. Neither government nor politicians are trusted. Neither the electorate nor the media appear to be able to handle, understand or communicate complex proposals for often poorly understood problems. The electorate and the media require brief concise statements that the least sophisticated of them can understand and communicate. Most voters do not really care how you are going to do what you promise, nor will they understand it. Republicans learned this long ago. Frank Luntz taught them, and for the most part it worked. It is time for Democrats and progressives to do so too.
I make no claims to being a qualified political consultant, but here are some suggestions (and they are only suggestions) for Democratic talking points that could be used during the 2022 midterms and perhaps even the 2024 elections.
The Democrats will:
save your children from the threat of death from government supported weapons of war;
make you, your family, and your neighbors safe in your homes, in shopping centers, and in the streets of the nation from those same weapons of war;
protect you from governmental control of your bodily functions and restore a woman’s right to choose.
reduce Republican caused inflation.
restore to all Americans their right to vote in free and fair elections.
restore our nations schools and universities to the best in the world and assure every child in the nation access to the education they need.
provide fairer taxation for all Americans
punish all those who sought to overthrow our democracy on January 6 and pass laws necessary to assure it never happens again.
The Democrats will stop:
Republicans from taking away your social security and your medicare;
government subsidies of energy developments that destroy our nation’s climate:
Republicans from eliminating Social Security for our elderly;
Republican’s plan to eliminate Medicare;
Republican increases in the national debt;
` Republican war on our nation’s public schools;
Republican assaults on our right to vote.
attempts to destroy our representative democracy by insurrection or subterfuge.
fraud in our elections.
attempts to deny any American their rights to equality of opportunity and respect.
government from imposing unfair taxes on Americans by, among other things, closing unfair tax loopholes.
Each meme should be used separately as needed. For example, “I will fight to make your children in school free from the threat from government supported weapons of war,” or “The Republican Party and the manufacturers of these weapons of war are killing your children as they sit in their schools. It is time to rid our schools of that threat.”:
This is not a complete list; there may be interests and policies not specifically mentioned here. I expect those more knowledgeable and experienced than I can identify them. But it should be noted that some policies and and ideas may be better saved for debate before a Democratic controlled legislature than in an election where the electorate most likely neither cares nor understands the issues and attempts at explanation risks both boredom and misunderstanding.
Try your own list of memes. Remember in politics the briefest meme wins.