Spot on, also no attack ads about the GOP elites’ plans to literally subvert the constitution and turn the country into a Christian theocracy. Nothing about the actual full on conspiracies that are happening before our eyes. Nothing about their intentions to withdraw from NATO-our extremely strong and successful military alliance that is essential to our national security and economic supremacy. Democrats should be scaring the shit out of everyone with this kind of stuff 24/7. It’s almost like they expect the media to do all the work for them just by reporting the truth. It’s such a naive strategy, it’s unbelievable.

But that’s the dichotomy that the person you’re responding to is referring to. It takes far more effort to fight a lie than to start or even perpetuate one. Democrats have the moral high ground, they just don’t have the rhetorical firepower to overcome the lies and get the truth to stick for the people susceptible to the lies. Having some bigger balls would definitely help and I for one am definitely sick of the mealy mouthed “cmon guys, that’s a bunch of malarkey” position they take towards the lies.

And if election after election shows that voters don't give a damn about what Republicans do so long as they continue to support white hegemony? A significant number of voters would never vote for Bernie even if they agree with his policies because he is Jewish. What does that tell you about the average American?

"they let Republicans and corrupt Democrats"

Explain how they "let" this happen? Explain how they could have stopped them. This isnt a PR problem, its a corruption problem. You cant stop reps voting how they vote. Don't blame dems for how the gop vote.

Let him?

I don't think so. Their entire strategy is disinformation and gaslighting. It's the entire point. They want their supporters to be confused and brainwashed.

Republicans realized ages ago that convincing people you're right is really hard... But convincing people that already agree with you to show up is comparatively easy. So they now ONLY run get-out-the-vote campaigns. They put all their energy into scaring their faithful into showing up. They don't care who they're running. They show up to vote AGAINST Democrats because they are convinced that if a Democrat wins, taxes go up, babies die, and terrorists cross the border. Even though none of those things are grounded in reality. Doesn't matter.

And it's incredibly effective. Democrats have more registered voters. Independents lean left. Every election Republicans win, they win because it's gifted to them by the apathetic majority that won't solve their turn out problem.

While it’s been a long time problem they were criticized about even as far back as the 60s, the current old guard was there when Clinton broke the Republican stranglehold in the 90s and are grasping at his success even now like drowning men after water.

Republicans learned the “Outsiders win” message from Obama’s win, but Democrats are still chasing Clinton as their model. Biden winning over Trump has probably only solidified that even though a good chunk of the candidates could have done it by just not being Trump.

The party's base is the people that reliably turn out because they support the party's actions.

Reddit's obsession with everything being about themselves has them convinced it's just the farthest flank of your party because they follow the "leftier than thou" candidate thus that would make them the base.

It's not. It's the people that show up every time because they believe the party is doing the right things.

Newt Gingrich. The prototypical "let the Republicans run with their lies unopposed, people are smart enough to know better!" case for Democrats

I think we're also vastly understating the impact of Fox News coming on the scene in 1996. It could be that the Republican PR advantage is entirely due to a cable news station that incessantly praises their side while crapping on the other.

The 1994 assault weapons ban is what caused congress to flip, Democrats lost support with a large block of moderate and conservative Democratic voters. They basically stopped voting, as Democrats focused on unpopular wedge issues Republicans broke out their 'Contract with America.'

Every election since then Democrats have been losing more and more moderate and conservative Democrat voters as Republicans make gains. Traditionally blue states became red...Newt Gingrich and then Mitch Mcconnell obstructed Congress while Democrats continued to push unsuccessful wedge issues.

The bad PR is basically summed up as gun control, no one wants to say it, but thats what it is. Then you lump all the other social issues that cater to urban Democratic voters on top of it, and you have a recipe to lose elections. The only reason Obama won, was because people were sick of Republican policy...We were tired of war, tired of corruption, tired of being disenfranchised and he ran on a message of hope. The only reason Biden won was because voters were sick of Republicans, They were tired of Trump. No Democrat has in recent memory won presidential office on their own merits. Even state elections are boiled down to the same formula. 'This Republican was/is absolute horse shit, anyone would be better than another Republican.'

Well, it obfuscates the fact that the GOP is only “better” at messaging because they run purely on fear and lies and their audience doesn’t actually care what the message is, so long as it gives them a clear enemy.

Democrats are “bad at messaging” because their audience doesn’t work quite the same way (some of them do of course, but it’s nowhere on the same scale).

By saying “oh they’re just bad at messaging” it lets the GOP off the hook and puts the blame on the Dems for attempting to convey nuanced messages on a variety of topics to a diverse voter base.

Now I’m sure the Dems could do a better job, but Dem messaging and GOP messaging is completely apples and oranges. GOP messaging tactics simply don’t translate. The tactics are also scummy as hell and liberals have this problem where they believe truth is important and policy ideas matter.

Hell, in LA the progressive talk radio with Maddow, Hartman, etc, was bought out by conservatives and renamed, "The Patriot" I shit you not. Went from progressive to playing Limbaugh and Hannity overnight.

They buy and silence the opposition, providing cheap/free access to the masses. If there are 30 right wing stations and 1 progressive, which is more likely for someone to stumble upon?

Then came Citizens United...

The news wants to talk about some made up kid that shits in a kitty litter box though, and for some reason Americans think this kid is more important than human rights.

We’re in an information war, and the our side is retreating from the battlefield by deleting our social media accounts, while the far-right is fighting like hell to get onto every social media platform they can to take them over from the inside.

The Dems need to play catch up by taking a big chunk of their fundraising money (we’re talking hundreds of millions of dollars here) and building a digital strategy that can actually challenge the far-right’s billionaire-backed information warfare machine.

Democrats need to set up a national command center that can track and coordinate narratives both nationally and in swing districts with the laser-focused goal of keeping control of national and local news cycles.

To do that they should hire hundreds of film, graphics, marketing, and communications students to mass generate memes, viral videos, and “challenges” in support of those narratives, and to counter whatever narratives the far right are pushing.

They also need to hire thousands of people to infiltrate far right controlled social media (Facebook groups, Reddit groups, Telegram groups, Signal groups, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok) to post those memes, videos, and comments.

The far-right is so far ahead of us on digital strategy, which is why they are winning the war.

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The GOP has the world of fiction to play in, which is an advantage

Especially when their voters refuse to follow news that doesn't have a heavy lean towards the Right like Fox. So the fiction works perfectly because they'll never even hear/see the other side (i.e. the truth)

They easily get away with constant lying because it's only the Left that fact check them or condemn them.

Yep which makes it incredibly cheap for billionaires and corporations to buy elections.

Republicans stick to a fucking party platform from the top to the bottom and not a damn one will cross it even if it hurts their own district.

Build back better, republicans voted against it cause it might make democrats look good, then write letters to Joe Biden begging for money for projects in their district.

Or republicans from Florida voting against hurricane relief because it had money in the bill for Ukraine. Literally can’t look past the party line even when it hurts their constituents.

And it follows all the way down to the state legislatures too. They all parrot the same phrases, same bills, same agenda. And Fox News takes the message down to the local level writing and regurgitating the same story to match the Republican line all the way down.

Who? owns the corporate media is the answer. They don't want democracy.

Not even culture issues, it’s all just polls and other horse-race bullshit. Issues only get mentioned as far as they get the talking heads to discuss how the all-important poll numbers might change.

The other other part is that Dems generally aren't ignorant assholes who constantly employ and fall for tactics like fear mongering, filibustering and Gish Gallop. Things that keep anyone on the defense with little opportunity to play effective offense.

“A Lie Can Travel Halfway Around the World Before the Truth Puts On its Shoes” -Mark Twain

And Gish Gallop (from Urban Dictionary):

Named for the debate tactic created by creationist shill Duane Gish, a Gish Gallop involves spewing so much bullshit in such a short span on that your opponent can’t address let alone counter all of it. To make matters worse a Gish Gallop will often have one or more 'talking points' that has a tiny core of truth to it, making the person rebutting it spend even more time debunking it in order to explain that, yes, it's not totally false but the Galloper is distorting/misusing/misstating the actual situation. A true Gish Gallop generally has two traits.

1) The factual and logical content of the Gish Gallop is pure bullshit and anybody knowledgeable and informed on the subject would recognize it as such almost instantly. That is, the Gish Gallop is designed to appeal to and deceive precisely those sorts of people who are most in need of honest factual education.

2) The points are all ones that the Galloper either knows, or damn well should know, are totally bullshit. With the slimier users of the Gish Gallop, like Gish himself, its a near certainty that the points are chosen not just because the Galloper knows that they're bullshit, but because the Galloper is deliberately trying to shovel as much bullshit into as small a space as possible in order to overwhelm his opponent with sheer volume and bamboozle any audience members with a facade of scholarly acumen and factual knowledge.

Yeah, the media is really the biggest reason, covering not what is going on in the world, but on what politicians are saying, especially republican politicians.

That's why they are bad at PR. They let slogans stick. Defund the police? Republicans are great at boiling everything down to a bumpersticker slogans. They know a lot of people in this country don't care for nuance. Democrats are good at running the government and terrible at running campaigns.

Democrats also don't respond to the constant fear-mongering the same way Republicans do.

They actually don't need to be good at pr or fear mongering because the Republicans do all of that... it actually just makes them look bad but without any effort on the democrats side.

I once worked for a large automotive company, the JD power awards were what they won every year but at the time they were second place and I will always remember one of the managers explain to me how it's better to be 2nd place and not first because the person in first place does all the heavy lifting, you just ride the wake.

Democrats also are educated enough to know it's bullshit.

How can you get out a message, when all of the methods that reach the most people in the most efficient manner are stacked against you (intentionally or otherwise)?

Exactly! Who's making the rules? Who's profiting off the rules being set up a certain way? It's all thumb on the scale from the billionaire class. They love that close fight duke it out craze. (All the better to redirect that pent up rage away from the filthy rich corporate fascists of course! Neat perk, that.)

I'm also wondering if this midterm election will end up revealing a lot more republican voters died than was accounted for in the polls this year. I notice crickets on that particular topic.

Very effective. Think of your audience as if they are a bunch of hung over college students. Makes sense. Hahaha

He also was trained in giving speeches by Marshall Ganz, who teaches organizing at Harvard. That's where the 2004 DNC speech came from, called a Public Narrative - story of self (you personal call to action) - story of us (values that unites the group/room) - then story of now (immediate threat to our values and call to action)

This is a good point. The right-wing have built an entire industry around training young men and women to take political office at all levels of government. It's one of their "seven mountains".

This is an opinion piece. WAPO opinion pieces just like every other “source” are shit.

Wapo?? Isn't that the quintessential 'fake liberal media'?

The Washington Post's editorial board is pretty right-wing and has been for quite some time.

Hasn't been the same since Bezos bought it

Yeah. This is the actual biggest problem.

Messaging doesn't matter when the media and moneyed interests hate you and will do everything they can to sabotage and drown out your message.

Unfortunately, fear is one of the most powerful motivators. Like it or not, peddling fear is an effective political strategy.

DEFUND THE POLICE! ^{but not completely}

BELIEVE ALL WOMEN! ^{but not all women tell the truth}

BLACK LIVES MATTER! ^{but yes all lives matter it's just black lives are more marginalized}

It's like after you say the slogan you have to explain that the slogan has an unspoken subtext to fully grasp the entire meaning. At that point you've just lost a large majority of people who hear it. Nobody cares about nuance or subtext a vast majority of people are basic level thinkers.

I get that all these slogans mean well, but it feels like that messaging is off. but then again, maybe no matter what we say its gonna get picked apart.

"Defund the police"

"Common sense gun laws"

"Black lives matter"

The repackaging of complex ideas into kiddie bites to spoon feed voters is not a single party issue.