Democrats Screwed Up The Messaging

It has been disappointing watching the Democrats' lead in national polls erode over the past few weeks. They went from having a good chance of taking over the Senate while being close to even in the House, to being a bit behind in the race to control the Senate and most likely to lose the House. I blame inept messaging for their loss of ground.

Democrats have a number of good issues on their side. Abortion rights are supported by a majority of the voters nationwide. Republicans are trying to restrict voting rights based on falsehoods about the "stolen" 2020 election. And their policy platform is based on cruelty and hatred. To be sure, there's a segment electorate for whom these positives, but they're a minority.

So what have Republicans done right to turn the issues in their favor? They've gotten voters focused on inflation and crime. These "kitchen table" type issues are more immediately powerful than wonkier issues like whether ballot drop-boxes are open for 1 day or 7 days, or whether abortion is banned after 6 weeks, 14, or 20.

What have Democrats done? Frankly, they've screwed the pooch. They have done almost nothing to try to control the messaging, or even respond to it.

I blame Democrat leadership for this. Four years ago there was scuttlebutt about whether Nancy Pelosi was the right leader for the party. I was, and still am, on the side that Ms. Pelosi is the wrong leader. It's not because of her position on issues, BTW. I agree with her positions. It's because her understanding of campaigning is horribly outdated. She's leading the party's campaigning like it's still 1992. And she's not the only one. There are a lot of senior Democrats who need to go— not because they're old, per se, but because they've let their skills and leadership fall horribly behind.

What do I mean by "Like it's still 1992"? Three big things. ...Not all of which are specifically 1992, though the first is.

First, 1992 with Bill Clinton's election was when the power of "the 24 hours news cycle" was proven. Clinton's messaging team worked hard to stay ahead of news stories and thus control the messaging. People made jokes at their expense about how an unfavorable story on CNN wasn't really a national emergency that required multiple senior advisors staying up half the night in the White House's Situation Room. But it worked. Clinton and his team stayed ahead of new stories, exerting ability to shape them by fast response. They ran circles around Republicans who were accustomed to waiting for news media to come to them, or appear on Sunday talk shows. Today Republicans have learned that lesson while Democrats have forgotten it.

Second, Democrat leadership has remained in denial about the reality that Fox News, and other smaller players in its ecosystem, are basically propaganda machines for conservative politics. Fox and allies don't report news, they make it up. And they repeat their points, with distorted or false stories, morning, day, and night. In a context like this, Democrats can't simply wait for reporters to come to them and help get their message out— especially when traditional news media have been hollowed out. Even the traditional media today tend to "report the controversy" rather than dig to report the facts, because reporting "He said/she said" is easier and cheaper.

Third, Democrat leadership has completely missed the importance of social media. To me, this is what complaints that people like Nancy Pelosi (and Chuck Schumer, etc.) are "too old" means. It's not that, say, 68 is okay and 82 is not okay; it's that failing to understand the single most important shift in communication of the past 15 years is not okay. Republican leadership is killing it on social media. Younger Democrats are active on social media, but the party's leaders have totally missed the boat.

Continued in next blog entry....

Democrats Screwed Up The Messaging, part 2

Earlier today I posted "Democrats Screwed Up The Messaging" about how they've not just lost the messaging war for this year's election but have underperformed on messaging for several years running. There are two important facets to messaging.... It's not just what you say but how you say it. In my previous blog I explained the high level mistakes in "how". Here's a bit on the "what".

BTW, you might be tempted to dismiss this as "Monday morning quarterbacking". Well, election day's not 'til tomorrow! So this is more like "Inside the 2-minute warning quarterbacking." 😅

In my previous blog I described that Democrats' 2022 issues of protecting reproductive rights and protecting the right to vote against conspiracy nuts gaining control over the levers of power got hijacked by Republicans making this election about household issues of inflation stretching family budgets, and crime. Because the Democrats have long been seen as the party of working class Americans it's notable that Republicans are further stripping away this demographic from them. It's not longer just the "God, Guns, and (anti-)Immigrants" White Christian working class that's with the Republicans; recently it's more ethnic minorities, too.

So, what could Democrats do (or have done) differently? Dems could own these issues. Here's just an off-the-cuff level response I'd make on inflation if I were a Democrat leader:

"You're worried about inflation. We get it. It's tough when prices on almost everything are going up. But while we've tried to pass programs that would help working families, Republicans have blocked them. And what does the Republican party propose to do instead? They've got nothing. Nothing.

"So look at what they did last time they were in power.... They passed a tax cut benefiting the rich. A tax cut that had to be paid for by the government borrowing more money. Excessive borrowing is part of what's caused this inflation!

"And what have the rich done in return? Just this week the world's richest man, an outspoken supporter of Republic politics, bought a company and promptly laid off 3,700 employees. 3,7000 well paying jobs, gone. You can't trust these people to fix inflation."

And on the subject of crime:

"You're worried about crime. We get it, we don't like crime either. But the Republicans are feeding you scare stories about how bad things are. The fact is that crime is at a historic low in the past 50 years. You and your kids are safer now than in your parents' or grandparents' generation.

"There's one sub-category of crime that really does seem to be getting worse, though. Mass shootings. These used to happen once a year. Then once a month. Then once a week. Now they actually happen more than once a day. They've become so frequent that most of them aren't even news anymore. And that's doubly terrifying.

"People in churches and schools shouldn't have to worry about getting shot by a nutjob with a gun who thinks he's fighting a race war. Yet what are the Republicans saying about crime? They're blaming it on immigrants and communities of color, fueling the racial animus of these mass shooters, and then saying the solution is more guns. Do you really want more guns in the hands of troubled people fed stories of racial hatred?"

Again, this just an extemporaneous take on how Dems could be looking to take control of the message. It's sad that with their wealth of experience and power they've missed so badly. That's why it's time for new leadership. New Democrat leadership.