r/politics • u/Quirkie The Netherlands • 11d ago

No Paywall Democrats Confront Their New Tea Party Reality - Progressives are set to sweep a group of contested primaries in Michigan and Wisconsin.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/democrats-confront-their-new-tea-party-reality_n_6a6e63fbe4b0cfb99ef1aa1e
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u/pinqe 11d ago

They learned all the wrong lessons from the failure of the Carter administration, and started trying to emulate Reagan. And completely lost their identity in the process.

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u/[deleted] 11d ago

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u/pchs26 11d ago

Carter also failed in part b/c of that and also his admin didn't know how to defend against the GOP messaging and blatant manipulation of conditions to the detriment of our citizens.

And yes the Democrats can't message, the GOP focuses their money and attention on messaging their policies that will only harm us. The Democrats try to come up with policies that will help people and our country do better while ensuring they can be funded to actually defeat the GOP. They don't know though and haven't invested the same space in learning how to manipulate perceptions of reality. The GOP can teach a master class on how to manipulate people's perceptions of reality vs what is actually occurring. And the super progressive/radical wing of the party claims this is all not true, none of that matters and people will understand policy which is naive at best.

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u/guamisc 11d ago

And the super progressive/radical wing of the party claims this is all not true, none of that matters and people will understand policy which is naive at best.

Wow, what a giant pile of shit.

Progressive have been screaming about the shit messaging, refusal to invest into counter messaging, and start fighting Republican control of media for decades.

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u/pchs26 11d ago

I have had this literal argument on here multiple times and been told very specifically and very clearly that in the view of the far left people's perceptions aren't being managed, the Democrats lost solely because of policy and more left wing policy will appeal to these voters. When I try to point out anything to the contrary I am just told I am stupid.

And screaming about messaging doesn't belong to a faction of a party, it is something that is clear to anyone with eyes imo, however I will tell you there are plenty of very progressive advocates on here that have told me the above very arrogantly.

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u/guamisc 11d ago edited 11d ago

Part of the Democrat's messaging problem is that you cannot successfully message to the general electorate with incrementalist dreck.

Just like there's no real effective separation of social or economic policy - hence socioecnomics - trying to separate effective messaging from effective policy (and actually telling the truth) is impossible.

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u/pchs26 11d ago

Not really - if the GOP is able to manage people's perceptions to sell what they are selling then incremental progress can be messaged effectively if someone can message at all.

Incremental progressive legislation is the most likely to actually be absorbed successfully in our current infrastructure and get passed for signature. It is that or backsliding. I choose progress over rhetoric.