I can't think of any better messaging for the party than we just experienced in the Harris campaign

[bigtree]

...so I'm not someone who believes recovering from this involves changing anything.

It's fuck around and find out time for both Americans who voted for him again, and those who sat it out, foisting this convicted criminal asshole on the nation again.

That's the only cure, unfortunately. This election demonstrates that plainly. Trump and the people who support him are dangerous trash for the country. That's the message.

The proof will be all too evident soon.

[gab13by13]

1. I agree with one caveat,

We need to elect leaders like Pelosi, compared with Schumer.

We need to get tougher. When a president can't get his nominee approved then appoint him/her as acting whatever. Look what happened when we got a milquetoast for Attorney General who 20 Magat Senators voted for.

[Native]

2. I've been watching the post mortems closely, & our messaging needs to be improved, among other issues our party is

Last edited Thu Nov 7, 2024, 05:45 PM - Edit history (1)

experiencing. There is always room for improvement, if you want to win.

[bigtree]

8. it appears that to get his voters we need to lie about the economy

...lie about immigrants.

Lie about women.

Demonize Haitians.

What else that his voters wanted should we amplify?

Americans who were indifferent to the things we all saw in front of us, are not only going to be made aware, but will experience the consequences of their actions and attitudes, again.

[Native]

20. you sound like my husband, lol.

I make a suggestion, and he goes all extreme on me.

[bigtree]

21. not really on you

...just expressing.

I've witnessed our messaging like most folks might not have, because of my obsessive follow of the campaign and even the party over the years. I'm basically a sponge for this stuff, and I guess I'm wondering what more could we do against a demagouge who is believed by voters?

We've had a counter appeal, backed up by actual action. I sincerely doubt republicans are concerned with much more than having their people in power, and the racism, misogyny, xenophobia, hatred of LGBTQs, and everyone who isn't them because, that's all they engage in.

No fairness, no reason, and nothing we're able to offer them outside of their core beliefs which are just garbage and antithetical to everything they say they want.

My message right now to them is, fafo.

I'm for their safety, well-being, and livelihood, like I am my own. Their guy cares only about himself, and his party cares only about him.

[Native]

22. Gotcha

[TwilightZone]

3. It clearly didn't work.

The Harris campaign will wind up millions of votes short of the Biden coalition from 2020. Had that coalition held, it would have been an entirely different race. We need to figure out why.

Focusing solely on Trump and his supporters never works. We should have learned that by now. That's all his primary opponents did in 2016 and 2024 and it got them nowhere. Harris was at her best when she was presenting her vision of the country and what she could do for voters.

The best strategy might have been to ignore him entirely. Everyone knows Trump by now, claims to the contrary notwithstanding, and beating voters over the head with it for the 4,000th time is not a winning strategy.

[bigtree]

7. doesn't mean it was the wrong message

...hell, it's not as if we should emulate ANYTHING republicans said.

No one should 'ignore' him.

Don't know where that's worked anytime in our politics.

[Taraman]

4. I don't think there was anything wrong with the messaging.

It was an excellent campaign, maybe the best I've ever seen. Harris would have been the leader we needed in this moment.

Many Americans are just selfish, entitled, silly people. And the misogyny and racism runs so so deep.

It is so discouraging to see our fellow Americans in the clear light of day.

[MaryMagdaline]

5. Yea. Our fellow citizens want fascism. Not much we can do with that.

[czarjak]

6. "Nothing you say will change my mind."

When truth and facts are deliberately ignored, it becomes mission impossible to go along .to get along and greeing to disagree.

[Elessar Zappa]

9. She did run a great campaign.

The only thing I can see going forward is to not focus on the fascist threat at all but instead focus on the traditional kitchen table issues like healthcare, economy, etc. To be clear, I’m NOT criticizing Harris at all as I think she was tremendous. I’m just spitballing ideas here.

[valleyrogue]

12. That is a waste of time. These people didn't vote for Trump because of the economy.

They voted for Trump because he is racist, xenophobic, and sexist just like them.

You can't reach them.

[bigtree]

13. as someone who was there almost every day

...I saw an intense focus from both of our candidates on middle class economic concerns.

It's not as if pretending like the president controls the price of groceries to appeal to the stupidity that was propagandized by republicans and believed by some of his voters might work... for a republican, maybe.

Either Trump voters didn't care about any of what they claimed, knew it was a pack of lies and thought that was a fine and dandy political tactic, or they're the stupidest people on the planet.

People need to stop trying to get us to bend reality to characterize these people who would vote to put a convicted felon in the White House - frickin convicted of election fraud.

There is a deep ignorance in America. That appears to be beyond our ability to effectively inform at this point in time, because the moron who once bankrupted most of the country was believed more.

My suggestion is to not only keep saying what we were saying, but say it louder now as reality envelops those vulnerable and supposedly struggling voters from states run by republicans who don't believe in helping anyone but themselves to the taxpayers dollars as they demagogue and propagandize everything.

Make sure to remind them what they did when it happens, and don't be shy about it.

[Tom Rinaldo]

10. Her messaging was great. But 100 days of great messaging doesn't...

...undo a decades long brand problem. Democrats used to be the party of the working class. It isn't wise to simply assert that there is nowhere that Democrats can improve on messaging overall, or that consistently good messaging isn't an aspect of winning. I'm just saying.

[bigtree]

15. the reality, though, was that Democrats were the ONLY ones actually doing anything for the 'working class'

...which I believe is a misnomer for that group of trump voters which doesn't include the millions of black and other minority Americans, who are actually becoming a collective majority in a rising number of the nation's workplaces in relation to workers identifying as white.

Do you believe republicans accomplished or even promised anything in this campaign for the 'working class,' other than to demonize the administration for 'ignoring them?"

Again, 'working class' in the context of Trump doesn't include black voters who voted overwhelmingly for Harris. This is shorthand for white men.

If we understand that, we can see where the problem is, and where Trump's demagoguery and divisiveness landed best.

[Tom Rinaldo]

16. I thought the theme was messaging, not policies

And the time frame I was commenting on is much longer than this campaign. Like I said, I think Kamala's messaging was great.

The trend lines are not good. Yes the core of the problem for us is white men, but white women favored (slightly) Trump over Harris. And that includes college educated white woman who favored Harris. Non college educated white women more strongly favored Trump.

There was a troubling uptick in Black male support for Trump, although overwhelmingly they supported Harris. Latino's were a greater problem for us. especially male Latinos, especially working class male Latinos. Yes they still backed Harris, but Trump got record breaking support from that demographic.

Non college educated minorities shifted in Trump's direction this cycle, in cumulative numbers that dealt a real blow to our chances. It is not only a white problem, or even a male problem. I'm not denying where the core of the problem lies, as I stated above, but recent trends with working class voters in general have gotten to where it threatens the Democratic coalition's chances of winning national elections.

[bigtree]

17. I'm talking about what the candidates were saying

...as well as their surrogates.

I think it would be more efficient for you to post examples, rather than me searching for and posting campaign speeches and statements.

I don't believe you have a clear view of what actually occurred. Perhaps this is based on what you saw? That would make more sense, but doesn't negate the point that middle class economics, working class for most of us, was their main theme and focus in almost everything they conveyed or sought to convey but weren't able to amplify enough through the media.

And again, black working class voters chose Kamala Harris in overwhelming numbers, so we're really just talking about voters identifying as white (mostly men), and the reported 11 percent of Latino men.

That's the canard in making this economic argument. Black working class voters didn't choose a convicted felon/adjudicated rapist for president. White men were his most ardent supporters.

[Tom Rinaldo]

18. Again. this is what i initially posted in reply to your thread:

"Her messaging was great. But 100 days of great messaging doesn't...
...undo a decades long brand problem."

You chose to focus on what was said during this campaign instead of what i actually raised. I generally agree with you about the last few months,, as I stated. I was commenting on trends that go back far longer, and those trend are problematic even though minority working class voters continue to back Democrats by large margins.

It has been a given for most of the last 50 years that Democrats seldom win a majority of white voters, not even white women. And our winning majorities, with strong support from minorities, are not large enough for us to afford continued leakage of minority support where class issues intersect.

I could say that "you don't have a clear view of what actually occurred" like you said to me, but i don't find comments like that useful to a discussion. I've gone as far down this rabbit hole as I have time for right now.

[bigtree]

19. kinda thinking going back a decade misses the point of this election and what happened

...seriously.

And I think it mischaracterizes those efforts by the party, as well. Not to mention what the politics at the time dictated to everyone after the primaries were over.

It's not as if there was some magic appeal that we weren't offering that the republicans were. It's been nothing but demagoguery and lies from them, coupled with absolutely nothing done to support their rhetoric about economic concerns for the 'working class', even when they were in power.

So why are we debating about Democratic messaging, when we're opposing a party that does little but lie about working class efforts and exploits those concerns?

That's actually what Democrats have been pointing out for years. Myriad legislators and successive Democratic administrations and nominees.

[valleyrogue]

11. There was nothing wrong with her campaign.

Lazy people didn't register to vote or show up at the polls or mailed in their ballots. Assholes who voted for Trump made up the rest.

These are the people to blame, not the Democrats.

[Vinca]

14. I thought Kamala ran one of the best campaigns in history. It was amazing what she did in such

a short period of time. IMO, it wasn't our candidate who failed, it was the voters who apparently want a celebrity who puts on a show over wise leadership. Well, it's going to go downhill from here. This morning, I went to the grocery store and a power transformer had blown, shutting down most of the store. It was cash only and you couldn't buy any cold or frozen items. As I roamed the aisles trying to figure out what I could still get without using a debit card, it occurred to me the experience was an omen for the next 4 years. A total clusterfuck.

[ibegurpard]

23. Not going to argue about changing messaging

Or policy.
The real emergency is that we have no messaging pipeline.
Whatever our messaging or policy is the word is not getting out.
Where are people getting their info?
That's where we need to be.

[SheilaAnn]

24. Her campaign was flawless, it's her democratic voters who didn't vote who need the kick in the a$$. n/t