Saturday, September 10, 2005

Translating the Politics of “We” into the Politics of “Me”

There’s been a lot of debate about what the Democrats should do in order to become more successful at winning elections. While there are many strategic moves we can make to improve our team’s chances of victory, there’s an imperative paradigm change that must infuse the way that we articulate our message; we must translate the politics of “we” into the politics of “me”. What does this mean? First, let’s say what it doesn’t mean; it doesn’t mean that the party should turn its back on communitarian ideals, progressivity, and concern for others. It means explaining to voters - clearly and effectively – why our policies (to the extent we can agree on them) make sense to them personally. This won’t apply to every policy, but we need to do a better job of appealing to self-interest of the enlightened variety. The Republicans have been great at telling voters how they’ll be personally served by conservative rule and it’s one of a number of reasons they’ve been able to knock us around so much lately.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

well said, AHT!

City Troll said...

one of the most important things is to honest about what it is that you stand for. Part of the problem with the democrat party is that they refuse to state openly their core beliefs. Democrats run on a middle ground platform and then vote ideoligicly left. In todays world of the internet, and alternative news sources where candidates voting records can and are viewed this tactic is viewed as deciet. People don't feel that Democrats are engaging in a debate over the differences in how they would deal with a situation. Instead its the ole attack the messenger routine. More ground could be gained if instead they were honest about what they would do and how they would do it. What we tend to get instead is not the presentation of a plan to deal with an issue but an attack at how awfull the other candidate is, with no explanation in what the different approach the democrat would take. Untill you start presenting ideas instead of redundant attacks you will continue to loose ground.

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