For the past 50 years, conservatives have been steadily promoting their bigoted, hierarchical, blue-nosed, and profoundly anti-American view of life, starting with William F. Buckley, Jr. and finally exploding with the Limbaughs and other radicals of our own day. Liberals, on the other hand, have failed to put their message where it will be heard by the broad public. The result is that liberalism is defined to the public by our enemies, and Democrats are often actively afraid of being identified as liberals. It doesn't work; they are so identified by the public; nevertheless Democrats tend to run away from their principles when running for office, while Republicans run toward theirs. The result is that it is very difficult to fire up the Democratic base, or to convince people who don't vote or have been voting Republican that there is any reason to do otherwise.
I say what follows (after the orange squiggle) with the understanding that there is no practical way around the two-party system:
The media is not going to run with our message out to the goodness of their hearts (snark font needed). So we need to run ads. Now, not just before the next election and in fact, not tied to the election cycle. These ads would not run as a media blitz, but as a persistent and consistent message over time. A long time. As in years.
These would be issue ads, seen all across the country and on all available media, showing how conservative policies are tearing down the middle class, turning Americans into wage slaves, savaging the environment, and taking away real liberties from real people. These should be followed by ads showing how liberal ideas (Social Security, Medicare, unionization, worker protections, free public education, affordable college, regulation of Walls Street an other financial institutions) have been responsible for creating a large and secure middle class. Similar ads should show how regulations or lack of them affect food safety, air and water pollution, and, yes, global warming. Attacks by conservatives on solar power and other good things should get nationwide exposure.
None of these ads should be vague. All of them should be put in terms that connect with the fears and hopes of real people. The people in them should be of all ages because we are a party for all people. Many of them would use terms like "your children's world" for pro-environment ads, for instance, or "your children's future" for economic matters. In other words, connect with people where they live. They care about the economy. They care about the future, especially as it relates to their children and even more as it relates to their grandchildren. All these ideas should ultimately be linked to the Democratic Party.
Then, the Democratic Party should make sure they run candidates that wholeheartedly and vocally support these principles. Charisma, trustworthiness, and so forth do matter, but it is vital that they do not espouse Republican-lite ideas or wishy-washy third-way notions.
If the Democratic Party itself cannot or will not run ads like these, then some of their major donors should step up to the plate and make it plain that their continued support of Democrats is predicated on Democratic candidates not running the other way.
As I said, there is basically no way around the two-party system. The last thing we need is a splintered Democratic Party. But the Democrats must act like Democrats and openly promote a vision of a just and sustainable world. All the more so since there is no such thing as a liberal media to do it for us.
Sun Nov 09, 2014 at 1:44 PM PT: This guy makes a lot of my points better than I can:
http://www.dailykos.com/...