Democratic voters say by a 10-percentage-point margin that they’d like [President-Elect Joe] Biden to compromise in order to work across the aisle rather than stick to his positions even if it means not coming to an agreement. Republican voters, by a 29-point margin, say Republicans in Washington should stick to their positions.This is what Republican politicians and media figures have persuaded their voters -- and many swing voters -- that Democrats are:
Republican Senator Kelly Loeffler called Georgia's Senate seats a "firewall" against socialism, claiming that Democrats would usher in "radical" change to the U.S. if opponent Reverend Raphael Warnock wins the state's runoff election.Democrats support popular ideas that most voters believe are mainstream: universal healthcare coverage, a $15 minimum wage, raising taxes on the rich, preserving Roe v. Wade, taking climate change seriously, requiring background checks for all firearm purchases. In the last two years, the Democratic House has passed a lot of legislation in these and other areas; it's all died in Mitch McConnell's Senate, but most Americans don't even know the bills existed.
"Everything's at stake in this election," said Loeffler during [an] interview on Fox News. "The future of our country is on the ballot on January 5 right here in Georgia...We know that if [Senate Democratic Leader] Chuck Schumer gets his way and says, 'Now we take Georgia then we change America,' they would fundamentally and radically change America for the worse."
The incumbent Georgia senator continued: "We are not going to let that happen. We are the firewall to stopping socialism in America, right here in Georgia."
Loeffler then called Warnock a "radical change agent," in Georgia's runoff race.
democrats have a serious aversion to marketing, especially marketing their own work when theyve done the right thing. there's a shared belief that the press will just pick it up and voters will somehow get the message. this doesn't work.
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) December 29, 2020
and we know democrats can market stuff, because during a presidential election, theyre pretty unified and repetitive about marketing stuff -- their candidate. the problem is they see elections as the exception, not the rule. in the modern world of politics always be marketing.
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) December 29, 2020
If anything, Willis understates the problem. He says Democrats "pass message bills" and "talk about them after they pass them," briefly. I'd say they barely do that.
And with Republicans, it's gotten to the point where they don't even talk about their positions on issues. What they "relentlessly market" is their opposition to us. They relentlessly market their embrace of "real American" cultural signifiers. Kelly Loeffler -- the wife of the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange -- campaigns in a trucker hat. President Trump pumps out ads depicting military flyovers and his own literal embrace of the American flag.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2020
There's a simple counternarrative available to Democrats: Here's what Democrats stand for. Here's what Republicans stand for. Here are some Democratic proposals. Here are the unpopular Republican alternatives.
But Democrats don't try. And so here we are: The party of Rudy Giuliani, Louis Gohmert, Sidney Powell, and Donald Trump is seen by much of America as the party of normality and stability -- even after Trump threatens democracy, nearly shuts down the government (again), and vetoes the military budget (while telling us in the ad above that he "stands for our military might") -- while the party of Joe Biden is seen as the party of radical upheaval.
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