Kerry Eleveld of Daily Kos details and endorses the House Democrats’ midterm messaging strategy of painting their opponents as radicals rather than focusing on kitchen table issues “which frankly only reminds voters about inflation and the cost of gas.” The premise is that the upcoming elections will be decided by (primarily suburban) swing voters and, as DCCC chairman Sean Patrick Maloney says, “Swing voters are, by definition, reasonable people.”
I think reasonable people think a lot about inflation and the cost of gas, and many other “kitchen table” issues besides. The Democrats, however, think this is their area of vulnerability.
Retiring Rep. John Yarmuth of Kentucky summed up the calculation this way: “If we win, it’s because we scared the crap out of people about the maniacs who will be in charge.”
At the extreme, this is like saying, “I have nothing constructive to offer but you have to vote for me because my opponent is a lunatic.” And that runs into the problem of people not being content, at all, with the status quo in this country. The whole reason lunacy has become a politically viable electoral strategy is precisely because promising more of the same is now a complete loser in the eyes of the formerly “reasonable” American public.
Certainly, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell understands this better than the Democratic strategists. He voted for the last bill Congress passed before they went in the July 4 recess. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act is the first significant gun control bill to come out of Congress in decades, and the Republicans relented precisely because they understood the public will not accept more of the same on guns in the wake of another mass shooting in an elementary school. The bill became law as part of an effort to blunt the Democrats’ ability to blame the Republicans for supporting an unacceptable status quo. Nonetheless, the shootings continue and the bill is actually quite tame, so there’s no reason for the Democrats not to go on the attack on this issue.
One area where the people were actually content is abortion law. Overturning Roe v. Wade is an unwelcome change. And a good part of the Democratic messaging strategy is devoted to highlighting extreme or crazy views about abortion held by various Republican candidates.
Take Yesli Vega, for instance, a local sheriff’s deputy running to unseat Rep. Abigail Spanberger in Virginia’s newly drawn 7th District that includes a mix of suburban, rural, and military communities.
In a leaked audio recording, Vega was recently heard downplaying the potential of a pregnancy resulting from rape. In the exchange, Vega was asked whether she’s heard that it’s “harder for a woman to get pregnant” if she’s been raped.
“Well, maybe because there’s so much going on in the body. I don’t know. I haven’t, you know, seen any studies,” Vega responded. “I can see why there is truth to that. It’s unfortunate.”
The idea that conception is rare in cases of rape has not proven to be a political winner, as Todd Akin found out in 2012 when he blew an easy win against incumbent Sen. Claire McCaskill. But, frankly, “reasonable” parents who were thinking of sending their daughters to Vanderbilt or Tulane are now rethinking their plans. Rape is incredibly common on college campuses, as are unintended pregnancies of all types. The entire Republican Party is responsible for making anti-choice states a dangerous place for women, on campus and off. That’s the new status quo, and the Democrats shouldn’t restrict their strong condemnation to just the most nutty and outspoken GOP candidates. This issue is the rare one where the party in power can get real mileage out of attacking the mainstream of the opposition for the current state of affairs.
I definitely understand the value of highlighting the most extreme rhetoric and ideology and hanging it around the necks of so-called “moderates,” and the Democrats are not wrong to pursue this strategy. But it should not be the primary message. I think there’s more mileage in attacking the Republicans as a whole, and not conceding that there are any GOP moderates, because they’re rare, timid and ineffectual.
There are some areas where appealing to reason can be profitable, primarily on guns and abortion, but there needs to be more of a focus on appealing to people who are fed up with the status quo on kitchen table issues, too. Republicans should be attacked for gas prices and inflation. They should be attacked for the loss of opportunity created by rampant monopolization of the economy. The Democrats needs a message that resonates in small-town America and the hollers of Appalachia. The opioid epidemic, the cost of prescription drugs, the cost of housing, these are things that should not be ignored. If nothing else, the voters’ concerns have to be recognized and respected, and Republican obstruction should be blamed.
It’s okay to have different messages for different regions, but the Democrats will not be successful if they restrict themselves to appealing to “reasonable” suburban voters. They’re been trying that for several cycles, and they’re losing the country because the country is not reasonable.
