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I’m still trying to process Tuesday’s election loss to Trump by an actual majority of American voters. I’m also watching the inevitable Democratic circular firing squads looking for someone to blame. “Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan [1].” So, Democrats are busy looking for that orphan.
Meanwhile, I see one major cause for this horrible defeat. Democrats lost this election, and lost so badly, because too many American are not getting our message. For a variety of reasons, we’re losing the messaging wars.
The Messaging Wars
A DailyKos post “Understanding the Hispanic Vote Exodus” triggered my thoughts. Quite simply, a majority of our voting population no longer get their news from traditional news outlets, but Facebook, YouTube video channels, blogs and podcasts. The DailyKos writer was discussing Hispanics, but it’s not just Hispanics. It’s a wide range of specifically-targeted populations with limited access to quality information.
As much as this galls me to admit; Republicans have an evil talent for messaging and controlling public discourse. Democrats totally suck. Over these past few years Republicans, with assistance from Russian assets, have been flooding social media at all levels.
Personal Observations
Between Winnie as a Chinese immigrant, and my cousin Mary as Vietnamese immigrant, I’m well-hooked into their local communities. I see their primary source of video entertainment is YouTube channels broadcasting in their primary languages. But these entertainment channels are also linked to “news” sources in their native languages.
Most of the Chinese-language “news” channels are sponsored by Breitbart News, Guo Wengui, and other radical right-wing sources. All this news pushes right-winger talking points all the time. I’m often forced into listening to the English-language portions of these broadcasts. I have to grit my teeth listening to crap the talking heads spew. Then I have to deal with the fallout of disinformation originating with these broadcasts.
These native-language talking heads know which buttons to push. For example, a big push to Chinese people is claiming Democrats are just like the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Escaping the CCP policies are a large reason why these immigrants left China. “Proving” that Democratic policies are like those of the CCP automatically turns Chinese listeners away from Democrats [2].
Impact
Initial election results show large blocks of Hispanic and Asian voters breaking for Trump and Republicans. Maybe, better messaging might have made a difference?
Integrated Messaging
It’s also not just Facebook, YouTube video channels, blogs and podcasts. Right-wingers have developed an online media infrastructure integrated with print media. For one example, I recently read the book “Mao’s America A Survivor’s warning [3] (no, I’m not going to provide an Amazon link). This book, heavily advertised on Chinese-language YouTube channels, spews the same right-wing crap as their online media. The book is even authored by a Chinese immigrant who writes perfect English, so it has to be true!
As a marketing student, this level of messaging integration is impressive. As a Democrat, desperately hoping for Democratic governance, not so much. This current level of integrated messaging is a big step up from the 1990s and 2000s with Rush Limbaugh on AM radio. Then, Limbaugh broadcast to communities using AM radio as their primary information source. He had a lock on all right-wing all the time with no liberal competition. Today the midwest is solid Republican, even as Republican policies consistently degrade rural communities.
Confirmation
The DailyKos poster for “Understanding the Hispanic Vote Exodus” wrote about Hispanics getting all their information from these social media channels. In her November 6, 2024 “Letters From An American,” Heather Cox Richardson wrote about the election loss. She describes misinformation media as:
But my own conclusion is that both of those things were amplified by the flood of disinformation that has plagued the U.S. for years now. Russian political theorists called the construction of a virtual political reality through modern media “political technology.” They developed several techniques in this approach to politics, but the key was creating a false narrative in order to control public debate. These techniques perverted democracy, turning it from the concept of voters choosing their leaders into the concept of voters rubber-stamping the leaders they had been manipulated into backing.
In the U.S., pervasive right-wing media, from the Fox News Channel through right-wing podcasts and YouTube channels run by influencers, have permitted Trump and right-wing influencers to portray the booming economy as “failing” and to run away from the hugely unpopular Project 2025. They allowed MAGA Republicans to portray a dramatically falling crime rate as a crime wave and immigration as an invasion. They also shielded its audience from the many statements of Trump’s former staff that he is unfit for office, and even that his chief of staff General John Kelly considers him a fascist and noted that he admires German Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
As actor Walter Masterson posted: “I tried to educate people about tariffs, I tried to explain that undocumented immigrants pay billions in taxes and are the foundation of this country. I explained Project 2025, I interviewed to show that they supported it. I can not compete against the propaganda machines of Twitter, Fox News, [Joe Rogan Experience], and NY Post. These spaces will continue to create reality unless we create a more effective way of reaching people.”
Conclusion
The Democratic Party is losing entire populations of voters who should be natural Democratic allies, because they are not hearing our messages. Our Liberal Democratic messaging, what little there is, is being swamped by radical right-wingers. I’m not sure Democratic party leaders even recognize this issue, never mind having a plan to combat it.
DailyKos Diary: We’re Losing the Messaging Wars
Related Posts
- J.F. Kennedy, The Socratic Method [↩]
- One observation is that although Democratic messaging was heavy on showing trump as Hitler, Chinese immigrants would not be so familiar with Hitler. Democratic messaging to Chinese communities showing how Trump’s policies were just like those of the CCP might have more impact [↩]
- Fleet, X. V. (2023). Mao’s America A Survivor’s warning. Hachette Book Group [↩]
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