Dems push honesty, Repubs push pride. Pride always wins.

Dems primary platform is that the Repubs are dishonest.
Repubs say the Dems will hurt our self pride by cutting and running.
Which view hits most Americans in the gut?

People will SAY they'd rather be an honest, upstanding citizen, even if it weakens them.
People's ACTIONS show they would rather be a proud, successful criminal.

Dems are approaching it from the wrong angle. Being right doesn't really impress people.
Making them feel they are the best, strongest, greatest people in the world will.
The Repubs understand this and frame all their points in terms of American pride.

Follow the Repubs and you are one of the strongest, best most admirable people in the world.
Follow the Dems and you are doing right and keeping the flame of Democracy alive for the future.

So which one emotionally attracts you. Forget about intellectual analysis of what each party means to the world and our lives. Which one emotionally attracts you?

You are STRONG and GREAT!
You are HONEST and TRUSTWORTHY!

Until the Dems find an immediate emotional hook to hang their platform on they will continue to lose.

Last time, pride and honesty were not opposing values.

If you know you are honest you might feel pride.

But if you are successfully dishonest you might feel pride also.

nt

:rofl:

Until it is more patriotic and amerikun to be a democrat our party isn't going to get very far.

Pride might be regarded as a particularly refined form of egotism. But what the Repugs are pushing are the coarsest forms of egotism -- chauvinism, bigotry, jingoism, nationalism.

I used to laugh at my former Superintendent when he would print this on our paychecks, but there is some truth in it. Feelings become facts for some people. They only care about validating their own feelings and readily dismiss facts that dispute what they feel.

I think you may have something there, i.e. that pride without humility in the form of "There but for the grace of God go I" is what separates the repukes from human beings.

"Pride goeth before a fall." OR "Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall." (Proverbs 16:18)

appear to be the case either.

A winning tactic? Probably not generally, but I hear an undercurrent of shame among former Bush voters.

Shaming the forces of evil into staying home on election day is a de-facto vote for the forces of light.

and people respond to FEAR - a gut reaction type response and that's what has happened since 9/11. FEAR FEAR FEAR it's what the Republican party is all about these days

f

OUR AMERICAN FREEDOMS ARE BEING DESTROYED!

That's real and it's pretty scary.
We must save America, land of the free. In Truth.

It seems to be a magic combination for them.

Dems still haven't figured it out. They are not saints and neither are the people in the country. To win you have to engage emotions, tell a story, act. Being best doesn't matter much if you can't sell. We've got a bunch of do-gooders who don't know how to rise above the Republicans and grab the people away.

If we were to become sloganeers like these worms, the country would be in real trouble, because no one would be telling the truth.
I would rather just have one party of the talking point, thank you very much.

Don't just use dry statements of fact.

Tell it as a story. A dramatic story. A TRUE story!

Good public policy and values and a good marketing campaign to go with it.

Look at Roosevelt and the slogans and campaigns he used during the Depression and WWII.

New Deal, Fair Deal, etc.

... and America is well on its way to reaping the results of its overweening misplaced "pride".