Do not fear the vaunted GOP message machine

Right wing media is now a liability for the GOP. Meanwhile Democrats have largely converged on a winning message

Callers into my radio show, The Big Picture with Edwin Eisendrath on WCPT 820AM tell me that the GOP message machine is killing Democrats. Why, they ask, don’t the Democrats have a strong spokesperson who sets the message agenda and why can’t we unify around it like the Republicans do? 

I don’t blame anyone for asking this pained question, but it is motivated old wounds not fresh ones. As we head into the critically important 2022 midterm elections the GOP vaunted message machine has become a liability for Republicans.

For years, GOP propagandists created powerful political community by stoking outrage and feeding confirmation biases. America turns out to be a pretty great country, so it has not been easy to stay outraged for decades. At some point, lacking real outrages, the machine had to start inventing them. Finally, during the Trump years, and in part due to Mr. Trump’s tactic of staying one step more outrageous than everyone else, the whole messaging operation started to careen between conspiratorial Q-ness, racist militia-speak, and misogynistic misunderstandings of manhood. Around and around this cesspool went their messaging, until all that was left was the drain.

Today’s GOP propaganda machine has two devastating flaws. First, it delivers messages that are completely out of step with the America most of us hold dear. Just look at the polling on common sense gun safety laws, or reproductive choice, or climate change. Second, as the January 6th hearings have effectively shown, they are caught in the big lie.  And, once caught in a big lie, all the little ones no longer go unchallenged. This week, according to Media Matters, Sean Hannity repeated more than 40 times the lie that Trump deployed the National Guard during January 6th.  Of course, Trump officials, under oath, told us all that never happened. Most Americans now see this for what it is. Lying for the cause is baked into the message, and the cause itself is wildly unpopular. To the extent the GOP has a powerful megaphone, that megaphone is turning ordinary Americans off. 

Because of that, the GOP’s message machine is creating a different kind of confirmation bias- reinforcing for Democrats and for independents that today’s GOP really is what Democrats have long said it was. As a result, generic poll numbers are tilting away from the GOP, and I just do not see how that tilt does not become a rout.

Here's the latest Morning Consult poll. President Biden and Donald Trump are both deeply under water, but that has not stopped Americans from walking away from the GOP.

The biggest increases for Democrats are tied to ongoing revelations about January 6th and the big lie, and the Supreme Court’s shocking, but not surprising decision in Dobbs.

So much for the GOP message machine.

But Democrats need an alternative message, and this is where many start to worry. Democrats do not have a single voice whose utterances are parroted. The size and diversity of the Democratic Party and its habit of letting all voices be heard, say its critics, makes it unlikely ever to find a clear discipled message.

Unlikely though it seemed, Democrats collectively have found their voice.

I could cite many columns to make this point. But what drove it home for me is that callers to my show ask why Democrats never point out… and then they list exactly the things that Democrats are pointing out. If you look at the things candidates are saying, and columnists are writing and pundits are talking about, there is a clear convergence.

What are Democrats everywhere saying? In four categories of messaging, there are clear:

• On the GOP, Dems and Republicans largely agree. The Republicans are who they say they are- a party that will ban abortion, stop efforts to remove assault weapons from our streets, undermine the democracy, treat the rule of law as if it only applies to others, apply religious tests to every policy decision, and stop progress towards a transition to greener energy. Democrats do not need to spend too much time on this, because the GOP propaganda machine is now stuck telling everyone who they really are (lies and all), and people are listening.

• On the democracy itself, Democrats are united in pointing out the gave dangers of a partisan and illegitimate Supreme Court. They argue for laws to end hyper partisan gerrymandering that undermines the people’s ability to make a difference at the ballot box. They push for new laws to end the corrupting influence of unlimited, unregulated dark money in politics. The House passed bills to do this. The GOP filibuster in the Senate killed them.

• On their own agenda, Dems are clear. Repair the democracy. Assure Americans that a radical minority cannot be allowed to take our rights. Rebuild our economy in a way that does not favor only the wealthiest. Treat every American with respect. Launch a serious effort to combat climate change. Stand up for Democracies around the world.

• On governing. Despite the overwhelming advantage of a nationalized election in a year when the GOP has gone off the rails, Democrats all over the country focus on the communities in which they are running, determined to show that they are competent to do the hard work of serious governance.  Michigan’s Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s new budget includes funds for a new veterans’ home, the replacement of lead service lines, projects to reduce traffic congestion at local rail crossings, and improvements at state fish hatcheries. This is typical of the governing focus you see at all levels.

This is an historic shift in the messaging dynamic. Democrats are unusually focused and disciplined around their messages. Meanwhile, the GOP message machine circles powerfully down the drain and towards the sewer.