Democrats can win elections by

[ProSense]

emulating Republicans! Let's pretend we're Republicans!

The GOP ad executive advice, "Madison Ave. Ad Exec Reveals How GOP Wins Elections" is posted at Kos, and this post from the thread states the point:

This is perhaps one of the single most interesting, and important diairies I've ever seen at Kos.

The content of this diary not only explains everything that has happened in all it's machiavellian disgrace ... but highlights how it's precisely how disgraceful we must become if we're to ever regain control.

Let's face it ... we Americans are sheep. We have to be told what to think. So let's start telling.

We have a better agenda, we have Americans' interests in mind, we have a higher moral ground, and we have a long standing history that contrasts to the republican's story of "screw the middle class, take what you can and run before they catch on."

So how we get there is no longer important ... especially if we Americans are so stupid, that it has now become THE ONLY way we're going to get there.

We are a TV commercial culture. It's how our tiny brains have been programmed over the last century. It's a bit late in the game to convince people of the virtues of digging to find the truth. People don't give a fuck about the truth. They want to be "convinced" and will accept nothing more.

Thank you, Populist, for this crucial look into the programming of the American idiot. Sorry, but I'm not afraid to call it like it is.

This diary ought to be printed and faxed to every democrat desk BY MONDAY NOON!

http://www.dailykos.com/comments/2006/9/9/124753/8755/427#c427

Let's behave like Republicans and work on http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14450808">America's pysche; afterall, image is everything!

Let use Machiavellian tactics, and let the GOP/media conflate Democratic and Republican values:

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-et-rutten9sep09,1,4386536.column?ctrack=1&cset=true">We've all become accustomed to a Congress that behaves as if it's divided between Bloods and Crips rather than Republicans and Democrats — but this was a thuggish new low. If we were inclined to dramatic license, the guys with thick necks in "On the Waterfront" would come to mind, though it's doubtful even Harvey Keitel could plausibly play Harry Reid as threatening.

Lets go all the way and fool Americans on Iraq and national security

Let's http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2809615&mesg_id=2809615">run a couple of Democrats as Republicans

I agree, let's pretend we're Republicans! :sarcasm:

What do you believe:

That the GOP won the 2000 election even though Al Gore bested Bush by half a million votes, only to have the Supreme Court select Bush for the job?

That because the GOP decided to steal two national elections to pursue the neocon's agenda, the lie about how GOP win elections (presumably through fair means) is true?

The Democratic Party is not the Republican Party!

The Democratic Party doesn't need its own version of Karl Rove!

The Democratic party doesn't want the media's help; the media has an obligation to be objective. The media shouldn't spew GOP talking points (see Path to 9/11, or calls for apologies to Rove) nor media hire right wing hacks, and journalist should definitely not be on the Bush administration's payroll!

The Democratic Party doesn't need to disguise its message in order to herd Americans like sheep.

[ProSense]

1. The great media conflation:

A great divide: Left and right battling for the nation's soul

[ProSense]

2. What if Everyone Voted?

What if Everyone Voted? Simulating the Impact of Increased Turnout in Senate Elections

The conventional wisdom among journalists and politicians is that higher turnout would benefit Democrats, although extant scholarly research suggests otherwise. We adopt a new approach to assessing the partisan impact of higher turnout. We use state–level exit polls and Census data to estimate the partisan preferences of nonvoters in Senate elections and then simulate the outcome of these elections under universal turnout. While nonvoters are generally more Democratic than voters, the dearth of close races means that very few election outcomes would have changed had everyone voted. Other scenarios—full turnout among registered voters, equal turnout rates for whites and African–Americans, and equal turnout rates across income groups—generate similar results: although Democrats fare better in each scenario, few outcomes would have changed. However, the gap between voters and nonvoters’ partisan preference varies considerably across states and across years, suggesting that this “partisan differential” warrants further examination.

[ProSense]

3. GOP mantra: If you can't beat them,

cheat!

[FrenchieCat]

4. With this sentence.....

media shouldn't spew GOP talking points

and therein lies the rub.

Without an "objective" media, Democrats have had, and will continue to have the most difficult time....cause all that the GOP has done has been possible with great assistance from the media.

Being like the GOP will not help the Democrats, because unless the media reports on the Democratic agenda and policies in the same way as they do the Republican agenda and policies, it won't make a bit of a difference. That's the scary part that makes me feeling helpless, hopeless and frustrated! :(

[ACK]

5. Couple of points on how to win an election

1. I think it is actually helpful to examine and understand how the Republicans manipulate and control the "liberal" press.

2. The Democratic Party definitely does NOT need to hide its message.
So, why does it?
I read the Kerry policy on education and I saw the arguements online right here on DU about wtf it meant. Is his lipservice to accountability and other Repuke talking points true people said right here? Drove me nuts. Oh yeah and what the hell was that voter lapdance he did on the issue of a woman's right to choose during the debates? Geez, man its a damn yes or no question one of the clearest easiest yes or no questions in all the issues involving American politics are you for a woman's right to choose or not? Stick up for what you believe in. Say it long and loud and in simple soundbite terms. If you take too long to answer that glibe question boyo you are going to get painted as worm by the press and as a fence-sitter by the hardliners in your own party. Get up there and yell loud for what you believe and in simple straight-forward terms.

3. The Democratic party is NOT the Republican party.
After all, we have no clue how to use the media to our own benefit or organize talking points correctly or convince the American public we are right. Shit man, we are so goddamn right we should not lower ourselves to talk to the mere sheeple of the common man or the working man. We are for those guys and the other guy isn't. And if they do not understand that then fuck them all they get what they deserve. Sounds insane doesn't it? Hell, you see someone post that same line of thought I just spewed on every other damn thread on the board.

You know we really have to come off our high horses and start acting like the minority oppossition party we are. We have to lower ourselves to actually convincing the American people of the rightness and righteousness of our claims.

It sounds crazy doesn't it?
After all, in 8 years of the Clinton administration we had barely just cleaned up the mess of a huge deficit and just put in a bit of tax relief for the common man in the earned income tax credits and we had just done something real for the crime rate by helping to put more cops on the streets and .... sure they had not done enough but with all the bile and hatred and all the mess that they had to clean up they did as good as moderates could in the time given.

Oh yeah who the fuck said the press has a duty to be objective?
This noble naive idea of an objective press is a pretty recent occurrence. After all, it was not so long ago that all the papers and press were essentially bought and paid for tools of one political idealogy or another.

Time for us to stop whining and start organizing damnit. Where and how? You have to organize locally. Until we take back the state legislatures we cannot redraw the district lines and until we do that the margins of victory will still be slight enough for them to steal.