The problem isn’t the message. It’s getting people to hear the message.
While pundits and strategists wring their hands and insist that the Democrats have “a messaging problem,” that diagnosis misstates the real problem. Chris Hayes recently–and accurately–wrote an essay for the New York Times (which, to ironically emphasize his point, MAGA folks are highly unlikely to read), in which he quite accurately described our information environment, where the problem isn’t the message, it’s getting people to hear the message.
Take the national election in 2024. Hayes (again, in my view, quite accurately) asserts that the Harris-Walz campaign’s message was fine. The campaign not only spent ample money on advertising, it concentrated that effort in the swing states–and as a result, swing state voters were less likely to defect to Trump than in non-swing states. “And the message of those ads was in line with a lot of what many critics have suggested — focused on core economic issues and framed in populist terms, with Kamala Harris portrayed as an ally of the working class.”
In other words, even though she lost, her core problem was not her message, however imperfect it might have been. It was an inability to get enough people to hear it, in spite of record-breaking advertising spending. If Mr. Trump had not run a single paid advertisement in the race, he almost surely would have dominated the single most important resource of our age: attention. Democrats need to win the attention contest in 2026 and beyond if they want to win back the country.
And winning attention is a lot harder than it used to be.
For one thing, as Hayes notes, ever since Teddy Roosevelt coined the term “bully pulpit,” the political party that doesn’t control the White House has struggled to match the agenda-setting power of the presidency. And as he also points out, today’s asymmetry is more daunting and profound than ever, because Trump has a “feral, almost pathological genius for getting people to talk about him, and to a degree that his supporters find thrilling and his opponents find suffocating, he dominates the nation’s and the world’s attention.”
As I have often argued on this blog and elsewhere, the fragmentation of our information environment frustrates efforts to communicate with a broad and diverse public. Not only have we lost the community newspapers that were widely trusted, and that accurately if scantily reported national news along with the results of the last City Council vote, not only do we have national mass media news that is little more than propaganda (think Fox and Sinclair); people use the Internet to confirm their biases rather than to access sources of vetted journalism.
Add to that–as one of the commenters to this blog regularly reminds us– the national penchant for entertainment. Given a choice between a football game and a news program–or a choice between a concert and a lecture–millions of Americans will happily choose the game or the concert. Hayes’ advice to Democrats is to “go everywhere”–to appear in forums that are untraditional. Podcasts, television shows, places where candidates talk “off-script” and with “lots of different kinds of interlocutors.”
And in our social media age, he emphasizes the need to post. Constantly.
It’s not just how you campaign and which outlets you talk to, though. Successful campaigns must prioritize producing content. One thing successful content creators will tell you about excelling in the world of digital attention is that there’s no penalty for quantity. No one checks your percentages — only your total numbers. You need to always be posting if you want a better chance of things going viral or at least ending up in the algorithmic slipstream that shoots it out to millions of eyeballs. So Democratic campaigns and candidates should be thinking about how their campaigns are going to produce a lot of attention-grabbing short-form videos to meet the most disengaged and youngest voters where they are.
He points to candidates who have effectively used social media–Mamdani in New York, AOC, a North Carolina candidate. Hayes also counsels candidates not to be risk-averse, not to worry about negative attention. (The proof of that recommendation has to be Donald Trump, who–despite his demonstrable lack of mental acuity–was evidently born knowing that any and all publicity is good publicity.)
As Hayes argues, the public has become distracted and distractible, and gaffes, controversial and even offensive statements no longer matter the way they did. When people are distracted, they rarely recall anything but the name.
And we’re all distracted all the time now.
The fact that many do not listen, or listen to understand, should be clear. trumps campaign speech’s, like his current speeches, were rambling, unrelated sentences strung together and a rehash of his grievances, most of which were lies. He told us what he wanted to do and many cult members refused to think beyond what they wanted to believe or understand what trumps statement meant would actually happen. Deport brown folks! Yeah! Never mind they are the ones picking our fruits & veggies or other food processing, cleaning hotel rooms, doing a large part of our construction. Suddenly trump loving farmers can’t get the help they need to get the crops in, and find themselves unable to sell to traditional overseas markets as those nations impose retaliatory tariffs. In trump 1.0 the “easy to win tariff war” that trump lost decisively to China shifted Chinese purchases from New England seafood markets to the Canadian Maritimes, hurting the NE lobstermen, scallop draggers, and oyster farmers. Now inflation is rising and prices are up, trumps supporters are looking to blame anyone but the person responsible, trump, or themselves for being gullible and failing to even try to understand what trump told them.
Republicans, along with some Democrats, have Memory Deficit Disorders; forgetting the best and worst of times for the Americans under which party. I am aware that there have been instances of disasters when the party in office could not be fully blamed for events; such as 9/11 under the Republicans, a culmination of years of careless leadership under both parties. My own mind, raised in a staunch Republican party but never agreed with their mind-set, does take some quirky turns as times. That happened this morning after watching Trump’s infamous puckered lips spewing another of his dangerous and mindless turns to further move this nation from democracy, Rule of Law, the Constitution and from using just plain common sense for our survival…within and outside of our borders. He wants to reopen our nuclear testing; my memories were those of our own nuclear near-full disaster of Three Mile Island.
I remembered Helen Caldecott’s messages after that weak public reporting on the true nature of the dangers which could still be active in areas far from the actual “spill”. The quirk my mind took was the title of a possible book to connect that memory with tomorrow’s possibilities: “Donald Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”.
“And we’re all distracted all the time now.”
Gov Gavin Newsom clearly understands this as does WI Gov Tony Evers.
Chris works for MSNBC, the Democratic version of Fox News. If he thinks Kamala Harris had a “good message,” he must be drunk on the Kool-Aid. She missed on just about every account. The people blamed Biden for lots of things, and his mental acuity was much worse than Trump’s. And what did she do? Kamala wanted to continue Biden’s path. #WRONG
She had no countermoves against Trump. She was actually playing right into Trump’s hands by not distancing herself from Biden. She listened to the traditional Democratic leadership rather than forging her own path. Biden had just censored young people for protesting a genocide and just wanted to continue down that path. #BADMOVE
If you pay attention to what’s going on right now regarding the anti-Israel movement, it’s grown into both a left and right-wing social media ecosystem. Tucker Carlson just legitimized Nick Fuentes, who is a racist, anti-Semite, Holocaust denier, white nationalist, etc., by having him on his show.
Here’s the other thing that most people don’t understand. When I utilize social media, I don’t really choose what I see – it’s the algorithm that decides for me based on my preferences. The Zionist Larry Ellison wanted to buy TikTok so they could control its algorithm instead of the neutral Chinese owner ByteDance. TikTok was sharing too many Palestinian videos of dead kids and women with its users. Larry will adjust the algorithm to remove those videos from users’ feeds. They won’t exist because they’ll reach fewer people. Facebook and X do the same thing. There are also huge bot farms that follow people to boost their penetration in the ecosystem.
The Democratic Party needs to listen to Mamdani, AOC, Crockett, etc., instead of listening to the aged and corrupt leadership of the DNC. I mean, both the leaders of the House and Senate refuse to endorse Mamdani. #IDIOTS
I think all of us have been out in public when we’ve encountered some poor mom with a two year-old that’s having a breakdown. The whole right wing media environment is designed to be upsetting, noisy, and completely distracting. Four years of solid work by Biden went unnoticed by half the population who were distracted by the whole purposely orchestrated right wing media environment lead by the master of distraction Trump and his hundreds of social media posts.
When you’re up against that, having a message just isn’t enough and I don’t know what is.
Couldn’t agree more Sheila. Troubling however to see the continued consolidation of media, witness Circle City Broadcasting’s
purchase if WRTV this week. Not only has the whole landscape and environment for media changed but the monopolistic ownership, once clearly banned by the FCC leaves fewer choices forcing successful candidates and news consumers to alternative sources.
I agree with Paul White’s comment.
The Republicans messaging is based on lies, but they are calculated lies to make those who don’t seek out multiple news sources or media. Fox and Newsmax as well as OAN push Trump and his message 24/7 using fear of “others” as their primary weapon.
Trump’s “moments” are edited out and while Fox News may be on their televisions 24/7 that totally eliminates their ability to hear, let alone consider opposing viewpoints and and of course facts. Fox viewers keep their TV’s on 24/7 and their messaging becomes so subliminal that their viewers are literally being manipulated and to some extent brainwashed.
Don’t always agree with Todd but spot on today. ” She listened to the traditional Democratic leadership rather than forging her own path.” YES!
I have one point of disagreement with Chris Hayes. He and most of the political establishment seem to think that only the swing states count. That’s BS.. I think think,the smart thing to do is get to every state. How about a Whistle Stop tour? It seemed like everyone only wanted to be President of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Nevada, Michigan, Georgia, and Arizona. There are a lot of states with thousands of voters in between, but you’d never know it from either of the parties.
Todd is right about the need for Harris to distinguish herself from Biden. She could have easily done that without stepping on any Democratic toes. All she had to do was say that she wouldn’t fault Biden for his support of his long time friend (Bibi)), but we need to rethink the sale of offensive weapons to other countries. We don’t want to be responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians.
So…the candidate who gets the most “attention” (clicks, likes, etc.) wins. Wonder what the founders would think about that kind of democracy? SAD
The premise is fine, but it misses the details. This works for low information independent voters. As pointed out, it helped turn out MAGA voters, but mostly for Trump. We don’t know what will work post-Trump.
It doesn’t work as simply for Democrats who have a big tent, full of people who only want “perfect” people according to their issue. Democrats haven’t weaved together a coalition that looks at the big picture – you can’t accomplish a thing if you are not in power, especially in these days of no compromise.
Rape and inappropriate touching are conflated by the likes of Gillibrand who drove Franken out of the Senate. A strict anti-Israel policy, not just anti-Bibi, is required by the left. Minority politicians have preferred majority-minority districts to having more Democratic districts in some redistricting discussions (not certain how wide-spread this last issue is).
In general, minor gaffs aren’t forgiven, so Democrats have to add one more element, “This is me. I am authentic.” Then the minor gaffs lose some votes, but the authenticity gains others. In the end, timidity, a hallmark of many Democrats in recent times, is a losing stance. The basic premise stands, just check your peripheral vision. It adds complexity.
Yes, Lester, that is sad. But, the founders envisaged a politically, and civilly, engaged population, which we have not had for a long time.
And, yes, Trump’s pathologically focused need for attention does the trick for him.
His skill at that, and at grifting, may be his only skills, but they’ve, obviously, been enough.
I think Hayes has a valid point.
Mitch et al,
What if the Democrats focused on actual “governing” for most people rather than “policies” or “positions” and quit caving to their rich donors. MAGA may not do good things, but they are “doing stuff” rather than talking or philosophizing. When many voters have a 6th grade civic education…that could/does a make a difference – see the current governors of PA and KY…for example.
To Chris’ pointer that gaffes no longer matter, we need look no further than Platner running in Maine. My dude has a huge load of dung following him around. To his credit, he didn’t run, he addressed it. Should he have realized it was going to come out, YES. But it isn’t putting off the voters. As an old lady, I gotta say, I’m sick of old people holding office. I am sick of corporate politicians. I am sick of Citizen’s United. I am sick of AIPAC. And I don’t know if I believe that swing states are even a thing anymore. I think if Dems want to win, they need to burn shoe leather in the neighborhoods they want to win. You have to talk to people. In their face. Show them your sincerity and passion.
HARRIS had a lot of money, but really only about 3 months to campaign.
Trump campaigned Nonstop for 5 years… Plus WOMAN OF COLOR.
SHE DID GREAT if you consider all that.
Americans are bombarded by memes, blogs, bulletins and special reports ad infinitum. Within our short attention spans the images and words have different interpretations by many. For instance, the photo of bulldozing into the white house was seen by many as a brazen assault on US history/tradition while other see it as progress and improvement to old structures and ways.
trump and Maga have concentrated on negative, oppositional messaging which a lot of is false, but the mental, social and political impact is accomplished anyway. Fresh reinforcement of demonizing long standing American values and people, using their base as a threat/ shield against opposition while they carry out overreach and grift.
Democrats might do better with demonizing/showcasing more of all the actual corruption and grift going on and make the messaging loud and clear. The negligence of the Republican Congress that they are unable/won’t do their jobs, the amounts of money that trump and family are extorting from foreigners/billionaires using presidential authority and the Epstein Files are fodder to spotlight and keep harping on. This is war to save Democracy, and we have to act like it is.
From the time I was 7 years old and JFK was running for President against Richard Nixon — and maybe even before that — I have been a news junkie. I ALWAYS watched the evening news on TV and read one or two newspapers — in addition to at times working for one. That is until November 4, 2024. Since that day, I have not watched a single newscast. Not one episode of any CNN newscast. Not a single Today Show. Not a single episode of Rachel Maddow or any of the other shows I used to watch almost nightly.
I simply cannot handle it.
I’m not completely shut off from the news. I have a subscription to the NY Times — mostly for the tag-a-long subscription to The Athletic. I cancelled my Washington Post subscription because of Bezos actions — and did that just before the election.
I pick up enough via news from various sources, but I simply cannot stomach watching the news, national or local, and seeing what Trump and his minions — and Braun, Beckwith and Rokita — are doing to this once great, once free, once respected country.