Definitely worth the read! I want tRump out and this is a blueprint to do that.

...than to convince them that they have been fooled." -- Mark Twain

Trump’s agenda should scare the living daylights out of any sane American. He is systematically destroying our country. Yes, this should be the #1 message for all the Democratic candidates.

I've been thinking and occasionally talking along these lines for months. Forget winning over any Trumpistas. Turnout is everything. Give the new and occasional voters something to emotionally grab on to and embrace, and Trump will lose for sure.

I think there are candidates who can be "wonky" on policy, and still wage a vicious battle against Trump's politics of hate.

If we inspire young voters and dramatically in crease their turnout, we WILL win.

that about 30 years ago the KKK might as well have bought 1500 radio stations and been spewing racism and pro-corporate and authoritarian bullshit ever since.

and might want to ask 88 universities why they support 260 limbaugh stations. they need to be asked if they would still broadcast sports on their stations if they were bought by the KKK or trump- because that who they work for and they would have to do something else if those universities started pulling out.

if left alone they will continue to attack AOC and omar and anyone else who sticks their necks out and send death threats their way, and make excuses for trump

from someone who clearly knows what he's talking about. Dems should take heed. This is how we won back the House, and it will be how we win back the Senate and WH as well.

he definitely knows what he's talking about and it does make sense. Make the election about Trump's racism and sexism and it will drive up Democratic turnout and turn off moderates to Trump.

who could really move things where they need to go.

I had thought about some of what he had said, but he really put it all together and laid it out there, by speaking from his experience.

Somebody with real charisma.

I unfortunately didn't see any inspiration in the first debate. Hopefully we will get something on the CNN debates. I won't mention any names, I think nobody in the field stood out as a "Hope and Change" candidate.

Voters will vote for the most inspiring candidate.

I agree with most of the Twitter posts.

but, I think Trump is such a train wreck that the negative aspects of his personality & Con Man charisma can work in Democratic favor

Trump also lost his shine. I think moderates see through trump now BUT I also don't think they care too much about his personality because most of his "policies" don't affect people in day to day life.

Hopefully our candidate is shiny.

hormones and pesticides in your beef, sex trafficking, guns, and living in fear for end of healthcare and loss of Social Security then OK vote for the number one dirtbag, Donald Trump.

it will show exactly what platform most Democrats want.

Trying to compare this election to any other is not very smart. It’s actually stupid. Best compare it only to the mid term elections last year. It blew all past theories out of the water. It shocked and surprised even the most seasoned pundits.

There are too many pundits thinking they know what they’re talking about. The fact is we are NOT in normal times, or dealing with a normal human being with Trump.

I've been leaning toward Warren lately because I think she's inspiring, but I still have my hesitations, including how Trump will play the whole "pocahontas" thing. And all her detailed plans also provide some ammunition to beat her over the head with. You said you hadn't seen much hope and change yet, but there's a lot of change in Warren.

I also like Buttigieg, and admire how he takes it to Trump, but does it without demonizing the people who voted for him... we could use a little less polarization. He may be the smartest candidate we have, but I'd like to see him show some more passion.

I might end up choosing on primary election day, simply by selecting who out of the various candidates I like are then polling at beating Trump in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. I think any candidate is likely to keep the states that Hillary won, we need someone who can capture enough of the next most winnable states.

Which is concerning.

I might choose on primary day as well.

I REALLY liked a lot of what Buttigieg said but I think he needs federal experience.

In the end I think I'm voting for whoever can beat trump.

while I support nobody, Biden was the one that focused on Trump's racism and support for Neo Nazis in Charlottesville when he made his announcement.

What a waste.

but, I did notice that in his announcement - he set the tone that needed to be set on Trump

We gotta hit Trump at every level for his racism. It's not going to win over his supporters but it sure could win over a lot of voters who sat out 2016 or voted third party.

too many Democrats and moderates sat it out in 2016.

Registered voters increased from around 150 million in 2012 to around 200 million in 2016 - a HUGE increase. But, actual turnout only ticked up marginally, and many voted Green or Libertarian.

if we can focus on the racism and sexism, it should help focus the voters and get them to vote against Trump.

We need to keep pounding the message that he is a white supremacist, a horrible human being who puts children in cages and directs his minions to harass people of color. He is a nazi fascist who wants to be a dictator.

keep that up - attack him on that. Differences on how to get to universal healthcare won't amount to crap if Trump wins again.

I agree. Trump followers are set in their ways. They know what he is, and they like it. Those on the fence, IMO, are basically Trump voters by this point. If they can see all these attributes in him and still not be sure, then they're a lost cause.

BUT the same points (racism--especially racism--pedophilia, fraud, etc) must still be made in an attempt to get non-voting Dems to vote. We should also include in our arguments the many useless and dangerous appointments he has made.

the number identifying with the GOP is shrinking under Trump

I think the Republicans who are turning from Trump would still vote Red if someone primaries him. Any GOP replacement would still be bad for the country.

The racist tweet got things riled up; it brought out a huge backlash against him and support for The Squad. We need to recognize that and keep it up. Keep calling him a racist on the House floor. Call him a racist in candidate ads. It is his narrative. Use it!!!

It will unite Democrats against Trump. Even the moderate Democrats in the House voted against Trump on the racism issue. Every single Democrat, from Dan Lipinski and Henry Cuellar on the right to AOC on left voted to condemn Trump.

Heck, 4 Republicans and Justin Amash joined them. More Republicans than voted for Obamacare.

up for election to the train wreck called Trump. They have all voted in lockstep for all his appointments and not one word of criticism for Trump has come from any of them. Make them own that. Every day.

They voted unanimously to put a rapist drunk on the Supreme Court. Try crying at a job interview and keep yelling that you love beer and see how it goes.

"And what I know for a FACT is that this message--that Trumpism is a threat to everything we care about and love about this country--is what will inspire the Dem base to vote...and THAT is what this election is about..."

We need to overwhelm the RepubliCON cheat machine. To do that we have to get turn out high, very high. One way to do that is to address Trump's blatant racism, sexism, pedophile friends and corruption. To ignore it is to legitimize it and him. The dire straights of our failing democracy has to be explained to Americans to get them out to vote against Trump.

But that is not enough. It didn't work for Hillary though his awfulness was not as visible then. Most people knew some of his psychopathy. I thought Hillary did a good job of showing and explaining Trump's racism, bigotry and sexism.

I think policy does matter and we can talk about both. Remember the TPP? That is how we turned off some major union voters. Though Russia and our American capitalist kings pouring money into the NRA, Trump and GOP coffers didn't help. Bad policy platforms will turn off voters and keep them away from the polls.

Maybe it is how you talk about policy is what matters. It's useless to talk about policy to Trump because he has No policy. But laying out how you will economically help those who have been left behind will motivate poorer voters. Don't engage in swapping policy with Trump because the only policy he has is to abuse us all....except those who kiss his big fat ass. Just confront him on his abuses and lay out our liberal Democratic vision. That will inspire voters and expose Trump.

Because everyone has a different set of hot-buttons, and he's both a jacked up person, and his policies SUCK too. Even the economy is not as great as he makes it out to be.

Economic shit is more important than anything, but people also care about clean air and water and the environment, and healthcare, and their kids education, etc.

I don't think SOLELY or even 'primarily' focusing on his obvious racism and 'who we want to be as a country' is any better of a plan than any other specific bad thing about Trump. Focus on ALL OF IT, and do so in ABUNDANCE.

is what happened in 2016. The tax returns, charity fraud, Russian and Saudi collusion, etc causes people to lose focus.

In 2015 and 2016, there was a new Trump scandal or outrage nearly every day. However, it made people forget about what happened yesterday, the day before yesterday and last week. Trump focused on Hillary's emails and the DNC emails.

So, in the eyes of the media and the general public all of the Trump scandals were equal to, or less than, the Clinton email "scandal" that really wasn't a scandal.

We can talk about our vision and all that. That's great, but never lose sight of WHAT the other side is. I believe it was disgust over the current pResident and his Rethuglican minions that drove 2018 turn out and flipped the House. We need that fire in the belly once again.

the other side is cheerleading the implementation of authoritarianism

without getting into the mud with them. Make it about the person. Already one can see some GOP success with their painting "a democratic vote is a socialistic vote" - certainly with the redhats I've talked with. Many people could care less about policy, especially details. They would rather hitch their wagons to the person. That's what we should be focusing on: unhitching the fence sitters from tRump.

From the thread:
"What the left never understands is: we need to stop approaching elections like the goddamned debate team, and start approaching it like the right does, like the cheerleading squad."

The only complication I see is getting equal time and support from the MSM. They've got to step up and do their jobs. Right now tRump has the bully pulpit and seems to never be taken to task for anything.

not even Obama saying he was going to run for a 3rd term could get the media to stop focusing on Donny Dollhands

I also agree that the best way to win is to get out the vote.
The more people that vote, the greater our chance of not jut a win, but a convincing win.
All of Trump's base is planning on voting. That's not going to change.
But, there are 10's of millions of Americans who aren't voting.
These people are not hard core Trumpies.
If we can get them to vote, a large majority of them will vote Democratic.
About 137 million people voted in 2016. If we can get that number up to 155 million, most of the 18 million additional votes will go to the Democrat...I'll bet at least 2/3 of them.
And then there is a whole group of people who simply voted against Hillary.
We need to give them a candidate they can embrace.
The other group to go after is the voters who didn't vote for either Trump or Clinton. Bernie Sanders got almost 112 thousand votes!
We also need to entice away as many votes as possible that went to Jill Stein...about 1,457,000 in 2016.

I'm sure the Democrats are planning a strategy that will maximize the vote. It's not rocket science, and we already know Trump consistently polls about 40%.
The Democrats need to get the 60% who aren't for Trump into the voting booths.

Trump is very vulnerable, and can be beaten...he must be beaten for the sake of this nation's future.

Patrick Phillips

Not just Jill Stein, but there Libertarians got a big increase in 2016 because some Republicans didn't want to vote Trump but also didn't want to vote Hillary. Will those voters stay Libertarian, go back to Republican? Or, if Trump is seen toxic enough, will they vote Democratic?

"First, trying to flip Trump voters is a waste of time."

Bam.

Hillary called them a basket of deplorables. she was FLAMED for it, and 100% correct.

Almost every single one of these people will be back for drumpf again in 2020.

They are GONE, and they are NEVER coming back. Say all the right things about wanting to "be a leader for all Americans" blah blah blah........ but do nothing practical to "reach out" to them.

and the Hillary voters don't need any convincing either. We will all be back.

I think 40% of the electorate sat out 2016. Those are the people you have to get up off their asses and into the voting booth in 2020.

and here is the rub............... Democrats can be the "cheerleaders" and not the "debate team", but when we do that? The media trashes us.

"They have no plan. All they do is hate drumpf". The GOP never presents ANY plans for anything, and the media never questions them on it. They cheerlead so well because the media lets them do it. Their only "plan" is saying how much WE suck. So I'm not convinced that if we are "cheerleaders" for 2020 the media will let us "get away" with it, and if we are presented as being nothing more than "opposing drumpf", I'm not sure that will drive turnout.

Democrats are going to need a healthy dose of both debating and cheerleading, and the trick is going to be keeping the media from saying we offer America nothing.

Essentially since the Rs are going hard right, the Ds end up having to go further right to appear "moderate" when what's actually needed is to put more weight at the opposing end of the seesaw. There will always be moderate Democrats, but the goal should be to give voters a satisfactory range from true moderate to "far-left" instead of "Rs call them Socialists even though they aren't!" to "Practically an R with a D in front of their name."

He's saying it doesn't matter if they support Medicare for All (Sanders, Warren, etc) or expanding Obamacare (Biden) if Trump wins again and implements a full-on authoritarian racist regime.

And, a $15 minimum wage or a $14 minimum wage isn't going to matter if Trump wins and the minimum wage becomes 0

Dont levae any stone unturned. This strategy can turn his image into political kryptonite.

I couldn’t agree more with this brilliant strategy. If a trump voter isn’t upset about kids in cages they ain’t gonna flip! And most are not going to flip. It is a complete waste of time to woo those people.
Focus on turn out and call him a racist and dictator and don’t normalize him with policy.

Eric Garner died in 2014. That image of the child is from a staged protest. Let's not sink to Breitbart/right wing blog levels.

but the Breitbart remark was uncalled for. I searched for the images at random. I chose the Garner incident because of it's widespread publicity without realizing it happened that long ago. Clearly the GOP is still responsible for the war on brown people so I stand by it's use.

thanks for finding it

Way too much handling of this guy like he was a normal candidate. All Dem candidates needs to call him exactly what he is - a racist, and a threat to America & the free world.

I sure hope our Democratic candidates have time to read this guy's analysis. He is right on the money! The old tricks of the trade just don't work against Chump, this is a whole new ballgame.

Except it isn't because Tim Wise has been there and done this before.
Thanks for posting!

it seems really simple what he said, but I think having it put together like that is makes it seem like a great strategy.

I think I mentioned upthread, but there was a new scandal or outrage with Trump every day during 2016, sometimes more than one per day. However, the effect of that was that yesterday's scandals and the scandals from two days ago and last week were soon forgotten.

With Clinton in 2016, it was all about her emails.

So, her emails were given as much weight as the hundreds of Trump scandals and outrageous statements because so many of them had been buried and forgotten.

If you keep the focus on the racism and misogyny, it will remind people of past incidents of racism and/or misogyny.

It's not rocket science and we certainly don't need Tim Wise to tell us how it's done.

I used to see those letters EVERYWHERE on DU.

GOTV!

But I hardly ever do anymore. I'm challenging anyone to explain to me what they mean and what part, of what they stand for, you plan to do to help us win in 2020.

Don't be embarrassed or ashamed if you don't know what they stand for because you have plenty of time to figure that out and to make the commitment to participate in the process.

But will you?

It's so much easier to whine and complain and attempt to push some questionable policy position or attack candidates. Being a keyboard warrior amounts to little more than blowing air. Being hell bent on making a point but doing little or nothing to build consensus. All talk, no action, as the saying goes.

You have to be willing to spend some sweat equity.
You have to focus on being a uniter and not a divider. You have to peel yourself off the sofa or out of your easy chair, plan your commitment and follow through.

Luckily, you have time to figure out, on what side of history you plan to find yourself. Will you GOTV or just complain about the state of the party? Will you actually try to do something to help us win?

When I first became a member here I didn't have a clue what GOTV stands for but one day I asked someone and everything changed for me. I went from a Moral Monday marcher with Reverend Doctor Barber to an active participant in our democratic process.

If you are interested in what I do and have done to GOTV, I'll be glad to share with you. Just ask and let's GOTV together.

need to keep up voter drives, etc. and drive this bigot out of office.

and, a lot of work will be done by Cambridge Analytica, Russia and others to divide the Democrats and suppress turnout

Yes, less debate team and more cheerleading.

Trump is systematically dismantling our government, particularly destroying all of our capability of scientific research. He is an active threat to everything that actually makes us great. and is causing a level of destruction that will change who we are, forever. Every single Democratic candidate should be shouting this from the rooftops, every day. Make no mistake, we are at Defcon 1 and double code red!!!

This needs to be shouted from the rooftops daily, weekly, monthly, until the elections. Every democratic candidate needs to take this to heart!

agreed - this message needs to be taken to heart

...I've been here daily since the election theft of 2004. Just don't post very much!

She is arguably the most intelligent candidate. The one that has done the most thorough job on her policy platform. She has an answer for everything.

But that kind of quiet logical ethical technocratic approach will only earn the admiration of the already politically active Democrats. (Which is why she is so popular in here).

In some ways its a shame with all the work someone like Elizabeth has put into her thoughful platform ideas. But all of that can come later, once we win. Its almost as if they don't want to take the low hanging fruit...racism, fascism, because its too easy. Sometimes the (keeping it) simple way is the best way.

We need a fighter. Doesn't matter if they have their platform all worked out yet. The only one that I see coming close is Kamala Harris, although I see her as more of an opportunist than say Warren, who I respect more, and think would make an awesome President. But Harris has chutzpah (if she was even willing to take on the revered Biden) I only wish Al Franken was running. He had the charisma, and the intelligence, and fight.

and, she's great on policy, but is she going to be able to attack Trump on Racism and Sexism?

Our party had great turnout for Obama. We need to recreate that kind of inspiration and motivation for good people who know it's important to remove Trump and his enablers. That energy and turnout helped Dems win downticket elections in the House and Senate too.