Progressives have been jumping and screaming as they ask Democrats to engage. Finally, an establishment operative, Donna Brazile, has joined the choir.
Donna Brazile has a warning for Democrats
Gun violence in America is rampant. We have a Supreme Court where justices appointed by presidents who did not win the majority of the American vote are about to take away women’s inalienable rights. All Republicans voted to block Americans from receiving childcare, family leave, and many other programs that would benefit many in these inflationary times. Republicans continue policies to deny people of color and poor people the vote.
Democrats are behaving as if it is a foregone conclusion that they will lose the 2022 election. They cite history. The party in power usually loses big in the midterms. Of course, there have been two recent exceptions under Clinton and Bush. But never have the stars aligned like now. It is easy to show the Republicans as a clear and present danger to most Americas, including their Republican constituents.
Donna Brazile appeared in This Week with George Stephanopoulos. She had a prescient message.
“Democrats got a stop sleeping at the wheel,” Donna Brazile said. “Stop sleeping at the wheel. Stop waiting for the last six weeks of the election. I know we’re about to spend a ton of money on television. That’s like just throwing water in the wind. Democrats got to go back and create communities and remind people what the Democratic Party is doing to help them, help them at the gas station, help them in the grocery store, help them where bad is in their wallets and in their homes.”
Unfortunately, Democrats too often use consultants that do not reflect the communities that elect Democrats. As such, their advice and work product are, at best defective. Brazile implies that when she urges Democrats to build communities and not use mass media to “TALK AT COMMUNITIES.”
Donna then lays out the threat the country faces. Maybe it is hard to swallow, but it is a fact.
“But if Democrats are not able to do that and they continue to sleep at the wheel and just rely on Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, forget it,” Brazile continued. “And if Democrats don’t put up a fight, they’re going to sleep at the wheel, and Republicans and Donald Trump and everything else are going to happen.”
Let me give two classic failures of the messaging as I see it in Texas. For about eight months, I have been in DC and have not followed much Texas-specific broadcast news. But I read the local papers. And I have many political operatives in Texas who have contacted me complaining about a Democratic Party that is asleep.
- Greg Abbott recently signed Senate Bill 1927, allowing anyone who can legally own a gun to carry a firearm without a license. So kids right out of school with childish minds are carrying guns because it is easy. Houston and other Texas cities are like the Wild West with road rage shootings and silly gun kills. Democrats should lean in and assert, tag the crime increase to Republicans.
- Democrats failed to tag the healthcare death of Texans effectively to Republicans’ refusal to accept the Medicaid Expansion to the Affordable Care Act.
- And then there is the Texas draconian abortion law. The state has enough women who care to make the issue an economic, social, and sexist issue.
- Governor Abbott has mismanaged the Texas grid with lax regulations. If it gets too hot or too cold in Texas, we must individually watch out for usage as if we were in a banana republic.
There is the perfect opportunity to tag Republican politicians as the EVIL TROGLODYTES they are. But Democrats seem timid to go on the offensive as they continuously take defensive postures. Democrats appear to replicate the Texas example throughout the country. It is time to heed Donna Brazile’s call — STOP SLEEPING AT THE WHEEL. Do not wait to act six weeks from the election. Engage in communities now. Stop spending with elitist, ignorant consultants and invest in individual community organizations who will inform and bring out the vote.
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