No. It's not just about ideas.
There's a woman on the local Invisible Facebook page who is killing a thread complaining about why Warren isn't getting more traction. She did a great job explaining what Pete is doing right and how it stands out in the field. Here are some of her posts:
Because voters hate policy wonks and love big ideas and personality that inspire them emotionally. Warren is branded as a wonk and has similar hair and appearance as HRC, who was also a wonk who had this exact same issue.
Warren is spending her campaign time trying to be someone people want to listen to, and she is backing into it from her wonkness, and it is only sometimes working.
People want to go to story time and have visceral reactions. They don't want to go to lectures. They are *assuming* they are going to lecture because of her reputation.
It is much harder to do it in this order. Beto, Buttigieg, Harris, and Sanders don't. Buttigieg + Beto especially, seem to be aware of this and using it to their advantage.
Yes. That is backwards. Yes. That sucks.
And, yes, it is utterly predictable and we need to stop being shocked by it and figure out how to manipulate it, which is what the GOP does.
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Who can fire up the majority of voters, especially the ones who went home or red in 2016? Who can quell Trump?
Beto or Buttigieg are the ones that seem to be able to most reach the spectrum while making people feel good about themselves (opposite of Trump).
Beto is a centerist, though, so I dunno how much that will play.
Buttigieg is rhetorically centeristish, but generally on par with Warren policy-wise, give or take a little. He is being labelled a centerist because of his rhetoric (which is, interestingly enough, straight out of a cult deprogramming psychological tactics).
Sanders taps into the same emotions as Trump (anger at the system), and I don't know if he will be able to sway people back.
Harris, et al. seem to be fairly neutral in the emotion-inspiring, but don't have the wonk reputation to deal with.
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Really, policy-wise, they are similar enough that any of em will move us further left the same amount of way in 4 years, so we are left with 1) electability, 2) policy records, and 3) ability to do the job effectively. None of em really hit all 3 in the middle, and I think we really, really need to worry about electability.
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I think it is about getting more people to vote, in general, including swaying moderates and centerists, TBH.
I think hardcore leftists will hate all of our candidates on purity tests and will either get with it or not. I think someone that makes people feel something akin to passion and makes them feel seen is important to inspiring them to actually vote than policy (though it is combined). Then I think someone who inspires the majority of people listening is important.
Everyone elected in the past 40 years (at least) has been elected on that, not policy. Even those that won the popular, lost because their messaging lost a very specific population.
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We really, really need to be thinking about it more than policy, IMO. Cause, again, I think we have a pretty standard, fairly ambitious progressive policy agenda across the candidates (with some outliers), but policy doesn't win elections.
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Full Disclosure: Buttigieg's attempt towards mass psychological deprogramming at the GOP base is fascinating me and I find it to be a technique that can only benefit us.
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Sure. His perspective is that due to a variety of factors, many centering on Trump's tactics, many people were radicalized. Yes, they were always racist and bigots, to a certain degree, but not to this extent. This is especially true because many voted for Obama twice and then essentially were like "yeah, I am racist, so what" when they voted for Trump.
So, if instead of writing them off (which many if not most of the 2020 candidates are doing), what if we treat them like we treat cult members or radicalized religious fanatics?
This essentially at the core of Buttigieg's messaging strategy.
We know how to deprogram people, psychologically. We even know how to move people closer to your political stance and it is generally the same techniques.
What research has shown you do is approach them where they are with firm boundaries to the values (Buttigieg has repeatedly said things like "racism is unacceptable"), but without judgement and with empathy. If you make them feel defensive, they double down and it doesn't work (which is why he doesn't outright declare that they are deplorable or say things like they are just racist). When they are listening and feel safe, you offer them a way out towards the other side and welcome them.
Buttigieg is reflecting their language back at them (hence things like "virtue signaling" in which he basically followed by saying there is no ethical consumption under capitalism without using any of those words), while telling them that bigotry is not acceptable, but offering them a safe way to join progressives (while reminding them that they actually support a lot of these measures). Meanwhile, he is interweaving progressive and some sort of pretty radical policy ideas at the same time, so he isn't compromising his values. He is also telling everyone he is doing it as he does it.
So, he is trying to deprogram Trump's base with his run. And it seems to be working, slowly, a little bit and no one else is trying.
It is starting to blow up in his face on the Left by those who think we shouldn't appeal to them, but 1) it is a rhetoric/pr shell game, not a policy one and we should pay attention to policy and 2) in order to make large structural changes, we need to start winning local and state-wide elections in those states, so we can't just write em off.
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He isn't wrong when he says progressive policies are overwhelmingly popular, even with the people who vote for conservative politicians. We are seeing that with ballot measures all over. So what is the disconnect?
It seems that his idea is to remind people that they are already on board with these things to pull as many people as left as possible for down ticket wins (I think he is a little surprised by his current popularity and likely ran to 1) show that his messaging strategy would work since he isn't part of the DNC and 2) to have some opportunities to pull people Left). Everyone else just seems to be running for POTUS; he seems to be focusing bigger picture.
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