The Language of Politics | Messaging Matters

Don’t give up on fighting gun violence

Written on May 9, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging, Republican Messaging

Good Democratic messaging here

The gun violence situation looks very bad in America right now. We’re averaging more than one mass shooting every day. One of the latest such shootings took place in Allen, Texas last Saturday, where a gunman wearing a tactical vest with an “RWDS” (“Right Wing Death Squad”) patch opened fire with an AR-15-style assault weapon at a shopping mall, killing at least eight people, including two young children, and injuring approximately nine others. Meanwhile, Republican-run states are going the wrong way on guns, with Florida passing a law allowing residents to carry concealed guns without a permit, and a 2015 tweet from Texas Governor Greg Abbott resurfacing again this week, in which he complains that Texas lags behind California in gun purchases, and that Texans therefore need to buy more guns. To top it off, Republican Megyn Kelly, who should know better about toxic harmful behavior, tweeted the following last Saturday:

Serious q for gun control advocates: you’ve failed to effect change. Pls face it. You can’t do it, thx to the 2A. We’re all well aware you don’t like that fact, but fact it is. What’s next? Must we just stay here sad, concerned, lamenting? Could we possibly talk OTHER SOLUTIONS?

Then, after being reprimanded for her tweet, she doubled down with the following:

No YOU F off. I am sick and tired of nothing changing after mass shootings bc we get mired EVERY TIME IN THE DAMN GUN DEBATE. You have LOST. It’s DONE. For the love of God what else can be done? You are ruining any chance at change by not admitting that the gun debate is lost.

But giving up on fighting gun violence is the last thing we should do. First of all, let’s take a lesson from the Republicans, as we suggested back in 2011, and go on offense. Specifically, when the U.S. Supreme Court decided in its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that the Constitution provides for the right to an abortion, did the anti-choice Republicans give up? Quite the opposite! They embarked on an effort lasting nearly 50 years to fight that ruling, and they made steady progress at the federal level and in various states (waiting periods, parental consent, protests, closing clinics, late-term abortion bans, etc.), until, with the right combination of Republicans in the White House and the U.S. Senate to confirm enough right-wing justices, the Court overturned Roe v. Wade in its 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson ruling. Along the way, outlawing abortion became one of the Republicans’ chief unifying issues and rallying cries.

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Tags: abortion, Antonin Scalia, Assault Weapons Ban, Democrats, Florida, gun violence, guns, mass shooting, Republicans, right to life, Supreme Court, Texas, U.S. Senate, universal background checks, White House

CNN is hosting Donald Trump, and people are freaking out

Written on May 3, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging, Media Watch

CNN covering 2019 Democratic Presidential debate

This week, CNN announced that it will host Donald Trump for a “town hall” event on May 10 in New Hampshire. This is a format that CNN likes to use with presidential candidates, and is essentially a one-on-one conversation with a CNN anchor or correspondent, on stage in front of an audience (some of whom get to ask questions as well), and televised live. Sometimes CNN interviews several candidates, one after the other, at the same event, and other times they hold a shorter event with just one candidate.

A number of Democrats, however, are reacting very badly to CNN’s announcement regarding the Donald Trump town hall. For example, in perusing various websites and social media platforms, statements and comments like these can be seen:

CNN is so desperate to boost its ratings, it will provide more free publicity for Trump.

Sure, have fascist insurrectionist town hall meetings air on cable news as if he hasn’t just been indicted and have 14 other investigations taking place in to his criminal activity, is just run of the mill normal. Nothing to be alarmed about, just another day in America.

It’s preposterous that CNN would invite someone to hold a purely political event who is currently being probed for his efforts to steal an election and stage a violent coup against the government of the United States.

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Tags: 2016 Elections, 2020 Elections, 2024 elections, cable TV, CNN, Democrats, Donald Trump, news, Nikki Haley, Republicans, Ron DeSantis, town hall, TV

President Joe Biden makes “freedom” his reelection theme

Written on April 26, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging, Democratic vs. Republican Presidents

President Joe Biden, running for reelection

President Joe Biden announced his reelection campaign for 2024 in a video yesterday, that was remarkable for its theme of freedom. As we have written about repeatedly, “freedom” is a word and an idea that Republicans have tried to claim for themselves. Since it is such a bedrock American concept, we have been saying since 2013 that it would be a great idea if Democrats took “freedom” back from the Republicans. We were very heartened last year when President Biden and a number of Democrats did exactly that, running or supporting Democratic 2022 midterm election campaigns by stating that “freedom is on the ballot,” and mentioning “freedom from gun violence,” “freedom of health care choices” (including, of course, abortion) and “freedom to vote” as three specific examples.

Likewise, President Biden’s new ad (which includes Vice President Kamala Harris) starts off with “freedom” as the very first word, and continues, largely in Biden’s own voice, to talk about “personal freedom” being “fundamental to who we are as Americans.” The ad goes on to explain that “MAGA Republicans” are threatening our freedoms, by attempting to cut our Social Security, “dictating what health care decisions women can make (again, an obvious reference to abortion), banning books, and telling people who they can love, all while making it more difficult for you to be able to vote.” The ad asks voters to support President Biden so that he can “finish the job” of protecting these fundamental freedoms.

The ad is very effective, not only in flipping the script on the Republicans over “freedom,” but also grabbing the theme of patriotism, and attacking Republican hypocrisy over their claims of being for “smaller government” as they try to invade Americans’ doctor offices, bedrooms and bathrooms, in Florida and elsewhere.

All in all, President Biden’s campaign announcement ad is a welcome opening salvo in what promises to be a major battle of ideologies between the pro-freedom Democrats and the pro-fascism Republicans for 2024.

Photo by Maryland GovPics, used under Creative Commons license. https://is.gd/Jpa2HA

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Tags: 2022 midterm elections, 2024 elections, abortion, Democrats, freedom, guns, MAGA, President Joe Biden, Republicans, Social Security, Vice President Kamala Harris, voting

Ron DeSantis is crashing: does that help or hurt Democrats?

Written on April 21, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging, Democratic vs. Republican Presidents

Ron DeSantis (center), riding higher in 2021

Florida Governor and would-be 2024 Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis has had a very bad week. First, on Monday, DeSantis continued his war against The Walt Disney Company, threatening to build a state prison or competing theme park next to Walt Disney World. Thus far, DeSantis has been on the losing end of his fight against the very well-lawyered Disney, which began when the gay-friendly Disney criticized DeSantis’ new “Don’t Say Gay” law. And this latest statement by DeSantis seems petty, as well as possibly unconstitutional.

Then, on Tuesday, DeSantis traveled to Washington, D.C. to gain support from Republican members of Congress for his all-but-announced presidential campaign. But instead, three Florida Congressmen took the opportunity to endorse DeSantis’ main rival, Donald Trump. Moreover, in one especially embarrassing instance, Rep. Lance Gooden of Texas literally walked out of a meeting with DeSantis and announced that he is endorsing Trump for President.

Given that DeSantis and Trump are the two clear front-runners for the Republican presidential nomination (with Trump ahead and gaining in the polls), there is little doubt that DeSantis’ troubles benefit Trump. Indeed, Trump piled on DeSantis on Tuesday by attacking his incompetence in the Disney matter, writing, with either typical name-calling or a typical Trump spelling mistake, “DeSanctus is being absolutely destroyed by Disney.”

The question is, do these DeSantis failures help or hurt the Democrats for the 2024 presidential election?

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Tags: 1976 election, 1980 election, 2024 Election, Democratic Party, Democrats, Disney, Disney World, Donald Trump, Florida, GOP, Republican Party, Republicans, Ron DeSantis

Republican overreaching may hurt them in 2024 elections

Written on April 14, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging

Younger activists, a major Republican fear

Republicans have a predictable pattern: even with government nearly evenly divided, they get drunk with power, use their votes to overreach with extreme policies, and wind up alienating voters in the next election. In June 2022, for example, the U.S. Supreme Court, with three new right wing Republican justices courtesy of Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell, voted along party lines to take away the right to abortion that had been established in the Court’s Roe v. Wade decision nearly 50 years earlier. This decision set off a firestorm among voters, especially younger voters, who showed up to the voting booths in droves five months later and gave the Democrats considerably better results (retaining control and actually winning a one-seat majority in the U.S, Senate, barely losing control of the House, and gaining state governorships and state legislature majorities) in an off-year election where the party in power usually does much worse.

Republicans, however, did not learn the lesson from the 2022 elections, i.e., that their extremism scared away voters. Instead, the GOP has charged ahead with even more extremist actions that could hurt them in 2024. These include:

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Tags: 2020 Elections, 2022 elections, 2024 elections, abortion, climate change, Democrats, Donald Trump, GOP, Michael Cohen, Mitch McConnell, Republicans, Roe v. Wade, Russia, Stormy Daniels, Tennessee, Ukraine

Trump criminal arraignment will be test for news media today

Written on April 4, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Media Watch, Republican Messaging

New York tabloid coverage of Donald Trump

Donald Trump is being arraigned today on numerous criminal charges at the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan. Thus far, much of the news media coverage of this process has focused on what Trump is saying and doing, e.g. his reaction to his indictment, his travel plans, and his plan to fly back from New York to Florida later today to give a speech, no doubt full of whining and complaining about being subject to the legal system. But today is really about what is being done to Trump, and what he faces, i.e. hopefully some modicum of justice. It’s also a teachable moment for many Americans, to find out this country was founded upon the principle that no one is above the law.

Therefore, the news media have a choice today: will they correctly focus on what is happening to Trump, including booking, fingerprinting, reading of the charges against him, analysis of the legal process going forward, the potential for prison time, etc.? Or will the media continue to base their coverage on Trump’s own statements and travels? In particular, will the news media fully cover the rather meaningless Republican circus of Trump’s Florida speech tonight, letting him once again set the agenda? If so, then we will know that the media will cover the 2024 presidential elections, like the 2020 elections, in the most superficial and damaging way.

The Republican myth of “politicizing gun violence”

Written on March 29, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging, Fox "News" Watch, Good Government, Republican Messaging, Republican Myths

Political process in action

Once again, the cycle continues of a mass shooting in America, followed by a public outcry to do something, followed by Republican charges that Democrats are “politicizing gun violence.” It happened again this week, in the aftermath of the school shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, which involved an AR-style assault weapon and an AR-style pistol, and claimed the lives of three young school children and three adults. Reaction to the shooting included one mother who took over a Fox “News” live stream following a press conference at the scene, saying that she and her son had survived the shooting, and that:

How is this still happening? How are our children still dying and why are we failing them?

These shootings… will continue to happen until our lawmakers step up and pass gun safety legislation.

Democrats support and propose such gun safety legislation, and indeed, President Joe Biden and other Democrats called for a renewed Assault Weapons Ban after Monday’s Nashville school shooting. But the only response to the shooting from Republicans is to avoid talking about guns. On Monday, for example, Republican U.S. House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan postponed a committee meeting at which he and his Republican colleagues planned to nullify a recent rule by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives which defined firearms with stabilizing braces (allowing firing from the shoulder) as “rifles” subject to registration and other requirements. In postponing their action, Jordan stated that “Democrats were going to turn this tragic event into a political thing.” That charge is another Republican myth, and we will show why.

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Tags: 9/11, assault rifle, Assault Weapons Ban, Congress, Democrats, Fox News, gun control, gun safety, gun violence, guns, lobbying, Nashville, Republicans, school shooting

Latest twist in the Disney-DeSantis Florida saga

Written on March 24, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Republican Messaging, Republican Myths

Will the Mouse outlast the Governor in Florida?

If you follow LGBTQ issues, presidential election politics and/or Florida stories, you will know that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is having an unusual feud with The Walt Disney Company. The feud started when DeSantis, who is running Florida like a fascist dictator, signed the “Don’t Say ‘Gay’” law, which restricts freedom of speech and education in Florida schools. After initially saying nothing, and under pressure as a supposedly LGBTQ-friendly company, Disney belatedly spoke out against the law. That led to a series of Disney-bashing actions by DeSantis, culminating in his state takeover of Disney’s self-governing zone (which contains Walt Disney World) near Orlando. So much for the Republican myth of “smaller government.”

Now, however, Disney has struck back, or at least thumbed its nose, at DeSantis. Specifically, WDW News Today reported this week that Disney plans to host “[t]he annual Out and Equal Workplace Summit, which boasts itself as the ‘largest LGBTQ+ conference in the world,’ this year at Walt Disney World Resort.” No doubt this will make heads explode in the Florida Governor’s office.

Disney may have gained some confidence for its announcement given that its repeated price increases at Walt Disney World have not cut down on crowds, to the point where the park is now extending its hours to try to spread out those crowds. Thus, while we fully expect a new round of tit-for-tat retaliation by Governor DeSantis, it may well be that Disney maintains the upper hand in the state of Florida.

Photo by Blake Handley, used under Creative Commons license. https://is.gd/2a7Dm7

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Tags: 2024 Election, Disney, Disney World, Don't Say Gay, Donald Trump, Florida, Republicans, Ron DeSantis

Florida and the myth of Republican “smaller government”

Written on March 16, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Good Government, Republican Messaging, Republican Myths

Republican idea of smaller government

At least since the days of Ronald Reagan, the Republican Party has tried to brand itself as the party of “smaller government.” Sometimes they add “and lower taxes.” Indeed, Republican anti-tax activist and Reagan ally Grover Norquist once famously stated that:

I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.

Presumably, such an identification tests well among GOP faithful, including today’s MAGA base, who sadly vote against their own self-interests based on race-baiting and other cultural hot-buttons such as abortion and guns. As an initial matter, however, plenty of polls indicate that most Americans don’t want small government. Rather, they like a full-size, robust “good government,” as we like to call it. That includes, for example, Social Security, Medicare, good highways, public schools, the U.S. Postal Service, a competent FEMA to assist with major emergencies such as hurricanes, universal background checks for gun sales, and more. Likewise, most Americans oppose federal government shutdowns, and correctly blame Republicans when they occur.

But even if most Americans wanted smaller government, the Republican myth that they are the ones who deliver that is false. A perfect case in point is Florida, which is almost entirely Republican-run under Governor (and likely 2024 GOP presidential candidate) Ron DeSantis, along with a state Senate that is 70 percent Republican and a state House that is similarly 71 percent GOP. In Florida, far from the Republican myth of “smaller government,” the GOP state government is huge and extremely intrusive. Here are some examples:

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Tags: 2024 Election, abortion, books, Disney, education, Florida, GOP, Grover Norquist, LGBTQ, libraries, racism, Republican Party, Republicans, Ron DeSantis, Ronald Reagan, schools

Arnold Schwarzenegger YouTube video seeks to terminate hate and antisemitism

Written on March 9, 2023 by Messaging Matters in Democratic Messaging, Media Watch, Republican Messaging

Anti-hate protest

On Monday, Arnold Schwarzenegger posted another stunning YouTube public service video, this time trying to combat “the rising hate and antisemitism we’ve seen all over the world.” A year ago, Schwarzenegger posted a YouTube video aimed at Russian citizens and soldiers, urging them to reject Russian lies and propaganda about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and to push for ending Russia’s illegal war. This time, Arnold points out that he recently toured the former Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz, where 1.1 million men, women and children, most of them Jewish, were murdered. He said that, at Auschwitz, “the weight on your back hits you at the very beginning … and it never goes away.”

Then Arnold points out that “‘Never Again’ is the rallying cry of all the people who fight to prevent another Holocaust,” and asks, “how do we stop this from ever happening again?” However, Schwarzenegger says his video is not intended “to talk to those people” who already seek to combat hate, or “to preach to the choir.” Rather:

I want to talk to the people out there who might have already stumbled into the wrong direction, into the wrong path. I want to talk to you if you’ve heard some conspiracies about Jewish people, or people of any race or gender or orientation and thought, “that makes sense to me.” I want to talk to you if you’ve found yourself thinking about anyone as inferior and out to get you because of their religion, or the color of their skin, or their gender.

Schwarzenegger goes on to cite his own personal and family history, indicating, “I’ve seen enough people throw away their futures for hateful beliefs.” He then references his father, a Nazi Austrian soldier in World War II:

I’ve talked a lot about my father, and the broken men that I was surrounded by when I grew up in Austria after the Second World War…. But besides their guilt and their injuries, they felt like losers, not only because they lost the war, but also because they fell for a horrible, loser ideology. They were lied to and misled into a path that ended in misery…. they bought into the idea that the only way to make their lives better was to make other lives worse. [emphasis added]

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Tags: antisemitism, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Auschwitz, Hasidic, hate, Holocaust, Jew, Jewish, Nazi, Russia, Ukraine, World War II, YouTube