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Micah Sifry on Top: Messaging Won’t Save Democrats. [1]
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Date: 2022-10-29
In my never-ending search of the internet for bits of information, opinion and humor, I stumbled on an article by Micah Sifry who wondered why there is no Democratic Party infrastructure. Now, that caught my attention. I always thought the party had an infrastructure. On more reflection, despite my past and current contacts with elected officials, I realize that the Party’s relationship to me and to most voters who consider themselves Democrats consists of contact by a network of semi-grifter consultants sending panicked fundraising emails of which they get an excessive cut. Sifry suggests the Party consider some things more substantial.
Why is there no democratic party infrastructure?
Micah Sifry: Messaging Won’t Save Democrats; Community Might: ‘Lux and his colleagues found… populist economics: tax the rich, hammer corporations for price gouging and profiteering, bring jobs home, help small businesses against corporate monopolies are all themes that resonate and also offer an answer to voter concerns about rising inflation…. These voters are sick of “partisan bickering” and not receptive to political messages from either part…. This rings true to me. Politics as it is practiced today, in the form of messaging wars on television and online, is just too far from most people’s lives…. “Candidates and party committees should be spending time doing things like sponsoring community events like [Ohio Senator] Sherrod Brown’s ‘movie nights,’ which he does in the old movie theaters of Ohio’s mid-sized towns, where the theme is to build community spirit and togetherness. Or they could set up events that were community health clinics where people come in and get health care assistance that they couldn’t otherwise afford. Or Chautauqua style events, where musicians, community theater performers, poets, and community organizations spend a day in a community.” Even better, I’d add, instead of opening campaign offices for a few weeks, stocking them with fresh-faced volunteers from out of town, and then closing as soon as the election is over, Democrats could invest in year-round community centers like the union halls of old, where people gathered to socialize, have a beer and talk politics. Unfortunately, Lux is a rarity among his colleagues. I don’t think Democrats are likely to shift the tens of millions of dollars they now have slotted for expensive ad campaigns this fall into community fairs or mutual aid programs. They’re going to keep doing what they’ve always done and pray for a different result…
LINK: <
https://micahsifry.medium.com/messaging-wont-save-democrats-community-might-7d802154b433>;
Micah L. Sifry, is a former Nation associate editor. He is also co-founder and executive director of Civic Hall New York City’s community center for civic tech, launched in 2015. Since 2004 he has been co-founder and editorial director of its parent company, Personal Democracy Media, curating its annual PDF conference and editing its news site techPresident, both focused on the ways technology is changing politics, government and civil society. He is also a senior adviser to the Sunlight Foundation, which he helped found in 2006, and serves on the boards of Consumer Reports and the Public Laboratory for Open Technology and Science. . His most recent book, edited with Tiago Peixoto, is Civic Tech in the Global South: Assessing Technology for the Public Good.
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