What's clear is that Democratic Party messaging is woefully inadequate

[jp11]

13. I think money needs to come out first so that politicians can

actually serve the people, the vast majority of people that want this or that like bank reform, cutting defense, etc can get those things. I think that is part of the messaging problem at the core. Democrats have young voters but I think they get turned off by the 'both sides do it' and 'the government is corrupt' which comes from the media. While a lot of that is BS RW/lies/propaganda it isn't all made up and the few true cases that can be skewed to make both side seem to blame hurts democrats more than it hurts republicans.

Politician's hands are tied in many respects to serving their bankrolling masters if they were free to serve the people their REAL masters then that is the first step in giving them the 'power' to do good. Which in turn gives both democrats and republicans accountability to us which is where messaging has much more power and meaning. That would be a great step in stopping the government's shift to the right.

I think it is much harder to get democrats to strengthen their messaging with the media both being owned by corporations and cowering to the moneyed interests that fund them through ads/etc. All the while politicians and their parties have to be aware that what they do and what they say will effect their ability to raise money to fund their campaigns. Even reversing Citizen's United will only do so much in removing unlimited superpacs but still having politicians cow towing to big money to win as well as wasting time raising funds. There is also the issue that democrats 'big money' comes traditionally from unions which are on the decline with help or the lack of resistance from democrats.

While not an easy task to get money out of politics it is at least much more in the realm of control of politicians than somehow 'fixing' private corporate owned media.

IF the only solution is to address messaging I think it has to have democrats unite to send the same message on various issues as well as never let republicans and their advocates get away with their lies and skewed propaganda. When a republican or their agents spout lies/falsehoods/half truths the response shouldn't be "that's your opinion" or to let it go but to confront it with the truth, "that is incorrect/false/or an outright lie and here is the truth".

The other aspect of messaging is to play up the positives that democrats actually accomplish. I don't see this often enough where democrats claim credit and place blame properly, an example is how terribly congress has acted. There is some effort to paint the 'do nothing congress' but not enough nor is there enough coverage by democrats on what their agenda has been ie not jobs. After the 2010 election they got together for a photo-op and their 'contract with america 2.0' about jobs yet how much of their agenda has focused on fixing the economy or creating jobs VS social issues like birth control?