A brand new, shiny, media wedge.

[PatrickforO]

I have been listening today to the media working really hard to generate controversy between progressives and centrists in our party. The way it is being reported is that the 'progressive' issue of defunding police supposedly hurt some candidates and helped others, depending on who you're talking to.

Excuse me, please, for expressing a bit of frustration around this. Honestly, I'm about as progressive as they come, and I heard very, very few people, except those Minneapolis City Councilmen, actually call for 'defunding the police.'

Let's think about that for a minute. Defunding. To defund the police implies getting rid of them, because we have no context telling us 'defund' to what extent? Does that mean cut funding for some things, and increase it for others? What things? My boss, whenever I go into her office (which has been awhile, because we're all at home) and say, "Well, I think THIS! or I think THAT," she will look up at me and ask, "Okay, what does that LOOK like?" I thank her for that because it makes me be a bit more precise when I'm advocating THIS or THAT.

Let's take that a step further. When you were driving to work this morning, how did you know that the opposing traffic would stop at the red light and let you go when you had the green? How did you know that people would go in turn at the four-way stop? What keeps you from killing the jerk who cut you off? When you left the house this morning, were you confident that you'd come back to an intact household and a safe family?

Because, if all of a sudden we had no police, we really couldn't be confident of these things, could we? Because we would have anarchy, and academic theories aside, no sane person wants to live in a state of anarchy.

But here we have the media, like a giant mouth that roared, pounding in the 'defund the police' wedge.

Before we continue this fruitless, losing, and futile train of argument, maybe we should step back and find out who REALLY said we ought to 'defund' the police, and who has been saying other things, like de-militarize, increase accountability, require body cams, require civilian oversight, and so on. There is absolutely no doubt, NONE, that police and sheriff departments NATIONWIDE need massive reforms. This idea they seem to have that they are at war and we are the enemy, especially if we are non-white, has got to go.

But 'defunding?' We need to take a page from the Republicans and craft some talking points and come back with those talking points whenever this comes up. We have to somehow take the wind out of the sails of this 'defund' deal.

Defunding the police didn't hurt Jaime Harrison because he was advocating it, or because Biden or anyone else of national significance was advocating it, or because it was on the Democratic platform, which it was NOT.

Nope. WE let the Republicans paint him with that brush. Simple as that. Remember that AM hate-talk, QAnon, and so on are basically echo chambers and once some meme gets going, it lasts and lasts and lasts, and it is designed that way. Trump knows this and this is why he is pounding on the idea that he was cheated. Same concept. Use the echo chamber to make the lie an article of faith among Republicans.

We have to find a way to stop this from going on by increasing our penetration of, and influence over, social media.

Am I wrong here? Overreacting? Seems to me we're being crucified on a cross of semantics.

[H2O Man]

1. Recommended.

I think that republicans sought to exploit the far left's call for defunding police. The vast majority of those calling for defunding the police are not members of the Democratic Party, any more than those who took parts in this summer's riots. It is hard to say how much the republican's attempts to put this on our party is impossible to say.

We need to simply keep telling the truth. For example, the violence on the right has absolutely been from Trump supporters.

[Walleye]

2. We also never advocated open borders, baby-killing, or looting. That didn't stop the propaganda. The

They get hold of a slogan and pound it and pound it and pound it. They love these three word phrases

[Ferrets are Cool]

3. "WE let the Republicans paint him with that brush"

No, WE didn't. They LIE, and LIE, then LIE some more. And the morans eat it up. And then the MSM runs with it because they can make it a story.

No, we did NOT LET repugs paint him with that brush. They had the paint ready and jumped on a sign they saw in a protest and LIED.
It's what they do best. LIE.

I ask you. How do WE stop those lies. Do we spend our entire budgets defending the lies? Do we ignore them? How do we defend the LIES? The media will run with the message that gets the most viewers. They do not care about the truth, only viewers and advertisers.

Again, how do we stop repugs from LYING?

[PatrickforO]

5. Good you asked. Because we need a strategy that involves

systematically increasing our penetration of, and influence on, social media platforms. What's more, we need to do this not merely as a party, because you can already make a good case we are doing that.

Nope. I'm talking about individuals among us becoming influencers. My wife and I were watching this show on HBO called 'Agents of Chaos.'

This was about how Russian trolls created the influence on social media that allowed them to tilt the outcome in a few critical districts in swing states to give Trump the Electoral College majority even though Clinton had the popular vote by 3 million.

I think it is happening. Lots of these kids coming up, these Millennials and Gen Zs, who instinctively know this, and have an identity that crosses Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit and other platforms. So, they focus on getting followers on each of these, then when they post a thing on Twitter, they also put it on Facebook and all the rest.

I've been thinking about all this for some time, Ferret. Back in what I call the 'way back when,' when dinosaurs roamed the earth and I was in undergrad school, I had a professor who talked to us one day about maximizing our influence as citizens. Basically he went down this litany:

- You don't vote, you got no influence.
- You vote, you got some influence.
- You show up at the caucus or vote in the primary, you got more influence.
- You get active in your local political party and its nomination process, you got more influence still.
- And, if you write and call those you elect about issues you care about, you got maximum influence.

That was then, this is now, and I'm advocating this litany:
- You start Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and other social media accounts.
- You get followers over time on these accounts, and you follow others who have lots of followers.
- You start posting truth overturning these Republican lies, and you post it on all your network accounts.
- Your followers post it too, and then it becomes a meme and overturns the lie, except for those really lost in the r/w bubble.

Thing is, this is what the Republicans are doing, too. To my mind, they are a bit ahead of us because they generate talking points and have real discipline staying with them. We've seen that over and over and over. Time to learn to fight back more effectively is al I'm saying.

And when you call me on the carpet for beginning that sentence with, "We let..." I hear you. I really do. We DID fight back, but Harrison still lost, and Clyburn made the point he made. So what can we do better? That is my point.

[Ferrets are Cool]

6. Thank you for your ever so thoughtful reply

I think you are onto something. I'm older than dirt, so I don't know how something like that is generated from a thought to reality.
I hope it can be done.

[CommonHumanity]

4. take back the narrative

You are 100 percent right. We need Lincoln Project type thinkers onboard full-time ready to change the narrative and reframe the debate. Mayor Pete is pretty damn good at it too. I'm all in for him for press secretary plus a new task force specifically to control disinformation and take back the narrative. I consider this of supreme importance because it impacts every other effort.