brainstatic:

Democratic ads are like “we need a functioning healthcare system and jobs that pay a fair wage” and Republican ads are like “I want to ethnically cleanse the country and my opponent will outlaw hamburgers” and every pundit keep saying “No one knows what Democrats stand for, Republicans are masters of messaging.”

It’s like that first bit of the show Newsroom – Democrats keep losing.  Republicans elected Donald Trump and somehow Democrats are still losing.  

There’s a certain way Republicans use phrases that was covered in a government class.  And for some reason, Democrats can’t seem to catch up.  

Examples:  

• Abortion = murder 
• Regulating the sale of guns –> Gun control 
• Estate taxes –> Death Tax 

Meanwhile, 

• Tax cuts –> Tax relief 
• Fracking/deep oil mining –> Exploring for oil 
• Global warming –> climate change 

Some rebrandings are more successful than others.  Some people still refer to tax cuts as tax cuts, but notice that people don’t talk about “global warming” in the news anymore; it’s all about “climate change” nowadays.  And “climate change” sounds a lot less threatening.  

Why are Republicans so much better than Democrats at dictating the terms of debate?  Empty rhetoric isn’t useless; you can’t purely reason at someone when they’ve successfully rebranded your plan with a name that no one would embrace.