(Last in a series on the Top 5 Winning Issues for Democrats)

This winning message is closely related to the first winning message: that the Republican Party is completely dysfunctional and incapable of leading a 21st-century superpower. But beyond that, voters need to be reminded what life under an ultraconservative government would look like. Here are specific ways to get that point across:

The messages:

• Modern ultraconservatism is not a philosophy of greatness. It is a philosophy of smallness, diminishment, meanness of spirit, stinginess, narrow-mindedness, rigid thinking, and fiscal incompetence.
• All the Republican tax-cut proposals would explode the deficit, as they have twice before under Reagan and Bush.
• The Republican budget would require devastating cuts to social services and programs that are part of what makes us a great nation:
  • Scientific research and space exploration
  • Programs to alleviate poverty and help those in need
  • Environmental and public health programs to keep our air, water, food, and medicine safe
  • Funding for the arts
  • The nation’s infrastructure
  • And many other quality-of-life programs and services
• Republican budget policies would devastate America the same way they’ve already devastated the budgets of Kansas, Louisiana, and Wisconsin.
• Millions of people would lose health insurance, with nothing to replace it.
• We’d be at war in the Middle East again within months of Republicans taking office, judging by their rhetoric.
• Medicare would be privatized and radically changed.
• Any philosophy that would give huge tax cuts to people who are already rich but cut food stamps for people who are desperately poor is immoral.

The contrasts:

• Democrats, by contrast, will continue the nation’s healthy state of economic progress and stability.
• For those struggling financially, we will focus our attention not on the rich but on American workers and people in poverty—the people who need attention the most, as Democrats have been doing for a hundred years.
• Democrats will maintain the high quality of life Americans have come to expect, while continuing to reduce the deficit modestly and responsibly.
• We will continue to provide affordable health insurance for those who need it most, and millions more will be signing up in the years to come.
• Democrats will continue a thoughtful and restrained foreign policy—keeping ISIS on the run, while elsewhere pursuing diplomacy before rushing off to other wars.
• Democrats will protect Medicare and Social Security.
• We will protect the environment.
• We will protect social programs like food stamps for people in poverty.
• We will protect civil rights for everyone, in the spirit of a great nation that cherishes freedom and equality.
• We will continue to uphold the American ideals of compassion, fairness, and equality for all.

Other posts in this series:

WINNING MESSAGE #1: The Republican Party

WINNING MESSAGE #2: Political and Financial Reform

WINNING MESSAGE #3: Helping the American Worker

WINNING MESSAGE #4: The Growing Inequality Between the Rich and Everyone Else

(Fourth in a series on the Top 5 Winning Issues for Democrats)

The shocking growth of income inequality isn’t just a message for Bernie Sanders. It’s a potent, populist issue for every Democratic candidate, and one that will resonate will almost everyone—liberal, conservative, or moderate—by appealing to Americans’ basic sense of fairness and our instinct to fight for the underdog. It also presents a stark contrast between the policies and values of Democrats and Republicans.

The messages:

• Republican policies of “trickle-down economics” have created a massive disparity in wealth—on a level we haven’t seen since the 1920s.
• Giving huge tax breaks mostly to the wealthy, in the hopes that it will spur the economy, doesn’t work. To prove it, show this chart.
• Or cite a few statistics:
  • The gap between the wealthy and the rest of America was the widest on record, according to a Pew Research Center study: The median net worth of upper-income families was 6.6 times that of middle-income families, and nearly 70 times that of lower-income families (2013 figures).
  • The top one-tenth of 1% of the richest Americans own nearly as much wealth as the bottom 90%.
  • Income inequality is higher in America than in any major developed country on earth.
• Republican policies will only make the problem worse. Their agenda is almost exclusively focused on people who are already rich at the expense of workers and people in poverty:
  • Conservatives want to give more huge tax breaks to the wealthy and to the biggest corporations.
  • They are trying to destroy unions.
  • They voted for major cuts in food stamps for people in poverty.
  • They are refusing to raise the minimum wage.
  • They want to repeal or defund the health care law that has brought affordable health insurance to 16 million people.
  • They support the Paul Ryan budget, which would slash funding for food stamps, Medicaid (health care for the poorest of the poor), and other social service programs.
  • They are blocking the expansion of Medicaid for low-income and disabled people in Republican states.
  • They’ve proposed steep cuts to Pell grants to help low-income students go to college.
• Great countries are judged in part by how they treat their poorest and most vulnerable citizens. Conservatives fail that test of greatness. Giving tax cuts to the wealthy while voting to cut food stamps for the poor in immoral.

The contrasts:

• Democrats are the only ones talking about income inequality. Nothing will get done about the problem until Democrats are elected.
• Democratic policies focus on helping workers and the poor.
• Democrats will raise the minimum wage.
• Democrats will fight cuts in food stamps.
• Democrats strongly support unions.
• Democrats support sick pay for every worker.
• Democrats have always fought for the underdog.
• We believe that all of us are created equal. We represent the deeply held American values of equality and fairness.

Other posts in this series:

WINNING MESSAGE #1: The Republican Party

WINNING MESSAGE #2: Political and Financial Reform

WINNING MESSAGE #3: Helping the American Worker

WINNING MESSAGE #5: The Consequences of Conservatism

(Third in a series on the Top 5 Winning Issues for Democrats)

Democrats have a long and truly remarkable history of improving the lives of the American worker. And while Republicans also claim to be on the side of average Americans, that scandalous assertion can’t go unchallenged. Every Democrat must make the case that Democrats are the true party of the people. Our party has by far done the most to improve the day-to-day lives of the middle class, working class, and the poor.

The messages:

• In the last hundred years, almost every significant improvement in the lives of American workers has come from Democrats. We gave workers:
  • The 40-hour work week
  • Social Security
  • Medicare
  • Paid vacations
  • The first minimum wage
  • Time and a half for overtime
  • Unemployment insurance
  • The right of women to join the workplace
• Democrats have strongly supported unions, so workers have a voice in how they’re treated on their jobs.
• Democrats created a health care program for people who can’t afford health insurance.
• Democrats have initiated almost every raise to the minimum wage in history, and we’re fighting to raise it again.
• Democrats passed the Credit Card Act and created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to protect consumers from the worst abuses of the credit and financial industries.
• Democrats are fighting for paid sick leave for all workers.
• Democrats kept the internet fair and equal for everyone.

The contrasts:

• If you’re a worker in America, why in the world would you vote Republican?
• Conservatives at one time or another have opposed almost every important advance for American workers.
• Conservatives want to destroy unions by passing “right to work” laws and taking collective bargaining away from state workers. If they succeed, workers will have no voice left in the workplace.
• The Republican agenda is about helping big business, not workers. Their “trickle-down economics” doesn’t work (as this chart dramatically shows).
• Republicans want to take away health insurance, with nothing to replace it.
• Republicans voted on the side of the credit card industry and against protecting consumers.
• Republicans oppose a significant raise in the minimum wage.
• Republicans voted to repeal the inheritance tax for people who inherit $5.4 million or more. Democrats oppose more tax cuts for the wealthy, who have already received very generous tax breaks from conservatives.
• Republicans wanted a two-tier internet to benefit business over consumers.

Other posts in this series:

WINNING MESSAGE #1: The Republican Party

WINNING MESSAGE #2: Political and Financial Reform

WINNING MESSAGE #4: The Growing Inequality Between the Rich and Everyone Else

WINNING MESSAGE #5: The Consequences of Conservatism

(Second in a series on the Top 5 Winning Issues for Democrats)

Voters are clearly in a reformist mood. Everyone, no matter their political leanings, is fed up with the influence of money in politics. They’re tired of policies that grant huge favors to corporations and financial institutions at the expense of average Americans. Political and financial reform is the second winning message for Democrats. Candidates can make a strong case that we are the only party capable of changing business as usual.

Remember to link these bullet points to basic American values like fairness and equality, and to incorporate the 7 Winning Messages. Also be sure to contrast Democratic values with those of conservatives.

The messages:

• Both parties say they want to reform government and take money out of politics, but which party has proven that it’s on the side of the people?
• Democrats have been the party of change and innovation for a hundred years. We have always fought for the underdogs.
• Democrats have pushed for a constitutional amendment to reverse Citizens United, which allowed obscene amounts of money into politics.
• When Congress voted on real campaign finance reform in 2002 (the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, which Citizens United partly overturned), Democrats in Congress collectively voted 246-14 in favor of it. Republicans voted 52-214 against it.
• Democrats support strict enforcement of Dodd-Frank Wall Street financial reforms, enacted after the financial crisis that caused the Great Recession.
• The Founding Fathers built checks and balances into our system of government, but they couldn’t have imagined the modern influence of money in politics. We need to restore those checks and balances to keep the system fair.

The contrasts:

• Conservatism by definition is a philosophy of the status quo. Conservatives are fundamentally against change. They either want to keep things the way they are or go back to the way things used to be. (See the essay The Case Against Conservatism.)
• It was conservative Supreme Court justices that gave us Citizens United and opened the floodgates of campaign cash.
• Conservatives have repeatedly tried to block any type of campaign finance reforms.
• Conservatives are trying to weaken Dodd-Frank laws and return to business as usual for the finance industry.
• The entire conservative agenda is about doing favors for those who are already wealthy. Republicans are not friends of working Americans and never have been.

Other posts in this series:

WINNING MESSAGE #1: The Republican Party

WINNING MESSAGE #3: Helping the American Worker

WINNING MESSAGE #4: The Growing Inequality Between the Rich and Everyone Else

WINNING MESSAGE #5: The Consequences of Conservatism