Democrats have poured huge amounts of money and time into finding the perfect message to fight President Donald Trump and win back voters. But they’re on the wrong track, political scientist Lee Drutman writes: What the party needs isn’t a better message, but to remember how to create and define a conflict.
As Drutman explains, this isn’t a new idea. And it’s something Democrats have done successfully in the past. Barack Obama set the terms of the conflict in 2008, and, nearly a century ago, Franklin Delano Roosevelt did too. But as long as the party keeps fighting over messaging, it will keep missing the battle that really matters — and it’s likely to keep losing too.
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—Angela Chen, senior politics, policy, and ideas editor
