Isn’t Senator Kaine a bit late talking to the middle class?

If you ask regular folks what Democrats want to do to the economy, not many will mention growth as the goal. (This is partly due to broad anti-business rhetoric that is directed toward Wall Street or multinationals but manages to scare off entrepreneurs and small businesses too.) 

The Democratic economic goal is more likely to be described as about fairness, regulation, taxation or redistribution.

And if you ask folks how the Democrats plan to accomplish their economic goal(s), you often get a blank look. We are wonky people and usually have a ten point plan with multiple sub-points about jobs and the economy. 

Complexity doesn’t communicate well and we seldom deliver an economic message that really sticks.

My 23 years in state, local and federal politics have convinced me that Democrats will always lose on economic messaging unless we have a simple and compelling growth strategy. If the Republicans pitch growth and we pitch anything else, we lose.

We can sometimes make it up on other issues, but why start behind on people’s key concern?

Wednesday May 24: Terror in Manchester, Trump overseas, impeachment & Bob Dylan is 76….click to listen…. https://t.co/C2tVu9PRqZ

— Silvio Canto, Jr. (@SCantojr) May 24, 2017