“This is Democrats’ fault too, because they’re so bad at messaging.”  This is the go-to blame-shifting critique I get from self-identified “moderate” friends, well-intentioned folks who dodge conflict, critical thinking, and/or accountability by continually declaring equal disgust for “both sides.”

In the wake of the leak of the forthcoming U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing states to ban abortions, I’m hearing this a lot. It’s hardly the first time.  I hear it every time there is another preventable mass shooting, and every time some jaw droppingly stupid piece of legislation passes, such as “don’t say gay” teacher censorship or something that further aggravates climate change.

The moderates’ flippant “this is Democrats’ fault too, because they suck at messaging argument” is patently ridiculous responsibility avoidance.

Let’s start with the “this Democrats’ fault too” part of their claim. To state the obvious, Democrats didn’t appoint the justices overturning Roe. Republicans did. Democrats didn’t vote for the politicians who appointed those abortion-banning justices. Republicans and moderates did.  So, where is moderates’ unambiguous criticism of Republicans?

Because these facts are so undeniable and damning, moderates, ever-wary of decisively taking a side on an issue, quickly shift to the “yeah, but Democrats are to blame too because they can’t message” condemnation.  This invariably gets the moderate bobbleheads nodding in self-righteous agreement.

I don’t buy that either. As for messaging effort, while conflict averse moderates too often have been silent on the sidelines of the unpleasant abortion debate, Democrats have been leading the fight for reproductive health rights for decades, including in the largest protest in American history.

Democrats have even been fighting for abortion rights in jurisdictions where they know it will hurt them politically.  For example, my former boss Tom Daschle lost his reelection bid in no small part because he courageously stood up for reproductive freedom in a state where he knew doing so would hurt him.

Beyond an alleged lack of messaging effort, moderates also criticize Democrats’ messaging skills. 

My question back to moderates: “Tell me, have you discovered the magic words that convince your anti-abortion friends to preserve Roe? If so, could you please share them? Has any human being on the planet come up with those magically persuasive words? 

Market researchers tell us there are words and arguments that seem to work better than others. But they still don’t change many minds.

If the magic words don’t seem to exist, maybe messaging skills isn’t the problem here.

Maybe the audience, not the messaging, is the problem.  Maybe the audience is unpersuadable on this issue.

This “it’s Democrats’ fault because they suck at messaging” line of blame-shifting is not just irksome, it’s one of the root causes of the coming abortion ban.  The moderates’ mindless, self-indulgent “both sides are equally bad” and “why should I support them if they can’t message” viewpoints frees moderates to continue using their election-swinging votes to empower Republicans. 

Too many moderates give Republicans their votes, often out of greed, because there is a tax cut promised, or out of shallowness, because of some kind of an irrelevant personality preference. They subsequently express shock and dismay when the Republicans they helped elect do the things they promised they would do on the campaign trail, such as making abortion illegal, censoring teachers, opposing gun background checks, blocking efforts to make health care and child care more affordable, and effectively empowering white supremacists and insurrectionists.

While all of us, including congressional Democrats, could and should get better at messaging on these issues, let’s not kid ourselves. The primary reason abortion is about to be banned in about half of the states isn’t messaging. The primary problem is that there are too many Republican extremists in office. That happens in part because there are too many moderates giving them their votes. That happens because there are too many moderates rationalizing their votes for extremist Republicans with self-delusional “both sides are equally bad” arguments. 

So the next time you hear moderates say something bad is happening because Democrats suck at messaging, please stop nodding your heads, and hold them accountable.