Rendell: Dems ‘piss-poor’ on messaging

Former Democratic National Committee Chairman Ed Rendell said on Sunday that Democrats did a “piss-poor job” of messaging in the midterm elections. 

The former Pennsylvania governor said the party did not do enough to show how President Obama and Democrats have helped the country in the last few years — leading to Republicans taking control of the Senate and increasing their majority in the House. 

{mosads}”We did a lousy job — we did a piss-poor job of giving voters a message,” he told New York radio host John Catsimatidis during an interview. 

“We tried to run against the Republicans, run against the do-nothing Congress, run against individual governors to say the things they had done poorly. But we didn’t have a good national brand. And there is no reason for that,” he added. 

He said Democratic campaigns focused too much on the negatives of Republicans.  

“We need to develop a brand and fight back,” he said. “Too often our campaigns are all about — ‘they want to take away women’s rights; they want to take away voting rights.’ “

Current DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) on Saturday announced a top-to-bottom of review of Democratic tactics in the past few midterm election cycles. 

Rendell, who led the committee in 2000, said Obama would continue to have control of DNC leadership. But he said that decision should be handed off to the Democrats’ 2016 nominee when the time comes. 

He advised that the Democrats should begin running national TV ads in 2015 touting some of the benefits of the Democratic Party. 

“It is more than just a messaging problem,” he said. “We also have what I would call a courage gap. We are not proud of the things that we do and the things that we stand for,” he said, citing the bailout of the auto industry and financial sector and improvements to the economy.