And, uh, I want to tell you a little bit about it today and take it apart and analyze it if we're all in luck.

Given the importance of a stable, intelligent, functional to party political system in the U.

S.

And in consequence everywhere else in the world, the video will make a reasonable case for something approximating a returned, a normative political debate, an image and word.

I'll show you the whole thing first, and then we'll take it apart.

Yeah, way we stand for the working men and women I always have and always will.

And we define ourselves by what we've done to help them get their shot at the American Dream.

Social Security, the G I Bill, the Civil Rights Act, Medicare Saving an auto industry.

23 million people with health insurance for the first time in their lives.

And all along it was American workers, farmers and factory workers, immigrants and engineers of every color, speaking every language who are building the highest standard of living the world had ever seen whose innovations were changing history whose courage made America a beacon of hope and freedom for those living in tyranny around the world, working people made America work.

Then something happened.

Some people in Washington took the side of the powerful against American workers.

Thegame got fixed for an entire generation.

Income flatlined.

Big donors made sure lawmakers cared more about Wall Street than your street.

Back in the eighties, a CEO made 30 times what his workers made.

Now they make 300 times since the great recession, Almost all of the income gains have gone to the top 0.1% not 1% 10.1%.

Instead of raising your salary, they buy back stock to increase their own bonuses, they merged companies and reduce competition so they could make even more money.

All while your cable bill gets bigger, your cell phone bill gets higher, your Internet gets slower.

Seat on your flight gets smaller, their taxes get lower and your health bills get raised.

Who's looking out for you?

The people in power are so busy giving tax breaks to the wealthiest that they blow up the deficit and leave nothing for roads and bridges.

Nothing for veterans or Medicare nothing for job training.

Something has to change, and we're going to change it.

A new generation of leaders who know what needs to be done and you have the will to stand up to those who would hold us back way.

Want our America back land of decency and fairness of generous hearts and big dreams on the freedom for anyone who wants to work hard to make those dreams come true.

I don't care what your politics are.

I don't care what God you pray to or what color your skin is.

I don't care if you write a tractor, run a business, and I hope your business is a big success.

As long as everybody plays by the same rules, same rules, same rules because this is America.

This is America.

This is America, and this is our generation's great calling to rise to the challenge.

Like those who had the courage before us to build a future for all Americans, not just the few to fight for the higher pay.

Working people have more than earned to fight to make health care available to everyone who needs it to stop those who would try to cut the Social Security and Medicare benefits that are rightfully yours to protect the environment instead of selling it to the highest bidder.

To fight for a government free of corruption, where your representatives work only for you to build a future that is just and free, full of hope and opportunity, our future.

Our Children thank us for leaving because democracy is built, not bought by the strong and the free.

So that's the statement, the story, the appeal to voters and the establishment of direction.

We want to take a look at the images, assess the text, determine what's in the video and, equally importantly, determine what is not.

So I'll give you some background first.

This is about the group that's created it.

After the election in 2016 we created a political organization to work on the important issue of expanding the reach of Democrats and focusing on shared core values.

Future majority that's the name of the organization under the leadership of Mark Riddle continues to work on a vast scale to rebrand and define the party, particularly in red and purple states and districts, in an effort to shore up our base, speak to swing voters and turn out those voters who we lost in the last election.

Built, not bought.

Created by Marshall Herskovitz, Greg Hurwitz and Callie Khouri, is the cornerstone of a new initiative that answers the question.

What do Democrats stand for?

The four minute film celebrates the singular importance of working people in the creation of modern America were calling out the big donor influences that have eroded our democratic institutions over the past few decades.

It is a patriotic, optimistic, solutions oriented affirmation of core American values.

Decency, fair play, the belief in a boundless future that seem too often forgotten in our partisan era.

It's a call to action to build a future that is just and free, full of hope and opportunity.

First is the name of the video itself built, not bought.

This is obviously a direct appeal to the idea of labor as opposed to capital, and is in keeping with the traditional Democrat emphasis on the contribution of the working class.

I think it skews a little left in an unfortunate manner strategically, because the amazing infrastructure around us was built and bought, since people need to be paid for their labor because capital contributes just like labor.

But perhaps that's a forgivable rhetorical flourish.

Let's turn from that to the opening shot way stand for the working men and women we opened, moving forward to a sun dappled mountain vista that indicates the possibility of awkward movement progress.

Then we switch to an image of a typical American nuclear family.

I like the choice of that image lot toe open, the opening scene of films particularly important, and the fact that these filmmakers chose to highlight a typical American nuclear family strikes me as a reasonable, intelligent, cautious and somewhat traditional initial choice.

And we define ourselves by what we've done to help them get their shot at the American dream.

Social Security.

The G I Bill a Civil Rights Act.

Medicare saving an auto industry.

23 million people with health insurance for the first time in their lives.

This is followed by a 22nd section detaining the Democrats contribution to the higher standards living currently enjoyed by working class people in the United States.

This seems to me to be handled with reasonable credibility.

Along it was American workers, farmers and factory workers, immigrants and engineers of every color speaking every language who are building the highest standard of living the world had ever seen, whose innovations were changing history, whose courage made America a beacon of hope and freedom for those living in tyranny around the world, Working people made America work.

I like this section quite a bit and found it surprising.

It was surprising because of the unabashed appreciation shown by the filmmakers for the effort put in by American working class people to produce a higher standard of living.

There's some genuine appreciation for the fact that this occurred, and I see this as standing and quite marked contrast to the all too typical dialogue on the radical left, concentrating on the pernicious effects of modern culture.

Bye, image and word.

The filmmakers in this section testified the utility of the efforts of people in the working class to producing the productive and relatively wealthy society that exists in the United States and elsewhere today.

So I thought that was really good.

I also think it's important not to miss the positively radical inclusion of a young boy playing in Army helmet with an airplane.

That's a bit of respect, shown both to the way boys typically play in the military all simultaneously.

That's quite something.

Then something happened.

Some people in Washington took the side of the powerful against American workers.

Thegame got fixed for an entire generation.

Income flatlined.

Big donors made sure lawmakers cared more about Wall Street than your street.

Back in the eighties, a CEO made 30 times what his workers made.

Now they make 300 times since the great recession.

Almost all of the income gains have gone to the top 3000.1% not 1% 10.1%.

Instead of raising your salary, they buy back stock to increase their own bonuses.

They merge companies and reduce competition so they could make even more money.

All while your cable bill gets bigger, your cell phone bill gets higher, your Internet gets slower, seat on your flight gets smaller, their taxes get lower and your health bills get raised.

Who's looking out for you?

I think that the section we just watched is the weakest part of the film, and I think it's inclusion was an error.

Although there are reasons to decry excess inequality, I thought the emphasis on the unnamed they and the images of wealth as under and luxury were unsophisticated clothes, shade and unnecessarily divisive.

It is absolutely necessary for the Democrats and for all those who wish for return to politics as usual, to distinguish between the majority of wealthy individuals and us who earn their money honestly and through benefit to society, freely chosen by consumers and the minority who gathered their position through unsavory or counterproductive means.

There's almost nothing more important than distinguishing between the successful who earned their success and those who managed it through exploitation and conflating.

The two is an assault on the ideas of confidence, aspiration and accomplishment.

As such, I truly believe that all this section was a regressive mistake, a call to resentment as a reason for civic engagement and an insult to the hardworking people of the U.

S, whose accomplishments were celebrated just prior to the deliverance of this darker message.

The people in power are so busy giving tax breaks to the wealthiest that they blow up the deficit and leave nothing for roads and bridges, nothing for veterans or Medicare.

Nothing for job training.

Something has to change Now.

I found this section problematic to the people in power well for a lot of the last, while those people were also Democrats.

And the tone in the section of the film we just watched implies that it was someone other than the people who are addressing you were responsible for the current mess.

I think this part of the film would have been a lot stronger had the Democrats taken some responsibility for the corruption that they're decrying instead of attributing its existence to unnamed others lurking somehow in the background.

This was a great opportunity in the course of the film, for the Democrats to note their own contributions to the current state of affairs and to promise to do bet.

And we're going to change it, a new generation of leaders who know what needs to be done and you have the will to stand up to those who would hold us back there.

That Invisible Enemy made its appearance again.

It's not good to look for the cause of trouble outside.

It's unethical error, another place where the filmmakers missed an opportunity to take responsibility on the part of the Democrats for what's happening around us today.

That's unethical mistake.

We want our America back the land of decency and fairness of generous hearts and big dreams on the freedom.

For anyone who wants to work hard to make those dreams come true.

I don't care what your politics are.

I don't care what God you pray to or what color your skin is.

I don't care if you write a tractor, run a business, and I hope your business is a big success.

As long as everybody plays by the same rules, same rules, same rules because this is America.

This is America.

This is America.

I like this section of law and again found its inclusion quite surprising.

There's even a bit of nostalgia for the past, something never seen on the progressive landscape.

There's emphasis on generosity, certainly, but also real consideration, given the aspirations, big dreams, something that has been woefully locking in the discourse generated by the left.

This is reiterated in the statement and the freedom for anyone who wants to work hard to make those dreams come true, which is again remarkable for its unabashed insistence that there's a relationship between hard work and success, and that success in itself is desirable, admirable and worth pursuing.

Then there's a positive disavowal, in my opinion of identity politics, with each speaker alone and identified visually as an individual and insistence on fair play, an analog of equality, of opportunity, not outcome, and this direct statement from a policeman no less.

And I hope that your business is successful, very radical in a time where success is all too often reflexively equated with privileging oppression.

I think the ethos in this section stands and powerful contradiction to that presented earlier, where wealth and success was negatively portrayed.

Which attitude is going to prevail?

It's obvious to me that the ladder message is most desirable and also most likely to generate a favorable majority response.

People vote their dreams, not the realities.

And it is perfectly reasonable for the Democrats to reconstitute themselves as the party that could make the dreams of individuals come true.

Even if those individuals occupy a lower rung on the economic ladder and to do so by insisting upon a fair playing field the same rules and to know finally, that this characterizes America this borders.

On stating that a shared value structure is a necessary precondition for social harmony and for the possibility of progress and upward mobility.

Much more of this on the part of the Democrats is necessary and would be widely applauded and welcomed.

And this is our generation's great calling to rise to the challenge, like those who had the courage before us to build a future for all Americans, not just the few to fight for the higher pay.

Working people have more than earned to fight, to make health care available to everyone who needs it to stop those who would try to cut the Social Security and Medicare benefits that are rightfully yours to protect the environment instead of selling it to the highest bidder.

To fight for a government free of corruption, where your representatives work only for you to build a future that is just and free, full of hope and opportunity, our future.

Our Children thank us for leaving because democracy is built, not bought for the strong and the free.

The film ends positively with a call to the future to build something promising.

It's marred once again, in my opinion, by the reference to those who would cut benefits and sell the environment to the highest bidder.

More politics of resentment but uses positive imagery of infrastructure, productive work and aspirational engagement presents a promise to fight corruption and closes with something positive about both strength and freedom.

It could have been better for the reasons I outlined, but it could have been a lot worse.

There's much less of the radical leftists tilt towards identity politics that has characterized so much of the recent Democratic conversation.

There's a strong sense of shared American society and values.

There's tremendous emphasis on a fair playing field and the importance of promise of hard work, not something typical of those who insist, for example, on equity or equality of outcome.

And you claim that our whole societies of patriarchal tyranny, in my estimation, this film is a welcome move towards classical liberal values and away from the divisive politics of political correctness and naive but dangerous utopianism.