Brand or tribe?

Ezra Klein flags a great article by Republican pollster Josh Kahn. When pollsters ask voters whether they prefer the Democratic or Republican message on issues such as taxes, Iraq, etc., Republicans prefer the Democratic message when they don't know which message came from which party. Kahn writes:

Republican voters like the Democrat’s message more than their own party’s message by a large 14% margin when they don’t know which party it comes from. Just as disturbing, numbers among independents drop by another 10%... giving the Democrats a massive 28% advantage. Even [Republicans'] horrifically damaged image is better than [their] message on the economy. Independents and even Republicans simply like the Democrats’ plan more than [the Republican one]. Iraq and trade both follow the exact same pattern...

Among Republicans, support for the GOP message on taxes drops by a gargantuan 53% when the party’s names are removed, leaving the Democrats with a 14% advantage. You read that right, on the nonpartisan test, Independents like the GOP message on taxes more than Republicans do and even Independents slightly favor the Democrats.

The takeaway? [Republicans'] message right now is electoral poison[.]

Ezra suggests that "brand loyalty" is the only thing keeping the Republican party alive right now. But why are voters loyal to the Republican brand? To be sure, some of it is historical - people have been voting Republican so long that they feel like it's "their" party, and are loath to switch. But I have a suspicion that a lot of it is tribalism - or, as Klein puts it in another post, the "identity politics" of the Right. Republicans, out of ideas, have resorted to telling white Christian voters that they owe the GOP their tribal loyalty. And, given the failure of the GOP to collapse, this approach is working.

So how do liberals get rid of this tribal loyalty? Urging people to abandon any sense of tribe (in favor of their personal interest or the interest of all humanity) is probably not going to work. People like tribes. As I see it, the only way to neutralize racial, religious, and regional tribalism is to invoke national tribalism. The Democratic party must convince Americans that their identity as Americans comes before their identity as whites, or as Christians, or as Southerners.