OPINION — There’s a series of striking images in a televised ad for Dan McCready, who is seeking to represent North Carolina’s reliably conservative 9th District in the U.S. House of Representatives. It puts the candidate’s military record and faith front and center — not entirely surprising for someone vying for voters in a swath of the state that includes an affluent section of Charlotte, as well as parts of rural counties all the way to the Fayetteville area, with its strong military presence.

In the ad, McCready stands with his troops as an announcer states that after 9/11, he “was called to serve his country.” Then the scene shifts, and the narrative continues to describe the Marine Corps veteran as finding another calling when he was baptized “in the waters of the Euphrates River.”

He is the Democrat in the race.

It’s not that the party is full of non-veteran heathens; it’s that the GOP has long sought to present that narrative, or at least claim itself as the more religious and military friendly of the two. But like Conor Lamb, another Democrat and veteran who beat a Republican candidate for a House seat in a Western Pennsylvania district that Donald Trump handily won, McCready is the party’s hope because he fits his district.

A big tent?

To counter dominance by the GOP, which has increasingly become one thing — the party of Trump — the Democrats are touting their big tent, resisting labels and stereotypes, and trying to reclaim onetime DNC chair Howard Dean’s 50-state strategy, or something close to it. It promises to be a difficult task in this polarized present. You can be sure GOP money will attempt to “Nancy Pelosi” their way to retaining House control. But that often effective message is harder to sell when candidates chart their own path.