It’s not about image. The Obama ground game would have killed anyone on Tuesday. They knew exactly what buttons to push to get white women, single women, minorities, etc. to vote againg the GOP. The Obama campaign was able to paint the GOP as a monolith— everyone was a homophobic, sexist, racist Mourdock-Akinite in favor of rape and making women have babies from rapists. The demographics won’t get better and the Democrats know how to keep those demographics on the plantation in large enough numbers.
Demographic trends and successful liberal indoctrination means there is a huge mass we can’t reach. You are correct. Tweaking image would not matter to this group. They are gone unless they become educated to understand the benefits of conservatism.
Image is important in politics particularly for the politically ignorant independents. image matters for this segment we have a shot at influencing
My general take is we are hosed. The first group of unreachable partisans becomes so large over time due to illegals, breeding and propaganda that it dwarfs the independents that we could influence. In fact this may has already occurred.
Then ... Game over. we find ways to slow them down