Some Signs for Optimism

Lots of people bash on the Democrats for having an ineffective legislative or rhetorical strategy, myself included. But over the last week or so I have seen the Democrats exercise remarkable discipline, present some good ideas, and force the Republicans to make some votes that will cause them trouble in '06.

Let me give you a few examples:

1) The Democrats, led by the unlikely Ben Nelson, forced the Republicans to vote against a resolution on Social Security which prohibited big benefit cuts or debt. Tee-hee. I can't wait to run against people who are in favor of burdening our children with trillions and want to starve grandma.

2) The Republicans narrowly defeated the re-imposition of Paygo rules. Now this is a hard issue to describe to the casual voter, but I think we can do it. Just label it the "only buy what you pay for" rule, which Democrats favor, as opposed to the "borrow it from your kid's college fund rule" which the GOP prefers. Again, this vote feeds into a theme that the Republicans are irresponsibly mortgaging the future.

3) The Republicans are close to drilling in ANWR. Now substantively this is a disaster, but it's the job of the opposition to try and make lemonade. Democrats can now effectively label the enemy as anti-environmental and in hock to corporate America, providing we explain the issue properly. The environmental issue got off the radar in 2004, to our detriment, but this way we can bring it back.

4. The Democrats are finally doing what they should have done ages ago - shut down the Senate if the Republicans don't stop trying to abuse the minority. As long as they hang tough, they can actually restore the "advice" part of "advice & consent" when it comes to judicial nominations. The Democrats are making a big issue out of the packing of the federal bench with loonies, and they need to keep it up. Some of these guys Bush is putting up are really wackos, and we should make them poster children for the Republican party.

5. Finally, the Center for American Progress has put forward an excellent way to steal the tax reform issue from the right. They suggest doing what I've also been proposing, namely to de-couple "tax flatness" with "tax simplicity." What people really like is the simplicity, but the Republicans have tried to smuggle a flat tax into that idea. It's your typical bait and switch. This way the Democrats have a concrete counter-proposal and can rail against Republicans as anti-middle class and pro-corporate. By the way, I don't think the Republicans will EVER get a flat tax bill, because they would have to give up too many subsidies to corporate America, from where they draw the vast majority of their campaign funding.

6. Everyone is moaning about the bankruptcy bill, which is surely a terrible piece of legislation. What I figure is that the consequences of this bill are going to be pretty unpopular, particularly when interest rates rise (as they must) in response to the falling dollar and ballooning deficits. Now it is true we had a lot of defectors, but I really don't see why we can't make it an issue anyway. Just run against the Republicans who voted for it and pretend the Democrats who did so don't exist. We should define the cloture vote as the essential one (which is was). We might also try and convince the Democrats to propose a sense of the Senate resolution aiming to correct the abuses of the bill.

7. Lastly, Democrats have been forced by the Social Security debate into enunciating first principles: we are in favor of a plan of social insurance, that we are all in this together, and that we cannot leave the least of us behind. If we can build on this, Democrats will finally be able to enunciate the "big picture" of what we're for and stop all this nonsense of Democrats not standing for anything. And guess what? We're winning that debate. If we finish the job, Bush won't have enough political power left to fill a thimble.

So don't worry, be happy. Things are looking up.