DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN:

Democrats Pulling Together United Front Against G.O.P.: Democrats in Congress have begun to put aside their differences, and have reached a general agreement on how to address economic and social issues. (DAVID FIRESTONE, 3/03/03, NY Times)

After a midterm election campaign that many Democrats considered fractious and muddled, party members in the House and the Senate have reached general agreement on how to address economic and social issues. They have instituted regular meetings with governors and like-minded interest groups to map out a strategy for weakening the legislative proposals of the administration, and claim credit for the president's somewhat weakened standing in opinion polls.

"We put a lot of thought into this last fall, after the election," said Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the minority leader and a principal architect of the strategy. "We knew we could do a better job of working with governors and outside groups to use our amplification system more effectively. Now we've got our rapid-response team going, our message of the week, and some of these things we've never really done before."

The message has not won universal acclaim from party leaders around the country, some of whom continue to find it unfocused and repetitive of class-division themes. Democrats remain scattered on Iraq, a subject on which members are free to go their own way.

Even so, the assault on the administration's domestic policies has remained consistent in its unrelenting use of three domestic themes, as laid out by Mr. Daschle and Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the House Democratic leader.

First, they say, there is a "credibility gap" between Mr. Bush's words and his actions, an idea they apply to dozens of specific issues. The president's budget, they also contend, is too concentrated on tax cuts for the wealthy and does not provide enough for domestic security or medical and social needs. And finally, they say the budget's record-setting deficits threaten the economy and job growth.

The broad outline of these themes was set out in a joint appearance by Mr. Daschle and Ms. Pelosi at the National Press Club in January, the day before Mr. Bush's State of the Union address.

Tom Daschle is supposedly a reasonable bright man and an adept politician, though I don't know when we've ever seen evidence of either. But this strategy is mind-bogglingly stupid and, it's a trap he's fallen into several times before. If you'll recall, Mr. Daschle's criticisms of George W. Bush have been most pointed at just those moments where the President was about to score big victories: just before the fall of Kabul, he questioned our reliance on the Northern Alliance; he spent last August ripping a vacationing Presiident just before Mr. Bush's UN Speech in September; he tried to turn the 2002 election into a referendum on Mr. Bush, which obviously back-fired; etc. So now we are arrived at a moment when everybody on the planet--with the exception of "peace " demonstrators and Saddam Hussein--recognizes that the war with Iraq is about to begin...and end. This will afford the President, no matter how briefly, a spike in public opinion polls and a serving of political capital he can use to push his agenda. Whast sense does it make for Democrats to be hitting a crescendo of hostility at just the point where they're going to be attacking a popular wartime president? Not only that, but note the specific weapon with which they're attacking, accusing him of a "credibility gap". The first president to be accused of so gaping was LBJ over the Vietnam War. Are Democrats really willing to compare Mr. Bush and his conduct of the Iraq War and the War on Terror generally to LBJ and his conduct of Vietnam? Are they going to be willing to do so in April when Saddam is gone, al Qaeda is being rolled up, and Mr. Bush is back at 65% in the polls?

Democrats look at the polls, see a President just under 60% and think it's something they've achieved. Rational beings would pause and consider that number carefully at a moment in time when we are all become, in Saul Bellow's phrase, "Dangling" Men, that is we are in a kind of suspended animation awaiting war. As a result there's much uncertainty, something that particularly impacts peoples' psychology and thereby the economy. Meanwhile, protestors, foreign governments, and the media are all attacking Mr. Bush and "his" War. Yet he's still in the high 50s in the polls and, even more remarkable, the War itself is favored by just as many people. (By comparison, take a look at popular opinion on the prospect of our entering WWII prior to December 7, 1941--when the Gallup poll showed that 88% opposed American participation in the war in Europe.) .It certainly appears that Mr. Daschle has set himself up for yet another fall. Remind me again why we're supposed to think he's a capable leader....

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 3, 2003 10:17 AM