A Brief Policy Memo for the Democratic Party

This week another non-new "news" story broke in USA Today (the New York Times had the same story last year before Christmas!) regarding NSA datamining of phone calling records. Again, some prominent Democrats (and a few idiot Republicans) dashed to the cameras to denounce the Bush Administration. Folks this is a dead loser of an issue for the Dems. It is simply not possible to credibly campaign on the platform that the President is taking the war on terror too seriously. (In addition to failing the political test, it fails the logic test. I'd argue he isn't doing enough on things like border control and fighting the war in Iraq with ferocity.)

There is plenty of room to the right of Bush and the Republicans on many issues--immigration, spending, the war on terror. The problem for the Democrats is that those positions, though attractive to the vast political middle are anathema to their base. Their political candidates are going to find it almost impossible to go where the votes are.

One of the greatest problems for the Dems in the upcoming 06 elections isn't being talked about much yet, and that is the fifth anniversary of 9/11. The party that refuses to take the war on terror seriously, and there is no other way to characterize the profound mendacity of John Kerry (who as James Tarranto likes to note, by the way served in Vietnam) is going to suffer when attention inevitably turns to it less than two months before the voters go to the polls. I still think that despite the best self-destructive efforts of the Republicans and President Bush, the Democrats are still in a worse position for this fall.