New! Improved!

It's all about the marketing.

Dems in Search of Pithy Agenda

Democratic leaders say they'll soon release a pithy agenda akin to the "Contract with America" that helped Republicans take over Congress in 1994. But the past two weeks underscore the difficulties of setting clear priorities and speaking with one voice.

Seizing the moment offered by President Bush's budget and State of the Union message, Democrats came forward in droves to float dozens of their own ideas and themes. They proposed energy independence in 10 years; universal broadband access in five years; a cleaned up Congress in 100 days; 100,000 new soldiers; 100,000 new engineers, scientists and mathematicians; a 17% tax credit to companies that give health insurance.

Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine talked about the dire consequences of partisanship and mismanagement. Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa talked about social ills. Capitol Hill leaders hammered at the GOP "culture of corruption." Governors offered a "competitiveness agenda." The chairmen of the House and Senate campaign committees stressed change and freshness.

Presidential prospects such as Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, lamented the party's poor image on national security. Americans won't trust Democrats on education or health care "if they don't first trust us with their lives," Bayh warned.

Slogan for a 'change election'

CNN commentator Paul Begala, a volunteer adviser to Democrats on Capitol Hill, says governors, mayors, senators, House members and other party luminaries are well along in discussions to produce an agenda. Many already are using a phrase that figured prominently in Kaine's State of the Union response: "We can do better."

Begala says the slogan will work because "basically this is a 'change election.' If you're the party on the outs and you say we can do better, you're going to win." He adds, "If it were up to me, I'd be tougher and meaner. But you're trying to unite a diverse party."

Activists on the Internet don't think the phrase is "tough enough or meaty enough," Begala concedes. Some don't think their party is moving fast enough, either. "It's about time," Markos Moulitsas Z'niga commented on the liberal website www.dailykos.com when an agenda appeared imminent. That was in October.

Brendan Daly, a spokesman for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., says the agenda is coming in spring or summer. Either timetable would put the party well ahead of the Republicans who announced their 10-point contract two months before the 1994 elections. Even so, the current void has proven an irresistible target to Republicans.

National Democrat leaders actually believe the reason they continue to lose most Senate, Congressional and Presidential elections is a matter of mere marketing?

Gee, they want to strip the Patriot Act of it's teeth, and they wonder why they are perceived as weak on terror? They threaten to filibuster conservative judicial nominees because they are, well, conservative, and they wonder why they are viewed as too partisan? All they do is react to the GOP and point out what is wrong but offer no solutions themselves and wonder why they are chastised for being devoid of ideas? I could go on and on.

The problem isn't in the packaging folks. It's in the product.

In Wisconsin, Joe Wineke is touring the state touting the Democrat Difference.

Maybe in Wisconsin they've slowly realized you can't beat something with nothing. Ole Yeller at the helm of the DNC, Reid and Pelosi in charge of the Senate and the House...at the national level, the Dems have yet to figure that out.