A few good words for the Dems

The Democrats have been way too timid about a lot of things during the Bush years. On the other hand, the Cheney-Bush administration and the Republican majorities in both Houses of Congress have taken measures that excluded the minority party from influence to an unprecedented extent.

So I like to see someone give the Dems credit where credit is due: On Second Thought ... by Harold Meyerson Dissent Summer 2006. Meyerson writes:

Never did [New Deal Democrats] seem more marginal than early last year. Republicans (and not just any Republicans, but the most right-wing Republicans anyone had ever seen) controlled everything - the White House, the Congress, and the courts, where things were only going to get worse with each new Bush appointee. Things have indeed grown worse in the courts, but in the other branches of government, the Republicans have undone themselves beyond anyone’s expectation. For once, they had enough power to really act on their ideas: That was their undoing. They sought to privatize Social Security, but their numbers didn’t add up and nobody supported their plan. They continued to wage their war of choice, past the point where anybody could envision even a remotely happy ending. They were drenched in corruption. They let a great American city drown.

Through all this, the Democrats have not stood idly by. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate, respectively, have proven themselves better at herding cats than any party leaders in recent memory. Democrats stayed united in their opposition to Bush’s Social Security lunacy and to most other Republican panaceas as well. They are even evolving a straightforward, modest program to campaign on this fall: raise the minimum wage, rewrite the drug benefit legislation so that government can negotiate costs with pharmaceutical companies, implement the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, and so on. See, they really do have ideas, and they’re pretty good ones at that.

He might have added that they even came out with a decent group statement on getting out of the Iraq War! Reminding us that miracles are still possible.

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