I've been as critical as the next guy about our Congress, particularly the Senate. It seems that they can't work together to get anything meaningful accomplished at all. Now, they're bending over backwards to give the GOP all the ammunition they need to get back in the game.
First, our Representatives were manuevered into placing language threatening women's control of their own bodies into their version of the health care reform bill. Today, my local paper (the Durham Herald Sun) applauds the Democrats "thwarting a Republican attempt to doom" health care reform by taking the "politically risky" move of cutting 460 billion dollars from Medicare!
OK, crafting legislation and passing bills is difficult, consensus is hard to achieve, you don't want to know how sausage is made, etc, etc. But how mind-numbingly stupid can you be to even appear to threaten two major pillars of liberal legislation, even if you're doing it for what you perceive just might end up being the "greater good"? Many progressives are disheartened by the actions of our current government, or lack thereof. If Democrats are going to just go ahead and include Republican-style provisions in the bills they try to pass, in the next elections a lot of the left will stay home, and a lot of the center will wonder why they bothered voting for Democrats in the first place. Furthermore, if Republicans can sell the argument that they and Democrats are essentially the same, except Republicans will cut your taxes, whether this is true or not, I fear many of the gains Democrats made in the last couple of election cycles will dissipate. This is especially true now that GWB has been firmly placed in the rear-view mirror, the attention span of the media and many voters being what it is.
C'mon now, folks. Give us progressives a bone of some sort. Do something to distinguish yourselves in the minds of the electorate. Address DADT. Pass a huge jobs bill. Smack the bankers around a bit. Heck, propose a big tax on cigarettes to pay for our continuing adventures in Asia, maybe I'll quit smoking. Just do something that isn't on the Republican's list of agenda items and will make a big splash. Please!