Realpolitik
This is one of those essays I wish I had written. If someone else has presented this in a diary or on a front page entry, I missed it. Apologies for any redundancy.
More:
Since diaries need to be 300 words minimum, and the whole intent of this diary is to bring this article to your attention, I'll flesh it out by quoting a nice snippet from the article.
When opposing conservatives, the most effective weapon has always been undiluted honesty. In 1948, Harry Truman said that Republicans were tools of the rich who didn't give a damn about the average citizen, thereby enabling him to win an election that supposedly was unwinnable. During the McCarthy Era, the Democrats abandoned candor in favor of cowering, and as a consequence were temporarily banished from power. When the party nominated John F. Kennedy the cowering stopped and the power returned. In 1964, Lyndon Johnson's harsh yet accurate message identified Barry Goldwater as a racist mad bomber and Democrats won an historic landslide. Truman and Kennedy and Johnson were totally indifferent to Republican complaints about being honestly critiqued. As a result these blunt leaders led the Democratic Party to victory.
The current generation of Democrats has lost the last six congressional elections by finessing the truth, compromising the truth, triangulating the truth, and generally avoiding the truth as though it had leprosy. Truman's truth was that Republicans are toxic for America. Six decades later nothing has changed except the Democratic willingness to make the case.