Time to Start Playing Offense

By the time of, or at least soon after the State of the Union, Democrats -- not just the party, but we the rank and file - need to realize it's time to stop playing Defense and start playing Offense.

Simply complaining endlessly about the failings and foibles of the Bush Administration isn't enough (Although it's fun and theraputic). We also, vitally, need to point out how and why our path and philosophy is better. Some of this is obvious - Curruption and Lies:Bad, Honesty:Good - but on some issues we still need some work (Taxation, Governments Role in our lives, Being comfortable in our own faith, Support nearly for unlimited Abortion).

Well past the point where we made everyone understand who we really and where we stand rather than let Bully O'Reilly's repeatedly define us as the Far-Left Secular-Progressives who with to put porn in your homss 24/7, take God out of your lives, and homosexualize your teenagers.

We'll never get Bush's true poll numbers down to just those who actually believe in the policies he implements - as opposed to the policies he exposes - to finally show up as the 12-15% of hard-core bat-crazed wing-nuts that they are.

We have to realize that what we have staring us in the face - is a completely golden oppurtunity to completely repudiate the policies and practicies of the neo-conservative movement and set them back for decades, if not completely run them out of politics.

I know that seems like a tall order, but bear with me. The truth is the neo-cons who currently control the Republican party are hell-bent on self-destruction. They're like deeply addicted power-junkies who don't know when or how to restrain themselves. Just look at Jack Abramoff's behavior - openly scorning his own clients with epithets and insults in email, after email. Everyday we hear about another scandal, another hotbed of curruption and incompetence.

• The Bush Administration failed to head the numerous warnings, and crunch the intelligence to prevent 9-11.
• Osama Bin Laden got away at Tora Bora.
• Koran Desecration, Humiliation, Stress positions and Waterboarding at Guantanemo Bay. One prisoner, al-Libi, claims under duress that Iraq still has Nuclear aims - he's Wrong.
• We go to War with Iraq, but all the WMD and Nuclear intelligence, our justification for going to war, is all Wrong.
• We didn't have enough troops to secure the nation allowing a deadly Iraqi insurgency to grow and spread, we still don't properly equip them with proper armor or helmets - if they try to equip themselves they get threatened, and we've cut their benefits while locking them into perpetual service with "Stop-loss" policies. All the Pentagon's expectations and plans are just plain Wrong.
• Vice-Presidential Chief of Staff "Scooter" Libby Indicted, Rove implicated in Plame Affair.
• Abu Graib gets Gitmo-ized, and photos of prisons in humiliating poses and stress positions begin to appear. Repubs claim it was just "frat styled hazing" on the night shift - they're Wrong.
• Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay Indicted for Money Laundering.
• $8.8 Billion just plain disappears in Iraq under the Coalition Provisional Authority.
• 2000 U.S. Soldiers dead since "Mission Accomplished", 50,000 wounded. Another estimated 100,000 Iraqi casualties, President Bush only admits to 30,000.
  
• Secret Detention Centers and the Extraordinary Rendition program.
• Terry Schiavo gets her own personal Congressional Legislation and a Grandstanding Red-Eye flight by the President to sign it. Republican Heart surgeon and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist gives her a video diagnosis, "She seems responsive to light". She dies anyway as per her wishes, and the autopsy shows that she was blind.
• The levees break in New Orleans - Bush remains on vacation and in avoidance of Cindy Sheehan.
• Republican Congressman "Duke" Cunningham pleads guilty to bribery.
• Republican Lobbyists Mike Scanlon and Jack Abramoff plead guilty to bribery of Congressmen. Tom Delay and Bob Ney implicated. Repubs and Corporate Media try to implicate Dems also, but they're Wrong.
• The NSA has been spying on American's without a warrant for over four years and causing the FBI to be flooded with makeshift busy-work instead of focusing on legitimate threats. Bush Admin claims they could've stopped 9-11 if they'd already been doing this, except that they were and they are still Wrong.
  

And just in the last couple days you also have.

• Halliburton allowed our troops to drink contaminated water in Iraq, meanwhile $Millions of rebuilding funds were lost and squandered,
• The White House was specifically informed that the levees could fail before Katrina hit, and did nothing.

Just look around, these guys are crashing and burning all on their own steam. Democrats have had almost nothing to do with any of it. Yes, a few voted for the Iraq War - but that was based on intelligence that the Bush Administation gave them, and it was Wrong. The blame belongs where on the people who provided the information, not those who were duped by it.

Yet, there are those who simply refuse to believe all the above. They live in a world of pseudo-reality, swamped by denial and self-deception. They know and suspect the truth, but can't bring themselves to admit it -like a junkie who can't put down the Fundie/Wingnut crack-pipe. They get bogged down in semantics - "How can you say Bush lied", and we get bogged down with them - arguing irrelevancies.

Truth is, it doesn't matter whether Bush lied or not - he was Wrong, and that's the point. We can't afford a President who makes this many bone-head mistakes and is wrong this often, deliberate or not. If he lied, well then he simply knew he was wrong, so he's a bastard - but if he didn't, he was just plain ignorant now wasn't he? Just which is really worse? I vote being a bastard is better than being a deluded dumb-ass, but maybe that's just me.

Bush personally shouldn't be the target anyway IMO, he's a lame duck President. The target needs to be the Bush Administration as a non-functioning organization, Cheney, Rove and all of Bush's political appointees like Brownie need to be the target - and of course their lackeys in Congress.

What people need to know, is just what Dems will do about all this?

Can we Dems seriously give them - particularly those who continue to support the President and Republican Party against their own best interests - a sense that we won't make the kinds of gross (deliberate?) mistakes that the Bush administration has made? Sadly, probably not.

But that doesn't mean we can't get there. People, we have some work to do. It's not enough just to let the Repubs implode if people fail to recognize that all the above is a direct result of the Republican Philosophy of Government - which is a Government that Doesn't Work. Their main campaign arguement since Ronald Reagan has been that "Government can't solve your problems, Government is the problem", and they've worked long and hard to make sure that axiom is true. Right now, with Repubs in charge - They are the problem.

We need to hang that sound bite around their neck like a scarlet letter. Their government doesn't work - but Dems in power have and will make Government limited, but effective.

We have to stop running away from Monica, and learn to crow about the great things we've already accomplished. A Democratic President Balanced the U.S. Budget, reduced the size of government by 15% while preventing drastic unneccesary cuts in Medicaid and Medicare. A Democratic President and Administration, brought peace to Northern Ireland, ended the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo saving the lives of Millions from Ethnic Cleansing, and at the same time prevented al-Qaeda Jihadist from starting an anti-American insurgency in the region. (Now that, was a noble cause^tm). A Democratic Administration prevented the Millenium Bomb Plot, the attempted bombing of LAX, the Lincoln Tunnel and the Holland Tunnel. A Democratic Administration caught Aldridge Ames, caught Eric Robert Rudolph and executed Timothy McVeigh.

We have to make it clear that the Democratic vision is one that isn't for unneccesary government intrusion into our personal lives or the operation of our businesses without due and probable cause. We have to learn some consistency on this - it shouldn't matter if it's guns or pornagraphy. People have an equal freedom to own either, as long as they show the personally responsibility [yes, that's right - Steal those soundbytes and turn them around] not to let either fall into the wrong hands or be used irresponsibly. It should be about what you do and how it impacts those around you - not what you possess.

Our primary objective has to be election reform and accountability. We can't have a government "by and of the people" if we can't verify what the people actually voted for. At the moment this needs to be a state-level initiative, as various states have begun to test and challenge the security of Diebold and other automatically voting equipment. WIthout this, we have nothing.

Our secondary objective needs to be a revamping of our tax policy. Dems are also being accused of "taxing and spending", when the truth is that Republicans are Super-spending (with the debt approaching $8 Trillion) and tax-shifting the burden from us onto our children, and their children. A tax-cut doesn't really cut anything if all it does is explode the defecit, rather it simply forces those same taxes to be paid years later with interest.

Government isn't a surrogate Mommy or Daddy - but it can and should be a tool to help us get back up when we fall down as a result of medical problems, natural disasters or other tragedies. The axiom should be that government provides a platform where the strong can pool their resources and help those who need aid the most, simply because if they don't - no one else can without the neccesary resources.

Dems needs to allay the fears of Conservatives - No, not cynically shift to the right DLC style - but make it clear that they have a plan to address the deficit and welfare of America in new and innovative ways such as John Kerry campaign suggestion of a tax credit to businesses who provide for American jobs rather than overseas jobs.

I think this idea should be expanded and ceased upon.

Rather than simply rollback the Bush Tax cuts and thereby "raising taxes" (although the truth is that a full rollback would simply put the taxes back where they were when we were running surpluses) another idea would be to offer public service tax credits.

A Public service tax credit should be available anytime that an individual or corporation chooses to spend money to meet public service goals, for example television stations that provide for campaign ads to candidates free of charge (thereby removing the need to develop complex campaign finance laws and schemes to catch people who try to "game the system" like Abramoff and co.), or provide for books, materials and facilities donated to public schools, or add more employees to your health-care rolls. etc. The point being that the more that private citizens and companies do to take care of themselves and each other -- the less government has to spend doing it for them. Conservatives like to crow that people always know better than government. Well, sure sometimes they do - and sometimes they don't. Either way government taxes should NOT disable them from trying to do the best they can on their own before it the guvmint comes in afterward to pick of the left-over peices for all those who are -- to borrow a phrase - left behind. Public Service Tax Credits should be offered as an alternative to a straight repeal of the Bush Tax-Cuts.

Under this plan It's possible that the overall tax burden might go down even further than Bush's cuts if enough people and companies embrace the credit option, the end goal is on eliminating the need for government spending by having as many people as possible able to stand on their own without government assistance. This strategy would completely destroy the old "Tax and Spend Liberal" canard.

We also need to re-address not just tax issues, but moral ones. Issues of faith and values. A recent episode of West Wing contained a scene where the Ambassador stated the following to the American representative...

With "Life, Liberty and the Persuit of Happiness". All the aspirations of your people are financial - not ethical.

And the chilling truth of that statement was palpable. We equate the "greatness" of America not with our character or values, but with or individual financial circumstances. The size of our SUV and the strength of our economy. Dems certainly need to take this bull by the horns.

It goes without saying that bribery, corruption and cronyism are wrong. But it also needs to be said that abortion is great moral issue as well, and that we Dems certainly do not celebrate in the destruction of human life. Rather, we must seek policy which supports personal ethics that make abortion unneccesary. We must support comprehensive sex education,since almost 90% of teens indoctrinated into abstinence-only programs break their vows and have unprotected sex within 18 months (since they are discouraged and withheld knowledge of effective contraception). Abstinence is a good choice - but so is Safe-sex. Our foster system care needs to be serious reformed. Adoption should be cheaper and far more open. We should encourage the formation of extended families for child care, as well as family support from the corporate world as well such as on-site day care. Our schools need deep and serious reform using innovation rather than rote test teaching..

Being "Pro-Choice" need to include all the choices, all of the positive things that people can say "Yes" too, rather than simply say "No" to an embryo.

There are just a couple examples of what we need to allow people to be able to comfortably say "Yes" to the Democratic party, rather than simply say "No" to Repubs. Those that only say "No" are likely to sit-out the 2006 mid-term or even the 2008 elections, and we need them - we need them on our side if we're going to save this country from itself.

We need them as part of the Reality-based community, not neccesarily as Democrats - True Conservatism can function within our reality, I firmly believe this is true, but they still need to be in the same reality as the rest of us to start with.

The Conservative movement has been hijacked by Neo-cons, who are just exploiting the "wackos" with anti-Liberal rhetoric. Just remember, A Balanced Budget Amendment was included in the GOP's Contract on America a decade ago. Where did those Conservatives go? Just think, if the Neo-cons can pull all this crap, fail at so much of it this badly and still not be held accountable, just what will stop them from going even further next time?

Vyan