Reply #82: There's no point in arguing about the route the car will take

[elperromagico]

when the car doesn't have an engine.

And that's where the Democratic Party seems to be right now. There are a lot of people arguing about where we're going to take the car or what we're going to do with the car once we get wherever we're going.

I hear very few people saying, "Hey, where's the goddamn engine?"

That engine is ideas.

Clinton didn't just beat the Republicans by fighting back hard. He beat them by having better ideas than them. He beat them by being able to challenge them -- and the American people -- with something other than "The Republicans suck."

On issue after issue -- on Iraq, on social welfare, on education, on jobs -- the American people are ready to listen to the Democrats' ideas.

And what do we offer them?

"Bush's ideas are bad. Vote for us!" Or "Bush's ideas are okay but he isn't carrying them out the right way. Vote for us!" Or "Bush's ideas are great. But vote for us anyway!"

Those are ideas only in the academic sense. They damned sure aren't the basis for an agenda.

We can call the Republicans everything but children of God; we can get down in the mud and shit with them. But as long as our ideas consist of nothing more than "The Republicans suck," we're not likely to beat them.

Hell yes, BEB, let's fight them with everything we've got. Let's hit them as hard as we can and not give up until they're boarding the planes out of Washington.

But first, let's figure out where our engine is.