Cowboys and Deaniacs

Bush's reelection must be agonizing to Europeans. No matter how polite his public remarks appear on paper, that Texas smirk and snicker are just below the surface. Then he ups and cracks jokes about Chirac becoming his cowboy.

Meanwhile Rove is out there claiming to have won 97% of the 100 fastest growing counties in America. These demographics trouble the progressive Left. They often claim that unregistered adult voters - the 'dark matter' of electoral politics, unseen and untapped - are intrinsically inclined to go progressive. They just need to be pushed with the right message. This wisdom is suspect. Both parties added voters in 2004. But Republicans added more. And the Republicans, when not attending services, are often reproducing.

Nonetheless, the GOP party is preemptively laying down cover fire. Frank Luntz has written a playbook for spinners and 2006 candidates that gives advice on how Republicans can frame notions of 'fairness' and 'opportunity' in pre-election discourse.

But blogger DailyKos already scored a copy of that treatise and released it into the wild. This allows Democrats to more furiously debate the merits of either taking a directly contrarian approach (responding with reasons why Republicans are full of malarkey) - or laying out a credible, positive, alternate vision for America.

I wish they would attempt B. But I fear they will reflexively do A.