Heads in the Clouds

This story in yesterday’s New York Times caught my attention: Some Democrats Are Sensing Missed Opportunities, penned by Adam Nagourney and Sheryl Gay Stolberg. Here’s my favorite part:

"…Democrats described a growing sense that they had failed to take full advantage of the troubles that have plagued Mr. Bush and his party since the middle of last year, driving down the president's approval ratings, opening divisions among Republicans in Congress over policy and potentially putting control of the House and Senate into play in November.

"Asked to describe the health of the Democratic Party, Senator Christoper J. Dodd of Connecticut, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said: "A lot worse than it should be. This has not been a very good two months."

"We seem to be losing our voice when it comes to the basic things people worry about," Mr. Dodd said.

Democrats said they had not yet figured out how to counter the White House's long assault on their national security credentials. And they said their opportunities to break through to voters with a coherent message on domestic and foreign policy — should they settle on one — were restricted by the lack of an established, nationally known leader to carry their message this fall.

"As a result, some Democrats said, their party could lose its chance to do to Republicans this year what the Republicans did to them in 1994: make the midterm election, normally dominated by regional and local concerns, a national referendum on the party in power." (Emphasis mine.)

Ya think?

It’s been four and a half years since the twin towers collapsed, choking the air, literally and politically, with a massive cloud of post-traumatic debris. The Republicans, who by an unfortunate quirk of fate happened to occupy the White House at the time of the attack, have been taking full advantage of that ash, using it as a smoke screen to disguise their agenda and drive through even the tiniest point on their political wish list. And the Democrats...well, the Democrats have been struggling blindly through the cloud, unable to find a path, a direction, or even each other.

For four  and a half years, the cloud has been sifting earthward. It’s at about waist height, now. Low enough that we, the people, the ones who are still looking, can see the crossed fingers behind the Republicans’ backs. But…where are the Democrats? Unfortunately, it appears the Democratic leadership decided that the way out of the smoke was to belly crawl. They’re still under the cloud. They have no idea that, if they just stood up, they could see everything: They would see us, they would see each other, they would see what the GOP has done to this country, and they’d see a way out. If they would only stand up.