Know your audience says Kevin Drum and he's precisely right. Part of being the party of the opposition is that you need only cast doubt. It's like being a defense attourney. You have a case to make that need not be in the affirmative. You need only tear down your opponent and his record. Offering an alternative plan (with specifics) only gives your opponent ammuntion. The calculating politician takes his cues from Collective Soul. They use the "Hints, Allegations And Things Left Unsaid" method.

It's a page from a very old playbook but the Democrats don't realize that this plays well off-cycle but voters cast a skeptical eye toward it at the voting booth. Howard Dean's foot stamping in the WSJ is going to be met with eye rolling at best. If the DLC doesn't come up with something more substantive than this, they're going to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in November.

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