I believe the operative word here is "take," not "be."
For years, the party has seemed to take great joy in being as off-putting and obnoxious toward certain people as it could, hang the consequences. Now that they've augured themselves down into a pit as the Party of Perpetual Inconsequence, it would probably be best not to continue to antagonize the few who might be still willing to throw down a rope.
Such a strategy might include dumping Howard Dean, who seems incapable of saying anything that might convince the people who grudgingly pulled the lever for Bush to pull it in the next election for a Democrat. I was watching something on television the other night--a retrospective of Harry Truman's words about the atomic bombs dropped on Japan. His clear-eyed, no-nonsense talk is not something we've heard from the mainstream party since, well, since Truman passed on. I cannot conceive of any of the current party leadership ever feeling comfortable saying something like this:
[…] On July 16, 1945, before the demand for Japan’s surrender was made, a successful demonstration of the greatest explosive force in the history of the world had been accomplished.
After a long conference with the Cabinet, the military commanders and Prime Minister Churchill, it was decided to drop the atomic bomb on two Japanese cities devoted to war and work for Japan. The two cities selected were Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
When Japan surrendered a few days after the bomb was ordered dropped, on August 6, 1945, the military estimated that at least a quarter of a million of the invasion forces against Japan and a quarter of a million Japanese had been spared complete destruction and that twice that many on each side would, otherwise, have been maimed for life.
As the executive who ordered the dropping of the bomb, I think the sacrifice of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was urgent and necessary for the prospective welfare of both Japan and the Allies.
The need for such a fateful decision, of course, never would have arisen, had we not been shot in the back by Japan at Pearl Harbor in December, 1941.
And in spite of that shot in the back, this country of ours, the United States of America, has been willing to help in every way the restoration of Japan as a great and prosperous nation.
Sincerely yours,
/s/ Harry S. Truman […]
"Until the party is able to find people who won't argue the definition of "is," or who see the folly in voting for something before voting against it, it will always be down there at the bottom of the well."
Too true.
Posted by: Nate at August 9, 2005 02:29 PM