Molly Ivins: Let's fix this mess

I have been collecting material for a series of columns on the peppy topic, "How Do We Fix This Mess?" The news is dandy in that there are a lot of a sound ideas being passed around. Really serious messes, like the one this country is in, do not, in my experience, have simple, definitive solutions. And if they do, such solutions are politically impossible. We are looking for progress, not perfection, so anyone who tells you the entire tax code should fit on a postcard is a bona fide, certified, chicken-fried moron.

But listening to the Democratic debate on what to do now, it seems to me some of the brethren and sistren are asking the wrong questions. The question is not, "How Do We Win?" That's a technical question that comes after, "What the Hell Can We Do About This Disaster?"

I personally think some good ideas and a plan should come first -- and to this end, let me chime in on a note of agreement with some Actual Moderates, William A. Galston and Elaine C. Kamarck, a couple of Clintonites still carrying on in that old Third Way that was good enough for Bill C.

They are opposed to putting too much stock in the political strategy of "reframing" issues as advised by the linguist George Lakoff. This seems to me merest common sense, and I'm not sure Lakoff himself wouldn't agree.

more...

http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?itemid=19770

there are many who adhere to the philosophy that until Democrats start winning, there isn't much we can do about anything. There's a certain logic to that.