I hope democratic strategists are following the headlines

--- Because the headlines suggest that those strategists could afford to take a little time off. The Bush administration continues to self-destruct quite nicely, and without any outside help or encouragement. For the democrats, at least, less appears to be more.

--- From the standpoint of the voting electorate, this latest one-two punch of the sudden jump in gasoline prices and Halliburton's announced move to Dubai cannot help but reinforce some of the public's nastiest suspicions about Big Oil in general, and its untoward role in the White House in particular. Hell, if anything the gas price hike only helps to confirm that Big Oil had artificially lowered prices during the 2006 elections in an effort to help their guy in the Oval Office.

--- And lest anyone forget, the trend in gas prices has been one of the most reliable indicators of the public mood. That is an admittedly stupid statistic, but it happens to be true. The public does not need much encouragement to dislike or distrust Big Oil,.. and its relationship to the White House is no longer much of an arguable issue. And who was that former Halliburton CEO again, eh? Make Big Oil the running mate of every republican running in 2008.

--- Add to this brewing debacle, the shoddy administration performance (DoJ) in the matter of those fired US attorneys,.. not to mention the ongoing the FBI spying scandal, the reversals in the administration's war on habeas corpus rights... and the continuing exodus of high-profile military brass from the administration's war-planning incompetency. And events in Iraq continue to spiral downward and out of control.

---These things are just the headlines from the past two weeks, and they pretty much have required little or no democratic assistance. The republicans are doing this to themselves,.. although to be fair, it must be conceded that these events, in fact, represent chickens coming home to roost from several years previous. And anyone with a grain of political intuition should by now realize that the public no longer harbors any sympathy for this administration; their disillusionment is virtually complete.

--- So,.... democrats,... let's not ruin a good thing by being too ambitious, eh? At least not right at this moment, okay? I like the old adage of giving the republicans enough rope to hang themselves. In the meantime, pick a couple of universally-popular issues (the minimum wage law was a good choice)... don't let the republicans co-opt the debate about renewable fuels,.. say all the right things about Bush's encroachment on the Constitution,... and FOR GOD'S SAKE, don't make any stupid mistakes. That is the key. The public obviously remembers and reacts to mistakes a hell of a lot more than it does to successes.

--- Small successes. No mistakes. Less is more. The stakes? Sixty percent majorities in both houses of congress in 2008 and a democratic president.

There are Democratic strategists? Who knew?

(We never see much evidence of them.)

--- Actually, I feel the same,.. at least where that "evidence" business is concerned. All the democrats need is a "master plan," .... but it seems to run against their grain.

You're not a Democrat?

--- I've never voted for a single republican,... but I reserve the right to make my own judgements about what "the party" does. And as an engineering trouble-shooter,.. entrusted with solving problems up to and including the impossible, I have little patience with politics.

Doing nothing guarantees that the war will continue until well after the 2008 elections. We do not have the moral right to do nothing with respect to the war.

--- But the tenuous one-seat majority in the Senate effectively places parameters on what we can and cannot do (hell, the one vote advantage belongs to Lieberman, ok?) and I'm not going to beat myself up over it. Oh,.. and just for the record, the concept of "moral right" is a human artifice. A thousand rabbits do not need a "moral right" to gang up on a fox and kill it,.... they only need the means and the opportunity.

from 2006 that showed CORRUPTION to be the biggest issue along with Iraq for the American voters.

The corrupt media and corrupt Dem strategists made sure to BURY that story.