Are Democrats starting with a failed strategy? 

The goals listed in Speaker Pelosi's 100 hour plan should warm the heart of any reasonable American.  But lists are not strategies, and the 100 hour plan merely covers putting these goals before the president as opposed to actually accomplishing them.  The Democratic strategy behind the 100 hour plan appears to be merely this:

Democrats innocently propose their most popular ideas while attempting to appease the President by not impeaching him.  In exchange, the President gallantly signs any bills that don't jeopardize his military, economic, or political intentions.

Appeasement is hardly a new strategy.  The British well remember Neville Chamberlain's strategy of appeasement in World War II.  And now they consider President Bush a greater threat than North Korea's Kim Jong-il [article].  Are the Democrats about to repeat Chamberlain's error?

The most perplexing deficit of the Democratic appeasement strategy is not that it may fail to achieve the Party’s goals, but that it may leave Democrats defenseless against guileful assault by their enemies and a misinformed public:

  • People may deride Democrats for the impending severe fallout from the war on Iraq, since the Democrats will have failed to develop and publicize exonerating evidence.

  • People may hail the President for signing appeasement legislation like raising the minimum wage, since the Democrats have failed to pursue more fundamental issues like the perceived trend away from Constitutional government. 

  • People may commend yet another miraculous drop in gas prices just before the 2008 elections, since the Democrats have failed to address, let alone correct record high oil profits.

Appeasement is all the more perplexing when one considers fallacies in the arguments used in its favor:

  • The alternative to appeasement is impeachment.  The broad alternative is investigation and prosecution of wrong doing, with the goals of recovering stolen funds, crafting of corrective legislation, maintaining the nation's moral compass, and achieving justice.  Impeachment is neither essential to nor sufficient for these goals, but it may be quicker than some of the alternatives.

  • Investigations leading to impeachment reek of revenge.  The starting point in heading off such claims is to produce a useful nonpartisan definition of "high crimes and misdemeanors" that characterizes mismanagement worthy of removal from office.

  • Impeachment is partisan, divisive, and degrading. The expense, distraction, and degradation of the Clinton impeachment suggests that an adequate definition of "high crimes and misdemeanors" would exclude private indiscretions and associated lies.  It also suggests that live impeachment proceedings used as theatrical performances be copyrighted and temporarily governed by fair-use constraints.

If the Democrats are to have any hope of achieving the goals that recently swept them to power, it is imperative that they develop Congressional priorities allowing them to

  • Reaffirm and restore inalienable Constitutional rights.

  • Identify and banish enemies of the Constitution from government.

  • And finally pursue the normal business of government.

Given the stakes, I suggest that every reasonable American begin to shout and holler, rather than simply wait and see.

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