It's increasingly clear that Democrats are wretched at the legislative process these days.
When they were in the political wilderness during the George W. Bush era, they allowed themselves to be pushed around and ridiculed by the Republicans and their right-wing extremist fellow travelers.
Since they regained control of both houses of Congress -- and the presidency -- their political spines remain well-sheathed. They're dumbfounded as the likes of Sarah Palin, Joe the Plumber, lobbyist-supported Tea Partiers, radio talk show buffoons, and back bench, backwater congressmen run roughshod over, around and through them.
All the while their leaders, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, are miserably unable to keep members of their own party in line, much less push back at a diminished opposition party.
With a few exceptions, including Michigan's senior senator, Carl Levin, Democrats have not had the stomach to investigate abuses of the previous administration. We have no idea -- and probably never will -- the degree to which our Constitution was despoiled by the neocons. Tens of thousands, including thousands of American miltary personnel, have died; thousands have been eavesdropped upon; trillions of dollars have been wasted in catastrophic wars, and crime and corruption stretching from Wall Street to the Green Zone have, for the most part, gone uninvestigated and unpunished.
In short, Democrats, cowed by Republicans, have done nothing to respond to the mandate of an unhappy electorate in 2006 and again in 2008. The promise of change became the hopelessness of impotence.
There can be only one explanation: Democrats enjoy being butts of jokes with their faces covered in sand.
The most recent example of their legislative inability is the health care dog and pony show.
Voters last fall resoundingly wanted the health care insurance disaster in this country fixed. Almost every legitimate measure of public opinion continues to make it unmistakable that people want change. They want broader and less expensive coverage.
The Democrats even have the support of the AARP and the American Medical Association.
But what do they do? They dither. They quake. They tip toe around in their usual namby-pamby fashion, confused, bewildered, rudderless and bullied.
If the Democrats don't get their act together quickly, if they don't accomplish what the majority of voters want, if they don't begin to stand for something, they surely deserve the fate that awaits them a year from now.
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