Facts On The Ground

Steve Soto has some interesting thoughts on how the Democrats should deal with certain Facts On The Ground (FOTG) with respect to national security and defeating Dubya. I appreciate Steve's analysis and I think I understand his points. But I can't help but think that this is more of the same kind of timidity in the face of inflated poll numbers that have dominated Democratic politics for several years now. There are two reasons Bush polls so high and neither of them have to with any measure of success. The first is that Bush never backs down from his blatant assertions, despite the evidence, that he is doing everything right. The second is the unwillingness of the opposition to call him on these assertions. As far as the Democrats are concerned the latter is the more changeable of the two. Bush's support is a self-sustaining phenomena enabled by the lackluster performance of the Democrats as an opposition party. If they were to actually call into question some of these FOTG they would receive heat in response but they would also plant the seeds of doubt. Without those seeds they cannot hope to bring down Bush. I'm sorry but the simple fact of the matter is that we must challenge Bush on these FOTG. We cannot concede anything to him where the facts so obviously contradict the spin that Karl Rove puts forward. We will suffer a lot of ridicule if we do this but that is all the more reason why we should do it: they wouldn't fight so hard to demean those who call these FOTG into question if they didn't understand that those facts are based on a foundation of illusion. They know they have to defend the outer dikes because the inner battlements are made out of cardboard. One of my mottos for this blog is "The snake bites hardest just before it dies". We shouldn't be afraid to go after Bush on these lies just because a large number of people have bought into the illusion. We shouldn't be afraid to go after him because of the backlash that will inevitably result. We have to go after them, if for no other reason, because they are lies. As long as they are allowed to remain unchallenged then Bush will be unstoppable. That is the real Fact On The Ground.