Learning from Buchanan

Say what you will about Pat Buchanan - the man can get a point across. Nixon's former speechwriter does just that in Bush Leaves GOP in Crisis. He rips into the administration with a terse tantrum that puts the leading left pols to shame. Watch him demolish the foundering case for war in a single sentence: Thus, in March, 2003, Bush, in perhaps the greatest strategic blunder in U.S. history, invaded an Arab nation that had not attacked us, did not want war with us, and did not threaten us—to strip it of weapons we now know it did not have. Clinton, despite the Slick Willy tag, always understood the political logic of framing an issue in such a stark manner. Two examples: "It's the economy stupid" and recently, "One hundred percent of the people recognize that -- that it [Katrina response] was a failure." There's an unspoken 'duh' hanging at the end of the phrases. It's Buchanan's style with the edges sanded down. Democrats need this sort of confidence in their talk if the sincerity and passion is to come across to the electorate. Let's hope their speechwriters leave the qualifiers and escape hatches on the cutting room floor as 2006 approaches.