Peggy Noonan makes some sense.

[woo me with science]

Obama’s Gifts to the GOP
Republicans own the political center for now. Not because they deserve it.

http://peggynoonan.com/

The Wall Street Journal: November 13, 2010

Democrats are down, and sniping at each other. That’s the way it goes when parties lose. What’s interesting is the mood this week among Republicans on the ground. It’s not triumphal...

They continue to be blessed by luck. Whatever word means the opposite of snakebit, that is what the Republican party is right now. One reason they are feeling hope is that they have received two big and unexpected gifts from President Obama. The first, of course, was his political implosion—his quick descent and speedy fall into unpopularity, which shaped the outcome of the 2010 elections. At the heart of that descent was the president’s inability to understand how the majority of Americans were thinking. From the day he was sworn in he seemed to have had no practical or intuitive sense of what was on the American mind. By early 2009 they had one deep and central worry, the economy. But his central preoccupation was reforming health care. He devoted his first 18 months to it and got what he wanted, but at the price of seeming wholly out of touch with the thoughts and concerns of the American people.

....

A month ago, in conversation with a veteran Democrat, I mentioned that the old cliché is now truer than ever, that everything happens in the center. The path to victory is through the center, that’s where things are won. The Democrat nodded vigorously. “Compromise,” she said, “it’s so important.”

But compromise was not my point. Persuasion was my point. Compromise is a tool you use to get the best legislation possible, but you have to persuade the big center that your way is the better way. We’re in an age where politicians assert, insist and leave. It’s all quick, blunt and dumb. But to win and hold the center you have to make your case, you have to show you’re philosophically serious, you have to show your logic, and connect it to a philosophy. You don’t sit around saying, “I like centrists so I compromise,” you say, “Here’s what we believe, here’s how we think and why.”

.....

Right now the center is with the Republicans. They voted like Democrats in 2008 and like Republicans in 2010. But there’s going to be lots of drama in Washington the next few months, and things could turn on a dime. To hold the center you have to respect your own case enough to argue for it, and respect the people enough to explain it.

.....


There is a lot of truth here. Not the way she means it, but Democrats can learn from this.

[LiberalFighter]

1. Persuasion not necessarily of the lawmakers but of the voters.

By persuading the voters that their lawmaker(s) are wrong when they are wrong and to put heat on their lawmakers.

It is also important to move that center more to the left so that Liberals are considered more reasonable and have the right answers. Answers from the right when they are not valid need to be fully shot down and exposed.