Stop Me Before I Vote Again

The LA Times reports on the DLC's Denver powwow. Their sum-up: 'Pocketbook issues form the core of a Leadership Council centrist plan to produce party members who are more "practical" and "accepting." '

The Fromniks, with St Hill front and center, offer a few derisory clip-joint pick-me-ups to a sagging jobholder nation:

... make college tuition and home-buying more accessible, expand the availability of healthcare, and provide greater retirement security...

As economic planks in a party platform... well, stirring stuff, eh? The LAT comments:

Over three days of workshops and panel discussions, there was much sober talk of pension portability, regional skill alliances, performance-based governing and the like ....closing tax loopholes, ending corporate subsidies and squeezing inefficiencies from the government...

Best of show, I thought:

... establishing a "baby bond" program for low- and middle-income families that would provide each child with a $500 savings bond at birth and another 10 years later...

Needless to say, foreign policy discussion was, shall we say, muted -- just a scattering of sour gripes, lead pipes, and long-grass snipes, that glued into one piece, spells "trust us."

The LAT piece struck a charmingly snide tone -- I like this line in particular: the conference was referred to as "another installment in the party's search for itself."