Running in reverse

A lot of attention is being paid to this year's congressional elections, and rightly so. On everything from the economy to oil to Iraq, the United States faces major choices. By all accounts, people aren't happy with the job President Bush and the Republican leadership in Congress are doing.\nYou'd think that the Democrats would be poised to capitalize on this. Many analysts predict they will. Some believe the Democrats could even take back control of one or both houses of Congress. From where I sit, I'm not so sure.\nThey continue to run against things, instead of for things. Their latest campaign slogan is that they are running against the Republicans' "culture of corruption." This is all well and good. The Republican leadership is pretty sleazy, and the way they are running the country doesn't inspire confidence. Unfortunately, it's pretty hard to run against corruption when the FBI found $90,000 in one Democratic congressman's freezer, and another is under federal investigation.\nWhat the Democrats need to do is to stop focusing on divisive issues and start focusing on issues that unite people -- those that the Republicans are ignoring. Generous columnist that I am, I have some suggestions:\n• The environment. Al Gore's revival aside, this issue could be a winner for the Democrats. The evidence is pretty clear that the climate is changing. Scientists can debate how much of that change is due to human behavior -- but something is happening. The Republicans, meanwhile, refuse to even admit anything is happening. The Democrats shouldn't press a radical environmental agenda -- but pushing for higher gas mileage standards, truly clean air and water and incentives for conservation could be a winner. As an added bonus, reducing our dependency on fossil fuels would help reduce our dependence on the Middle East -- as many experts have repeatedly pointed out.\n• The budget. Americans get the concept of a balanced budget. And they understand that the Republicans have taken what was a budget surplus and turned it into a massive deficit. The Republican Party has abandoned its traditional fiscal conservatism in favor of ever-greater tax cuts. People like tax cuts, but they also like knowing that their kids won't pay the price later. The budget deficit was a winning issue for the Republicans throughout the 1980s and 1990s. It could be one for the Democrats now. \n• Foreign policy. The Democrats are hopelessly divided on the Iraq war -- so, they need to stop focusing exclusively on it. They need to broaden the issue to include President Bush's aggressive, unilateral foreign policy. Americans like President Bush's sweeping calls for democracy, freedom and an unending fight against terrorists. They don't like how he's going about it. The Democrats should stop fighting his goals and start offering alternative, more cooperative approaches to achieving them; things like respecting other countries' points of view even when we disagree -- and recognizing that the only way to spread democracy, and contain terrorism, is through economic development, not war.