Disarray or just out of power?

I love the kind of knowing Washington press articles that take the Democrats to task for just being opposed to the preznit's actions, but not offering a consensus for a viable alternative.

Around the country, many grass-roots Democrats are clamoring for a quick withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq. On Capitol Hill, Democratic politicians have grown newly aggressive in denouncing the Bush administration's war strategy and outlining other options.

But among the Democratic foreign-policy elite, dominated by people who previously served in the top ranks of government, there are stark differences -- and significant vagueness -- about a viable alternative.

In interviews, veteran policymakers offered no end of criticism about how President Bush maneuvered the United States into its present predicament, but only one had a clear vision of what he would do if the Iraq problem were handed over to a Democratic administration tomorrow. Several accept Bush's premise that a rapid withdrawal anytime soon would leave Iraq unstable and risk a strategic disaster in the broader Middle East.

"I'm not prepared to lay out a detailed policy or strategy," said former U.N. ambassador Richard C. Holbrooke, who was widely considered the leading candidate to be secretary of state if Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) had won the presidency last year. "It's not something you can expect in a situation that is moving this fast and has the level of detail you're looking for."

The difficulty that the Democratic foreign-policy elite has in coming together around a crisp alternative to the Bush administration has consequences that echo beyond the warren of think tanks, universities and consulting shops where most of its members now bide their time. On complicated policy questions, candidates and elected officials usually turn to respected and experienced policy experts to fashion their own platforms.

In 2004, it would have been wise for John Kerry to more forcefully articulate his plans for the war and for combatting global terrorism threats. Failure to do so may have contributed to his defeat, though I would suggest that just enough voters preferred the simple, stay the course Bush "plan" so that nothing Kerry could say would have altered the vote's outcome.

But in 2006, why would Democrats be required to form a consensus on "What to do about Iraq," beyond "Stop fucking it up."?

In fact, where's the Republican consensus? After all, they're the party in power and could actually do something if they weren't more concerned with pantomime votes intended to make a single Democratic congressman look like a fool. It would be nice if Washington reporters focused on that, just a little bit.