Why don't the democrats in Congress introduce legislation revolving around our agenda like health care, etc.?  It would force the GOP lawmakers to either vote for it or against it (and of course most likely against it).  I guess being a realist, to suggest that the democrats do this would mean taking positions contrary to the interests of many of our corporate donors.  Right now in the eyes of the public we are pro-corporate GOP enablers who are just as corrupted by the money grab in Washington as the Repugs are... 

There may be a bit of a trap here.  The temptation is to present ideas, which can then be used as a target for attack, instead of the Repugs defending their record.

If this the case, and we are afraid our policy proposals will be turned back on us, then maybe our ideas aren't so good.  I say put our best foot forward and get the Repugs on the defensive for why the resisted policies that would help the American people.  We have the ideas but if we don't act on them, the ideas won't amount to a hill of beans.

As I've posted here http://www.tpmcafe.com/comments/2005/6/25/122538/883/38#38 , I think we need to focus on developing a short, pithy, memorable statement of what the Dem Party stands for.  I think that without that, people may like our policy positions but continue to be uncomfortable with our party.  Our party lacks definition in the mind of the public.  Leaving aside whether that perception is fair or justifiable, we've got to deal with it and give people an easy way of distinguishing us from them.  Leaving people to puzzle out our party values by inferring them from our policy positions, is a losing proposition.  We need to clarify our party's values and ensure then that our policy positions are in harmony with and derive from our values.

I'm a wonky type myself. Not much of one to consider the finesse of a proposal as opposed to its operability. That being said...



It seems to me that, as Mr. Schmitt implies, some serious thought needs to go into how Democratic ideas are structured for public discussion. Bush's "Ownership Society" is a case in point: invoke a simple principle with which we all can agree, then argue that several distinct proposals all reflect that goal.



Yet we can go further than that, by having as one of our main 'simple principles' that operability matters more than finesse. Believe it or not, I think that's a good selling point.



The Bush administration has bent over backwards to deflect criticism by blaming their mishaps on lower-level incompetence; I say, fine. There were no checks in place to ensure competency - that national guardsmen and women wouldn't torture captives, for example, or that the prescription drug bill wouldn't actually cost double what they claimed. If that's their story, then the brunt of blame should still fall on the shoulders of the Administration because they overvalued the selling quality of their proposals and underestimated the operability factor.



I believe the Administration's lack of checks was intentional - they didn't want to stem torture at Abu Ghraib, and they full well knew the actual cost of the prescription drug bill - but that's really beside the point. In these cases we can take them at their word, but insist that the buck stops at the top. This incompetence issue is a weakness across the board - Iraq, Social Security, tariffs and subsidies, prescription drugs, you name it - and I think your average Joe on the street already knows it. What they lack is a reason to think the Democrats won't be equally incompetent.



So I think we should address this concern directly, by shaping some of our platform under the guiding principle that planning matters. Details matter. And our candidates should slap the GOP at every opportunity for their incompetence, projecting accountability as a Democratic value.

Ours include "universal health care", peace in Iraq, equitable progressive taxes, proper support for out military, protection of the environment, a union friendly labor climate, etc.

Democrats do have good ideas and big ideas.  I see no reason to flesh out the ideas publicly now, when we can't bring any of them to fruition.  The Republicans would then have the opportunity to tear them apart piece by piece.

Regarding Iraq, Dems should call for better support for the troops, while reminding everyone how badly the Republican leadership fallen short.  We must  demand a realistic accounting of the situation there and repeatedly ask for the plan for winning the peace.    

An interesting, productive project for some group of democratic whiz kids might be to make a comprehensive list of all the misconceptions floating out there that currently bedevil our party.  Then devise strategies and talking points designed to not only refute them but leave the listeners with a corrected view of the record contained in a easily understood and remembered slogan, for want of better term.

For example, on another thread earlier today, someone posted the old canard about how our party is so divisive and doctrinaire using the example of Bob Casey being 'silenced' at the convention because he was pro-life.  Casey was silenced because he didn't endorse the candidate of the party, but the lie has been repeated so often that it is conventional wisdom probably accepted even by many Democrats as true.

Every dem politician when confronted with this Casey silenced myth (and I heard it just the other day on CNN), should have a pithy response ready that refutes the myth and replaces it with the truth.  There are dozens of things like this and the GOP machine will continue to churn more of them out.  We need a comparable machine that is helping our guys confront and deflect misconceptions that damage our party, distort our record and diminish our credibility.

Republicans copntrol the agenda.  In the House, it is very difficult for the Dems to get a vote on any of their measures.  (See Pelosi's bill on specifiying benchmarks for withdrawing troops).  They get voted on only as amendments to something the GOP brings up for a vote.

Mark is right that the Dems do have good ideas.  But they need better packaging.  On something complex like healthcare, the Dems should adopt the Bush strategy of defining the problem, talk it up and say they are for solving it, and then demand the Republicans come up with a plan.  Dems should also propose making the gov't fiscally solvent.   Every time Bush and the GOP talk about Social Security, point out that it is the only part of the gov't that IS solvent and bring the debate back to making the gov't solvent again.

 

The dems should respond with; that statement is a lie but if given a choice between no ideas and the Republicans horrific ideas like killing social security, invading Iraq for no reason at all, effectively cutting taxes for the rich and rasiing it for th epoor... we could do without those sorts of ideas, thanks.

I don't think I agree with this. The trouble with jacking up lower incomes for retired people is that inflation very soon makes those higher incomes worth no more than they were before. My wife and I are retired and live comfortably in Sacramento on considerably less than $100,000 a year, and this is a high cost of living area, although not like the San Francisco Bay area is. I don't believe we retired folks have any claim on being able to continue to live in very high living cost areas. Instead, we do have a claim on being able to live comfortably somewhere, and it certainly takes less than $100,000 a year to do that.

It's not that the democrats don't have ideas or pithy slogans, but rather that they chose candidates who believe in them only half heartedly. And you cannot blame those leaders either. Generally the democratic ideas address the problems of the have nots, and so, given that the candidates cannot be from the have not group, there is immediately a contradication between the self interest of the leaders and the democratic ideals that they are supposed to propund.

I'm afraid that I disagree with the defensive tone of most of these posts.

Truth is, Democrats don't have any real ideas.  Perhaps part of the problem is what we're talking about in "ideas."  Yes, Democrats do have notions of universal healthcare or international development and many others.

 What Democrats don't have is any meta-idea that connects these issues together - -an idea that presupposes an anthropology, a deep economic critique, and a theory of society. 

Without this, Democrats -- the progressive party -- is left only to humanize their opoponents' agenda.  

Democrats, like the SDP in Germany or the Labour Party in the UK, took their cues from left-wing thought that had developed over 2 centures: Marx, Kautsky, Bernstein, Crosland.  And, too, more moderate, but progressive, figures like Keynes, Ohlin, and others.  

Over the last forty years, these thinkers and their associated ideas have been systematically discredited.  The list of Nobel laureates that this project has produced are legion:  Friedman, Stigler, Lucas, Buchanan, and many mores.  Which left-wing economist has produced ideas of this caliber?

So the right offers its adherents a vision of the promised land, a whole worldview.  What do progressives now offer?  A technocratic appeal?  An assertion that things could be managed a little better? (It's about competence, not leadership, said the oracle Michael Dukakis). 

What Democrats and progressives around the world need is another Keynes, another Marx.  Someone who can articulate the unseen assumptions that undergird our life, and who can hope to change the prevailing consciousness.

The Left is dead.  Long live the Left.

A/O 

The Democrats have big ideas too. They're just too compromised and cowardly to utter them out loud.

The problem with big ideas is that they're going to alienate someone. Can't offend the ____ lobby. Fill in the blank.

Moderate equals mediocrity.

There are no moderate, big ideas available to Democrats. Sorry. I know this new site is infiltrated with worshipers at the alter of centric accommodation.  But there is only one big idea that offers any hope of winning back the country: class warfare.

Of course, just mentioning the term will alienate people. I probably alienated plenty of you upper middle class white intellectual elites just now. But make no mistake. We didn't start this war. But we sure as hell better be prepared to fight it lest we find the Democratic party perpetually irrelevant -- as opposed to temporarily irrelevant as we are now.

Class war is the swordblade of populism. And populism alone is what made the Democratic party the dominant party throughout most of the 20th century.

So the Democrats next big idea better be offensive. Offensive to those who have betrayed the commonwealth  for their own greed and enrichment. Offensive to those who profiteer off the sick and elderly. Offensive to those who have sacrificed posterity and the wellness of our natural world for short term gain. And offensive to those who are turning our once thriving middle class into second class serfdom.

What do the Democrats stand for? I can tell you what we stood for when we controlled all three branches of government: We stood for the very big idea that we are our brother's keepers. That we are all in it together and when we work together for the commonwealth, we enrich ourselves too.

The New Deal was not just a set of policies. It was a covenant. It was a promise we made to each other to watch each others backs. And it took over 40 years of chipping away at that promise before Ronald Reagan was able to stand up in front of the American people and claim that government is the problem without being booed off the stage. It took 50 years of faded memories of food lines and suicides before Bill Clinton told a Democratic audience that personal responsibility was more important than our responsibility to the each other.

But the Democrats can start by standing for one big idea that has really come back into its own: democratic government. Specifically, the federal government.

The United States federal government is arguably one of the greatest inventions of man. And it is certainly the single greatest agent of social justice in human history. And we can't even get Democrats to defend it. In a democracy of, by and for the people, to claim that government is the problem is to say that we, the people, are the problem. It is a slap in the face to our founding fathers. It is an assault on the will and enterprise of the American people.

And yet the Republicans have managed, almost without opposition,  to depict the agent of our democracy as an enemy of the people. What can the Democrats offer when they can't even defend the institutions of democracy?

I hope it won't take another Great Depression before the Democrats return to their rightful role as The Party of The People. And I hope that the merchants of mediocrity that have taken over our once great party are as small of a minority as I think they are.

But it will take the honesty and wisdom to undestand why Jefferson created the Democratic party in the first place. And it will take courage to act on it. I'm not holding my breath.

Here is a big, fat Democratic idea (or at least it should be one):<div><br /></div><div>Wealth should not determine health.&nbsp; Note the distinction of health from health care.&nbsp; It's broader, and intentionally so.&nbsp; It goes to nutrition, safety, health care, and retirement security.&nbsp; And it goes to class and is, therefore, highly subversive.</div><div><br /></div><div>Yet it is powerful.&nbsp; I&nbsp;sat at a table this morning at my United Methodist church with 7 others, all across the political spectrum.&nbsp; Not one person disagreed with this simple, yet very big, idea.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>

despite a few misspellings and such, your words of wisdom come shining through

I agree that the right wingers claim the democrats have no ideas is an attempt to distract us from the failure of the Bush administration.

I also have to comment on the "progressives" playing the right wing game of trashing democrats. Quite honestly, "progressives" in name only have zero appeal for me.. and I'm as leftist as you can get. In all seriousness, it's the issues STUPID.. and the "progressives" who've been foaming off at the mouth about abandoning the labor movement, treating social justice and civil rights as cavalierly as the right wing are REGRESSIVE, and in no way grassroots. But then again, what else can one expect from those so afflicted by their own self interest that they're setting themselves up to be a hot dinner for the right wing.. so keep stroking your egos.. and paint yourselves into a corner. It seems to me that the old adage that a little education is a dangerous thing.. more like, some with too much education can and do get so puffed up that they lose touch with reality.

I did pay attention to the plans on the table by the various democratic candidates in the last presidential election. Perhaps the progs in name only had their heads up their posteriors instead of paying attention.. maybe the truth is inconvenient for them.. but democrats have laid out plans. They also have plans for dealing with poverty.. not the let's shift poverty from one group to another that some neo-progs tend to favor.. but the let's lift all boats together ideas that democratic leaders like FDR and JFK brought about.

but without the power to put them into action, they are just that: ideas.

Also, the Democrats have stood up for some pretty good ideas in the minority. Here are a few:

1- John Bolton is not a good choice for a U.N. envoy. We've stood behind that.

2- We need to increase the minimum wage. That proposal, led by Ted Kennedy, got smashed by the party in power.

3- Social Security should be protected and funded in its current form. The GOP disagrees, regardless of what they say. And we have clearly won that debate.

As a minority party, we're doing a pretty good job of projecting our ideas while rejecting theirs. The problem is in the basic principle that while the GOP can merely say "we want to do this" and get by with that, when the Democrats say "we want to do this," we are pushed to explain, in minute details, every facet of our plan. And if there is a single flaw, the GOP, with the aid of the MSM, attacks it to the bitter end. And if it's flawless, they just fund a think-tank to invent flaws.

The GOP has this down to a science, and have strong-armed the media into acquiescing. Rather than look for the truth, the media standard has turned into: "President Bush has laid out a plan" without any details so that it cannot be attacked, "Democrats say it is wrong" the media then refuses to state any facts. Then, "Republicans say that the Democrats must come up with a plan of their own instead of using obstructionist tactics."

I mean, look at it in the context of Social Security. Bush admiteddly has no plan, and says all options are on the table, as long as they have private accounts. The Democrats say that private accounts are a bad idea, that there is no real crisis and we have plenty of time to solve a problem that may not even be a problem at all. Then the Republicans ask us for a plan of our own.

But it's what is NOT said that is most important. What is NOT said (in the MSM, anyway) is that the GOP's plan is to ELIMINATE Social Security, not fund it, and in order to acheive long-term solvency could require repealing Bush's massive tax cuts.

This puts the Republicans in the position to say "see, the Democrats will use any excuse to raise your taxes," even though the Republicans brought the issue up to start with.

It's a TRAP, and we need to reverse it. Don't dare ask us for a plan when you don't have one yourself. And if you're plan is garbage, all that we need to do is say "that's garbage, NO."

The Democrats have a platform. The Republicans have a platform. Most Americans know the basics of those platforms. What they do not know (or in many cases do not want to know) is which platform helps them and which platform hurts them.

That's all we have to do. Show the people why they're core ideals are bad, and why ours are good. The polls show that the people tend to like more liberal ideals (environment, Social Security, higher wages, etc, etc) than conservative ones. The GOP just happens to be in a position to spin the truth, partly through their control of power and partly through media intimidation.

So far since the elction we have done a good job in just saying "no." It may not be a great long-term strategy, but if you check the polls, it's working.

Our biggest asset as Democrats is the ability to recognize that sometimes events can dictate changes in policy. That's not flip-flopping, that's called leadership. The opposite is the biggest weakness of this current batch of Republicans. "Stay the course regardless of the consequences" may sound relosute and strong, but in the end, sometimes it just doesn't work.

Just look at the Three Little Pigs. The last pig survived because he realized that wolves can blow down weak houses, so he built a strong, brick house. The Republicans continue thinking that if they continue to throw straw on the house, eventually the wolf will get tired and stop blowing.

So let's not make the mistake of the second pig, who hedged his bet by building a twig house. A twig, after all, is just more straw.

>I don't see why Democrates can't flesh out their big ideas even though they are in the minority.  If the Republicans are able to shoot them down, then maybe the ideas weren't so good after all. <

>I think when you run on the promise of a secret plan to be revealed after you are elected, people suspect you really have no plan.<

If the Democratic Party really wants to reconnect with the American people, it will stop throwing ideas and slogans at them and will instead announce that it is ready to listen. I believe that most Americans are frustrated about many things, be it Iraq, outsourcing, education, debt, and whatever, and feel that no one is really listening to their concerns. For the next year, the Democratic Party needs to get its forces out into the neighborhoods of America, asking people what's on their mind. All year long we could have press conferences reporting on what we are hearing, and on what the Democratic Party wants to do to address the concerns they are hearing. I know this idea sounds hokey, but if done in good faith by the entire party nationwide, I believe it could reconnect us to the American people and reinvigorate and expand our grassroots. I know that I would be impressed if someone came to my door and listened to my concerns, and promised to do something about them. Afterwards, I'd keep my ears open to hear what they have to say. Anyway, that's what I would do to get America involved and interested in what Democrats are going to do for them when they get the chance.

And that was all I was suggesting, cloudy, is that we get out front on our issues instead of always responding to the Repugs.  When the choice is proactive vs. reactive, proactive is always better.  And especially on the big bore issues you refer to, that affect the most voters.

First of all I agree that what the Republicans do best is frame big issues. Democrats fall all over themselves trying to dot every i and cross every t, until the basic party platform has so many footnotes and qualifications that it reads like my philosophy textbook. Broad strokes first, details later.

In my opinion two things need to happen. First, the democratic leadership needs to work much, much harder to give us dems in the trenches total access to it's policy positions as well as the reasons behind them. It makes it extremely difficult to play an active role in progressive politics if you have only a surfice understanding of why we believe the things we believe. Republicans have enjoyed tremendous success with conservative books that stray from academia and focus on broad issues the layman will understand. It's time for Democrats to get in that game. Publish a Democratic Party Reader containing the 20 most important issues to Democrats, why we think they are important, and how we can most effectively make our case to independents and moderate republicans. Have grass roots meetings which focus on these 20 issues, making sure that everyone who leaves the meeting has a solid understanding of what we thing and why we think it.  I realize this goes on already, but make it official and make every meeting across the US about the same issues and get everyone using the same language. Educate the base, then...

SET A DATE OF ACTION!
Remember on the Simpsons when Springfield was assulted by an ad campaign that said, simply: GABBO IS COMING! No one knew what Gabbo was, what it did, who it was for, etc.  But on the date of arrival people were glued to their TV for no other reason than the promise of something huge (the fact that Gabbo was a hand puppet for kids didn't matter at that point).  Democrats need to do this.  The spin and the soundbytes and the speeches on the steps of the capitol mean nothing if no one is listening. Everyday a Democrat is saying something worth hearing but no one, not the public, not the press, knows when to tune in.  What we need to do is set a date and make it plain that from that date forward the tide will turn. Keep plugging this date as the most momentous occasion in politics in the last 25 years. Push and push and push until you guaruntee that every single American with a tv or a radio will tune in to hear what you have to say, then...

DROP THE HAMMER. Come out swinging with everything you have. Have a televised convention that shows powerful democrats laying waste to republican failures (Biden on foreign policy, Obama on poverty, Clinton on healthcare, Warren Buffet on taxes). Make it clear that from that day forward the Democratic Party will be the party that restores America to the promise of the Clinton years. The day after and beyond, hit the talk-shows with a unified message, and I mean WORD FOR WORD. This thread was started because in the last 2 weeks every conservative colomnest has used the phrase "The democrats have no ideas." It's a testement to how the press can be manipulated, not be speaking the same message as other members of your party, but by speaking the EXACT SAME WORDS! The Republicans get this, the Democrats need to get this.

Anyways the point is, we talk about fixing the party or bringing new ideas, or refuting accusations. But we're missing the most glaring problem: The Republicans control the dialogue and no amount of change will help the Democrats as long as that's the case. We need a PR blitz and a specific "Turning the Tide" date that will wrest control of the airwaves away from Republicans just long enough for us to talk cultural revolution and present our plan to the American people. THEN we'll have an audience and a genuine chance at political change.

Here is one simple, very straight-forward idea.  Lower the overall social security tax by one or two points, and make everybody pay it.

This would ensure the financial stability of social security for untold years.  This means that those earning over $90,000 would be taxed for social security, but at a lower rate than everyone else is today.  

Why hasn't this been proposed?  It is simple; it would lower everybody's taxes; it would be fair.

The second suggestion, for those who want to control their retirement investment, is to allow any amount to be placed in an IRA or Ruth or 401K.  The taxes would be collected in the future, as now, but anybody could save any amount they wanted to.  This is true "privatization," unrelated to social security. 

my second comment was in response to Robert Brown, posting #16, which is now somewhere else for some reason.  Maybe I goofed, but screwy things have been happening, like ratings misaveraged etc.

Not a problem, I didn't know the reply wasn't for me.  There have been glitches.  This is still a young site, so I try not to get too worked up about them myself...

It seems to me that it ought to be easy for someon who has a modicum of wit and style to just turn this on it head by saying something like:

"The Republicans think they are full of ideas. Well, they are: bad ones. Radically overhall a tax code that was delivering surpluses and paying down the national debt? Bad idea, but it sure is an idea. Radically overhall the single most successful social program the world has ever seen because of a financial problem that is 40 years away if it appears at all? Bad idea, but, yes, it's an idea all right. Test out a new theory of warfare, against the advice of your top generals, in the most dangerous and unstable place in the world? Disastrous idea, but it's an idea for you.

Frankly, I think we'd all be better off with a lot fewer ideas from the Republicans. Our ideas were low unemployment, balanced budgets, high economic growth, peace and prosperity. And you know what? Our ideas were working pretty well until the Republicans came along and decided we needed some new ideas."

I'm not sure if I have it exactly right, but the phrasing is important. It is very difficult, to counter the "bad idea" charges without first rephrasing the charges to make them more specific. That's the position we want to put them in. Deny them the soundbite.

"I don't know.  It worked for Nixon back when it was clear that the Democrats didn't have any plan at all to get us out of Viet Nam.  We might have to do something like that in '08 if Bush keeps on failing  in Iraq."

Sadly, I think this is the most likely route back to power for D's.  Stick to vague, flowery platitudes and hope for failure in Iraq so you can win by default.

Agreed. Before we get all wonky, circle our wagons and attack each other over "ideas", we must develop a consensus on values and principles that we will turn to when developing those ideas.

Please visit my blog on values, principles and Democratic Party Message. It is a bit too long to post here.

While this is a good idea, it supports the Republican frame that social security is a problem. And, the unspoken frame is that one does away with problems.

"We stood for the very big idea that we are our brother's keepers."

This slogan played well in the great depression since most people could reasonably interperet it as meaning the Feds. would force my brother to take care of me.  In more prosperous times people interperet it as meaning the Feds. will force me to take care of my ner-do-well brother-in-law and it doesn't go down as well.

I think that most progressives, despite their repeated claims of being oh so compassionate, are just as greedy as anyone else...it's human nature.  Thus, a really successful will have to await the next depression.

If you are going to take up class warfare, you better fight on the side of the wealthy. Numerous surveys have shown that most voting Americans think they are fairly well off (even if they're not). This means you can only win the class warfare battle if you take the side of the wealthy. This, of course, is exactly what the Repugs have done and it's worked marvelously well for them.  Fighting for the poor only works when the majority of voters start identifying themselves as poor. I don't see any sign of that happening any time soon. 

While Democrats do have policy proposals -- like "universal health care," peace in Iraq, equitable progressive taxes, protection of the environment, union-friendly labor climate, etc., as mentioned elsewhere -- there doesn't seem to be a principle uniting these policies. 

I think that's part of where the sense of the Democrats as nay-sayers comes from.  Opposition to Republican bills/policies is rarely couched as a stand on principle.  Instead, it's about the minutiae of the matter.

Yeah, it matters a lot if we let myths perpetuate.  (BTW, 'myths' are NEVER reality based -- that's why they call them 'myths'.)  Look at your original post on the other thread -- if you realize that the Casey example is not true, your whole argument falls apart.  But people persist in believing that we stifle pro-life politicians -- when we do not.  Apparently you want to fix things that aren't broken?  How exactly would the Ds stop stifling pro-life voices if we haven't been stifling pro-life voices?

We've let them define us, if we go forward based on their 'myths' about us, it will never end.  Do you suggest that every time the GOP manages to delude people into believing some nonsense about democrats, we should just accept it?  Your comment about Dean just underscores my point.  The uproar was over a 'myth', i.e., that he said the GOP is racist.  You want to push back with the 'truth' about what Dean said.  But I thought you didn't want to dispel myths?

You wrote:

"This means you can only win the class warfare battle if you take the side of the wealthy....Fighting for the poor only works when the majority of voters start identifying themselves as poor."
 
If you define the class war as between the rich and the poor you will lose.  If you define it as the rich vs. the middle class you have a much better shot at prevailing given the current conditions in our country.

One of the things I see with John Edwards is that he has made, to his everlasting personal credit, fighting poverty his major theme at the moment.  During his campaign, on the other hand, his Two Americas rhetoric was couched as the wealthy on the one hand and everyone else--middle class and poor--on the other.  The latter might work as a message with sufficiently broad appeal in a general campaign, particularly if Edwards continues to put the positive, this-is-America-and-in-America-everyone-deserves-a-fair-chancefac
e on it. 

Personally I am not in favor of demonizing rich people in a campaign.  First, it simply is not true that all rich people are selfish so and sos who are just fine with screwing the rest of us.  There are many well off people who are doing public spirited things and even some who are politically progressive.  I believe there are many more who would respond to a call for national unity if it is put in a positive way from a candidate who earns their respect.  

As a matter of political strategy it's sort of true by definition--isn't it?--that people who are wealthy and are involved in politics tend to have more influence than the rest of us.  So why give cause for legitimate animus to shakers and movers by saying things which demonize them all? 

That doesn't mean I believe in sugarcoating what is going on, either.  A message with no edge won't resonate.  

But I hope we do it in a way that doesn't paint an overly broad brush or get us out on a limb that is going to break off.  Remember we--or at least most of us, I would hope--are economic populists these days because we seek to unify the country, bring it back into balance, not pit groups of Americans against other Americans as this Administration has done.  Tonally I thought Edwards had it about right with his Two Americas theme.      

I think the best approach is to avoid pitting rich against middle class or poor.  Instead, I'd recommend a phrase like:

"We're standing up for hard working Americans."
 
Most Americans of every income class consider themselves hard working. You're not alienating anyone and you're appealing to a virtue most Americans like to attribute to themselves.

Actually, those are two good ideas, with tweaking, of course. I would add: charge income tax on all Social Security income, thus taking back much of the SS benefit the millionaire earners would be getting. The "no limits" idea for existing savings program I would modify by just radically increasing the existing limits, so as to prevent the very high earners from avoiding taxes on the bulk of their income. This would still make Social Security sound for the future as far as the eye can see.

Listen, you are going through all these contortions to convert SS to a means tested poverty program paid for from general revenue.  Why not just do that?

No, I didn't say anything at all about a means test. Today we pay income tax on our Social Security payments, and that tax is progressive. The change I proposed is to simplify it by just taxing Social Security as if it were any other income. Eliminating the upper limit on income to be FICA taxed is not means testing at all. Even today you get a better "return" on your FICA if you are low income than you do if you are high income. My change doesn't drastically change that. And, raising the limit on contributions to IRAs and 401ks isn't remotely related to a means test.

Assuming you don't pay any more benefits to those earning moe than $90,000 but force them to pay SS tax, that is the same as raising their income tax by 10 points.  Taxing benefits is no different for the recipient than denying benefits due to means.

Listen, I understand that smart liberals do not want SS to look like a poverty program for politival reasons though I think most of them want it to in fact work that way.  Your scheme is one of many that pushes in that direction.  Is it a political bridge too far?  Not for me to judge.