Catch of the Day

Kevin Drum spots a truly meaningless poll question about the GOP "Pledge."   Good catch!

There is, of course, a shell game here.  Step one, if you know you're apt to do well in the fall elections, publish a set of vague talking points, carefully scrubbed of any obvious controversial issue positions.  Step two, put the "agenda" aside, and continue with your normal campaign.  Step three, pull out the talking points after the election, now re-interpreted to include all of your controversial issue positions, and claim that the election is a clear mandate for whatever it is that you want to do.

There's nothing wrong with running that shell game.  Of course, there's no reason that objective observers or the political opposition should buy into it, either.  Mandates, whether for liberal or conservative pols, are just fictions dreamed up by the winners.  Nothing more.