I thought Noam Scheiber was joking on this. Apparently not:
Moderates must insist, à la Galston and Kamarck, that Democrats won't win back the White House unless they convince voters to trust them on national security, which means making the war on terrorism not just the party's top priority but its central preoccupation in 2008. We're not just talking about calling for a larger military, but something dramatic to signify the shift--like a plan to strike an Iranian or North Korean nuclear facility if need be. Moderates must also maintain that Democrats can't afford to lose ground among swing voters by taking hard-line positions on abortion and gay marriage, though the basic right to an abortion and civil rights for homosexuals should remain central Democratic positions. In return, moderates would endorse an ambitious domestic policy agenda, the centerpiece of which would be universal health insurance but which would also include revisiting nafta and intense opposition to K Street-sponsored legislation like tort and bankruptcy reform.
Dude. We tried this already. Go ask Lyndon Johnson how well it worked.
Update: Maybe this needs a fuller rebuttal. Since my colleague Matt gave it a semi-approving citation, there's a terrifying chance that someone, somewhere, is taking it seriously. And we can't have that. So let's say it simply: this idea is insane. And it's insane in the Einsteinian sense of the word, as in doing the same thing twice while expecting different results. Kennedy got us into Vietnam because he was worried about looking weak, and Johnson accelerated our involvement for the exact same reason. He figured that The Great Society couldn't go off if its planner was deposed for being too soft on Communism, so he'd better level IndoChina to be on the safe side.
It didn't work. Indeed, not only didn't it work, the schism it created destroyed the Democratic party's national security credentials for a generations. Eugene McCarthy and later, George McGovern, were direct results of Johnson's decision, and they collectively did the party's foreign policy standing more damage than any red baiters ever could have. And, in doing that, they helped create Reagan and doom the the Democratic party's social projects for a generation.
