Good to see someone standing up and tamping down on the hysteria that the GOP will make Nancy Pelosi into some sort of Democratic albatross. When you live in DC and breathe politics, it's easy to assume that the median American does relatively the same, and if they don't actually know many congressional staffers, they religiously watch Meet the Press and scan The New York Times to gain familiarity with their bosses. But thats uh, not true. As it turns out, a majority of voters don't even know who Nancy Pelosi is. And it's hard to be scared of someone who hasn't even seen fit to accrue some name recognition.
Indeed, so much as I don't like the implications of it, the Democrats great advantage going into this election is that they lack a distinct leader who can be defined and vilified. Republicans have to somehow escape their association with George W. Bush, Tom DeLay, and the rest of that crew, but Democrats have been so thoroughly defeated for the past couple of election that no publicly recognizable leaders exist in institutionally powerful positions. That makes Democratic targets diffuse and slippery, and thus hard to hit. And while Republicans might want to allay that weakness by painting Nancy Pelosi 12-feet tall and nuts, first they're going to have to explain who in the world she is, and why anyone should care. Democrats running against George W. Bush will have to do no such thing.
