Democrats need to do more than just criticize the Bush policies. However Bush and his supporters in Congress need to do more than just dismiss Democratic suggestions. Two weeks ago a Democratic representative from Massachusetts attempted to add a provision to the energy bill that would mandate increase mileage for cars, trucks and SUVs in an effort to help reduce demand for oil. The Republicans promptly voted that down past the bill with no such provision and ignored the most effective way reducing the demand for oil and thus reducing the price and the energy problems we have in this country.
The Democrats have suggested moving the debate for Social Security to funding the existing system rather than making changes to the system. President Bush continues running around telling everybody that individual accounts are the answer when everyone knows, including the Social Security actuaries, that the individual accounts do-nothing fix the funding problem of Social Security and in fact make a solution more expensive. Thus unless the Republicans are going to take alternate suggestions seriously, nothing is going to happen.
