Plouffe Better Get It Right This Time

is all I can say. Judging from what appears to be a new Democratic feistiness, I sort of hope he is. But then, I want to believe.
Krugman reminds me not to be too sanguine.

I have to say that the various accounts of what went wrong are converging on a very depressing picture, in which White House political “experts” actually believed that trying to please the Washington Post editorial page was a winning political move.

From an earlier column on "most voters," vs. the Very Serious People:

What I learn from political scientists is that this is all fantasy — albeit a kind of fantasy beloved of political pundits, who love to imagine that complicated psychodramas are playing out in the minds of voters. Well, here’s a little secret: most voters don’t sit around reading Clive Crook columns or debating the Bowles-Simpson plan. They have a gut sense — things are getting better or they’re getting worse — and mainly vote on that basis. They’re not paying attention at all to this stuff.