Mild-Mannered or Lily-Livered?

Are Democrats wimping out?

I'm too, ah, civil, to make such a charge, but we're starting to hear such complaints.

The conservative side has cranked up the decibel level, fueled by the town-hall shouters, the talk-show ranters and the just-say-no Republicans who want to derail the health-care plan.

And the president's party?

Well, the Democrats are famously fractious, but Barack Obama sets the tone. And despite his threat to "call out" critics who distort his policies, he's maintained a law professor's tone. He still talks about bipartisanship, even though the Dems are down to maybe, possibly getting Olympia Snowe on the health bill.

Of course, it's easier being in opposition. Downside: You have no power. Upside: You don't have to actually pass anything. You don't even have to put forth a plausible alternative. You just have to stop things from happening. When the Dems stopped Bush's Social Security plan, they didn't try to push through their own. They celebrated having killed the thing.

Does the liberal side have to punch back harder in the Beck era? Or would that just make voters blame both parties for endless Beltway bickering?

In the Wall Street Journal, Thomas Frank argues for a stiffer spine:

"There has been no better time for a vindication of activist, Rooseveltian government since the 1930s. The laissez-faire faith lies in pieces around us. Conservative dogmatism lay behind many of the Bush administration's worst blunders, including some of the monumental screw-ups to which conservative pundits point when denouncing government generally.

"But that is not how the Democrats have chosen to respond. Instead, they pine for civility, pretending that the argument comes down to the scary rhetoric issuing from the right. 'I have concerns about some of the language that is being used, because I saw this myself in the late '70s in San Francisco,' said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi last week. 'This kind of rhetoric was very frightening, and it created a climate in which violence took place.'

"I have concerns about the rhetoric being used as well, and about the louts and the bullies who use it. But it seems clear that Mrs. Pelosi's aim is to avoid debate when she ought to be wading into the thick of it. Her team has the arguments; it has the facts; it has gale-force historical winds at its back: Why not give back as good as you get? Why not simply beat the other side instead of complaining tearfully that they play too rough? . . .

"Their opponents, meanwhile, have responded to the economic crisis by doubling down on the bad ideas that got us here in the first place. Their most prominent representative is the conspiracy-minded TV weeper Glenn Beck.