IT'S THE ENTIRE REPUBLICAN PARTY, STUPID

I know I should be writing about the imminent Third World War, but this Axios story has me pounding my head on the desk:

Biden needs a Trump substitute

Searching for a strategy to avoid a 2022 midterm disaster, advisers to President Biden have discussed elevating a unifying Republican foil not named Donald Trump.

... Biden confidants worry that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is too unknown, that Biden won't demonize Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell because of their longstanding and collegial relationship and that elevating Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis could backfire.

... Team Biden's muscle memory is to elevate and focus on the best foil Democrats have ever been gifted — Trump.

But as Terry McAuliffe's loss in the Virginia governor's race showed last fall, running against an out-of-office Trump won't cut it with voters.

Biden advisers know they need to bring Republicans back into the fray and interrupt the ceaseless news cycles about Democratic infighting....

DeSantis is an obvious target who has been discussed among Biden confidants as a potential foil for the president.

But some Biden advisers are reluctant to contest every midterm race on DeSantis' signature issue — COVID-19 — because the Biden administration's approaches on vaccine and mask mandates may be a political liability with some swing voters.

Mazie Hirono is the only person quoted in this story who comes close to understanding what Democrats should do.

Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) told Axios: "I wish that we could just find one face that we could point to, such as with Donald Trump... maybe a composite."

I suppose you could say that Democrats need a "composite," but the way I'd put it is that they need to develop the habit of highlighting every extreme, radical, off-putting thing done by any Republican and linking them to a generalized critique of the Republican Party as an extreme, radical, off-putting party. It would mean shining a spotlight on the worst statements and policy proposals from Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Paul Gosar, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, J.D. Vance, Josh Mandel, Kari Lake, and, yes, Ron DeSantis, as well as a host of other far-right figures, and saying, "This is what you get if Republicans win."

But that would require a lot fewer paeans to the glories of bipartisanship -- not just from Biden, but from other Democrats. It would require Democrats to stop talking as if Democratic policy proposals are invalid unless they have Republican buy-in. It would require Democrats to say, in effect, "We're right, they're wrong" -- which was actually the title of a book by James Carville, of all people, many years ago.

They can't bring themselves to do this. They want one GOP foil because they don't want to say bad things about the other members of the party -- who hate them. (Biden thinks McConnell is a pal? If a future GOP-majority House impeaches Biden, I guarantee you McConnell will vote to convict.)

And while I'm talking about this story, I have a question: Why did these internal discussions even go public? When Republican intraparty strategy debates are reported, the tone is always "Here's an attack the GOP is considering that could well be devastating for Democrats." When Democratic strategy debates are reported, the tone -- as it is here -- is inevitably "Here's a desperate thing Democrats are considering to cover up all their recent failures." So don't talk about this stuff within earshot of reporters. Even if Democrats were planning a smart strategy, they should have kept it to themselves.