The purpose of winning elections is not merely victory but the opportunity to enact one�s policy preferences.

But, of course, if one won't announce what those policies will be, it leads to two obvious options:

1. There is no coherent set of policies to announce
2. The set of policies one would advance in office is likely to drive voters away.

This morning, WaPo notes that it isn’t just the Democrats who lack a compelling message going into the November elections:
Republican efforts to craft a policy and political agenda to carry the party into the midterm elections have stumbled repe...

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The Democrats� failure to assemble a unified message is more of a head scratcher. Certainly, they have a major opening with the current tide of public dissatisfaction with the status quo.

Their message will turn out to be pretty much the same as Kerry's was in '04: "We'd do everything the same, only better."

Why would their doing it be any better? "Because we're Democrats."

It's the brand thing. Like why Coke is always better than Pepsi, even when it's worse.