In Illinois we've elected a Democratic governor (Rod Blagojevich) who for one full term and now into a second one has maintained a "no new taxes" pledge, while government services have been cut to the bone and now beyond the bone.  All state services, prisons, health care, police, parks have felt the lash.

Now we've elected a Cook County Board President (Todd Stroger) who has made a similar pledge, and vast swaths of county government are now to be stripped in a 17% across-the-board meat-ax approach.  Inner city health clinics are going to be closed.  Jail staffs will be cut, as well as sheriffs' deputies.  I recently served on a jury where I got to see the deputies first hand.  I don't see how the court system could do with fewer than it has.

It has been said, over and over, that these institutions are larded with patronage employees who don't provide a full day's work for a full day's pay.  And it's true.  But unless leadership has the will to cut these people out surgically, ignoring all political considerations, something they find it impossible to do while still maintaining their positions, the people punished for this are always those who depend on the services, never those connected ones who are goofing off.  The "connected" know how to maintain their positions.  The hardworking, useful employees who are not "connected" are the ones who lose their jobs.

It seems that the tax cutters are content to ignore this fact, and simply assume that cuts will be made efficiently.  But this assumption is almost certainly false and everyone knows it.

Seems to me that Democrats, under such conditions, need to argue the need for higher taxes, balancing, perhaps with sincere efforts to raise efficiency by letting patronage do-nothings go.  But to demand that all fat be cut before considering tax increases does not seem to demonstrate the compassion that Democrats like to cite when comparing themselves to Republicans.

Bottom line:  Dems must not be afraid to challenge Republican taxcut dogma, and indeed argue for state and local tax cuts where necessary to make up for federal cutbacks, while strenuously trying to shift the blame back to the Republicans where it belongs.

Needless to say, such policies are invisible on the political landscape today, either from the "Establishment" or the gate-crashing "Netroots".  Things need to change.

Please read the following this column and this one from Chicago Sun-Times Columnist Mary Mitchell and ask yourself why the people Mitchell is talking about should bother voting Democrat.

Are these issues that the "Netroots" should really be ignoring?  Shouldn't politics be about more than "framing" and media and getting elected?  Is this why we all are doing what we do?