Peggy Noonan offers some sober advice for the Democratic party in today’s WSJ. Here’s a taste:

The Groups--all the left-wing outfits from the abortion people to the enviros--didn’t deliver in the last election, and not because they didn’t try. They worked their hearts out. But they had no one to deliver. They had only money. The secret: Nobody likes them. Nobody! No matter how you feel about abortion, no one likes pro-abortion fanatics; no one likes mad scientists who cook environmental data. Or rather only rich and creepy people like them. Stand up to the Groups--make your policies more moderate, more nuanced, less knee-jerk. . . .

And don’t forget to confuse categories. Be counterintuitive. Republican Mike Bloomberg of New York won’t let workingmen and -women smoke at the local bar. Democrats always wind up in support of such measures. Don’t! Distance yourself from the smoke Nazis, from all Nazis. Be sane; take the side of normal humans with normal imperfections. Let the Republicans look stupid on these issues if they choose to. Don’t fall for it. The Sierra Club will love you anyway. (Politicians in New York tell me the tide has turned, that even people shuddering outside buildings grabbing a smoke say it’s only right. I’m not shuddering outside a building, but I talk to smokers all the time and let me tell you how they feel about the banners. They hate them.)

As I write this, however, the left-fringe of the party is on full display on C-SPAN, voicing their objection to Ohio’s electoral votes. Perhaps they should have read Noonan this morning.