Can Democrats succeed without Bush-hate to unify them?

The whole effort was summarized nicely by the party’s slogan in 2006, “A New Direction for America.” There was no need to specify north or south, east or west, up or down. Compared with Bush, any alternative destination seemed appealing. And by becoming the apotheosis of the fresh and the new, Barack Obama emerged as the most attractive guide to this unknown promised land.

The consequence is that Democrats must govern in one of the most difficult periods in American history while managing a sprawling coalition and working though a political structure near the point of breakdown — largely because of the dilapidated state of that dysfunctional and undemocratic partisan hothouse, the United States Senate.