Rainbow Nation?

There's a suggestion on the table to mix up the seating for the State of the Union next Thursday evening ... get Repubs and Dems voluntarily to sit together and not on rigidly partisan sides of the hall. Virginia Foxx next to Barney Frank, for example. Dem Sen. Mark Udall of Colorado advocated for this in a letter to the leadership of both parties. Many Dems are embracing the idea, but so far no elected Republican in Congress has publicly endorsed it. But a spokesman for Repub Leader Mitch McConnell has pointedly not rejected the suggestion.

Sen. Udall got the idea from The Third Way, a creation of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC). Historically, the DLC has represented the most pro-business wing of the Democratic Party. The presidency of Bill Clinton might be said to have been its apotheosis, and Hillary Clinton essentially ran under their banner. That Clinton legacy endures. "What would Clinton do?" seems to be both a literal and a figurative byword at their "fresh thinking" scroll.

Bill Clinton is so 1992 for the moniker "fresh thinking," but the idea of uncomfortable seating for the State of the Union -- Michele Bachmann next to Anthony Weiner -- might actually get me to watch.