The Hill reports that vulnerable House and Senate Democrats want to focus more on the economy and “skip the party’s controversial legislative agenda.” Rather than safeguarding their reelection bids, these Democrats are more likely shooting themselves in the foot by deliberately sidestepping issues like immigration reform and climate change which helped Obama win the White House and put many of them in office.

In a Huffington Post column posted today, political strategist Robert Creamer offered Democrats four pieces of invaluable advice in preparation for next year’s midterm elections. Yellow-bellied Democrats should apply some of Creamer’s “lessons learned” to the immigration debate before passing up a golden opportunity to craft and pass progressive immigration reform in a Democratic-controlled Congress:

1. “First and foremost, the results show that it is critical that the Democratic message be framed in populist terms.”

Creamer explains that yesterday’s election results represent a referendum on incumbents — or candidates from the incumbent party — who failed to present themselves as populist “agents of change who will return economic power to average Americans.”

Backing away from the immigration issue isn’t going to do anything but reinforce the status quo. Democrats can and should talk about immigration reform in economic terms. For example, they could mention that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 would have generated $66 billion in new revenue during 2007-2016 if right-wingers hadn’t blocked it. Legalizing undocumented immigrants wouldn’t just generate more tax revenue, it would also level the playing field for all workers and improve wages and working conditions in industries that currently exploit immigrant labor. Meanwhile, shutting the door on high-skilled immigrants could drive the world’s best and brightest away from contributing to and growing the US economy.

2. “Independent voters will demand that Democrats deliver on our promise of change.”

Creamer points out that independents are impatient and need to see “some serious evidence” of change. He specifically lists immigration reform as one of the battles Democrats are going to have to win in addition to passing legislation that stimulates the economy. The nation’s immigration system has been broken for a long time and Democrats could win a lot of points for being the Party that finally fixes it.

3). “Democrats must inspire the base.”

Latino and immigrant voters make up a growing and powerful voting bloc that in 2008 came out in droves to support Obama and helped flip red states blue. Latinos overwhelmingly favored Democrats in hopes of seeing major improvements in their communities. Much of the political success of the current Congress and administration hinges on its ability to deliver comprehensive immigration reform and in turn make life-long Democrats out of Latino and immigrant voters.

4. “Our not-so-secret weapon in 2010 is the Republican circular firing squad.”

The right-wing’s self-destructive tendency is especially evident in the immigration debate. Right-wing anti-immigrant demagoguery tarnished the Republican brand during the 2007 immigration debate. The GOP is now viewed amongst Latino and immigrant voters as having created a climate of undeterred public immigrant-bashing that brought nativism into the mainstream. Some Republicans are trying to clean up the Party’s image, but one doesn’t have to look very far to realize that it’s probably going to be a while before the GOP is able to purge itself of its nativist fringe. Old habits die hard, and right-wing anti-immigrant rhetoric will probably lose hardline Republicans some votes without any Democratic interference.

But Creamer warns that Democrats can’t count on it. Actions speak louder than words and despite the fact that it’s progressives who created the “deep well of desire for real change in America,” their majority is by no means guaranteed if they don’t have the guts to go after it.

Defending recent suggestions that National Iranian American Council director Trita Parsi is an instrument of Iran, Reihan Salaam doubles down on one of the hoariest of hoary old conservative foreign policy arguments:

[W]hile Parsi is undoubtedly a believer in democratic liberalism who wants to see Iran radically reform its institutions, he objectively serves Iranian interests insofar as he discourages Western efforts to exert pressure on the regime. This doesn’t make Parsi a bad person. Plenty of Iranian dissidents believe that a democratic Iran should have a nuclear deterrent. Plenty want a denuclearized Iran, yet believe that Western pressure amounts to a kind of imperialism that should be actively resisted. This isn’t that complicated.

Iran doesn’t have an actual AIPAC. Instead, there is a loose network of policy scholars, activists, think tanks, civil servants, etc., who strongly oppose a forward-leaning U.S. policy in the Persian Gulf for a wide, sometimes overlapping variety of reasons. Some of these people have a real financial interest in a better relationship between Washington and Qom [sic], but most don’t. On some issues, members of this loose network get important things right. A lot of realists have raised important questions about the efficacy of sanctions, and they are right to do so. But it’s also true that these voices help today’s Iran. The Iranians among them have added credibility.

Remember when people who opposed the Iraq war — that is, the people who turned out to be right — were accused of being “objectively pro-Saddam“? They didn’t want the U.S. to invade Iraq, and neither did Saddam!

By this reasoning, those in favor of the Iraq war — that is, those who supported what I guess Reihan defines as “a forward-leaning U.S. policy in the Persian Gulf” — “objectively served Iran’s interests” insofar as the war removed Iran’s most hated foe and produced an Iraqi government dominated by Iran’s Shia Islamist clients. This isn’t that complicated. But it is very, very silly.

What is complicated, however, is answering the question of whose interests in Iran, exactly, would be served by further sanctions, or undermined by continued engagement. Reihan writes about “Iran” as if it were one group of people with one set of interests, but of course this is not the case, especially post-June 12.

For example, it’s pretty clear that the gasoline sanctions bill currently wending its way through Congress would hurt the Iranian people while benefiting the Revolutionary Guardsmen who control large portions of the Iranian black market. Does this make all of those who voted for and support the bill objectively pro-IRGC? I doubt anyone would say so. “Objectively pro-Evildoer X” arguments tend to apply only to those who don’t believe that “a forward-leaning U.S. policy” has to necessarily entail unilateral escalation and confrontation.