You have to hand it to the Republicans: They know how to stick to their guns. With a million people facing the abrupt expiration of their unemployment and COBRA benefits this week, Senator Jim Bunning, Republican of Kentucky, went to the mat to prevent a routine extension of those programs during the worst economic crisis our country has seen outside the Great Depression.

Bunning held up unanimous consent for the extension, insisting that the program should be paid for with the remaining stimulus money already committed to other projects, because otherwise Congress "does not intend to pay for" floating the unemployed.

Democrats are having a field day with Bunning's obstructionist stand. As they should, since it epitomizes Republican politics: cruel and out of touch--totally unconcerned about people's suffering. It is also, as it happens, bad economics. The pay-as-you-go budgeting Bunning is championing is refuted by Republican economist Mark Zandi--John McCain's economic adviser during his Presidential campaign. Zandi produced a chart showing that the most effective forms of economic stimulus include extending unemployment benefits and giving aid to the states. These programs, coincidentally, are the very ones Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid stripped out of the recent jobs bill, which is why the Senate was having a last-minute vote on extending unemployment in the first place.

Here is where we get to the real problem. While Republicans and Democrats are eager to make each other look bad--and Bunning's Darth Vader routine certainly lends itself to late-night parody--the Democrats are, unfortunately, correct when they assert that the two parties are "not that far apart" on policy matters, as they did ad nauseum during the President's health care summit last week.

Instead of pushing through a healthy economic stimulus, including aid to the states and the unemployment extension, the Dems have been trying to pass these items piece-meal in an attempt to peel off Republican votes and make obstructionists like Bunning look bad. It may turn out that Bunning's stand, like Newt Gingrich's government shutdown in the 1990s, ends up benefiting the Democrats politically. But winning these political skirmishes could come at the cost of losing the war--not to mention a lifeline for the million-plus Americans who are left out in the cold this week.

Clinton managed to make the Republicans in Congress look bad, but he also moved so far to the right politically that he became the President who ended welfare. He conceded significant ideological ground on tax cuts and trimming the size of government, explored privatizing Social Security, and his other programs, including health care, dwindled to a handful of micro initiatives. Meanwhile, the right grew stronger, louder, and more extreme on his watch.

The Democrats have remained in a habitually defensive posture ever since. And it is not doing the country any good.

A large part of the health care summit was taken up with Democratic talk about the need to rein in deficits. Viewers of the first half of the debate saw plenty of ideological agreement on bringing down deficits and capping medical malpractice awards. (Finally, Senator Dick Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, pointed out that med mal represents one-fifth of 1 percent of medical spending in this country.) The Dems' ideological bridge-building paved the way for the summary spin Republicans like to give to any Democratic program, from health care reform to the jobs bill: expensive, unfunded, wasteful government programs that will drive up the deficit.

Instead of opening the door for that attack, Democrats should be fighting back, defending a set of economic priorities that sets a floor on how far we should be willing to let people fall in the richest nation on Earth.

A majority of Americans still believe in Medicare for all who want it, a safety net for the elderly and unemployed, and a more just and equitable society.

The Democrats need to push against the Republican extremists, before the rest of us are left scrabbling over scraps in a country that looks less like and less small-d democratic.

Ruth Conniff is the political editor of The Progressive magazine. To subscribe for just $14.97 a year, just click here.