Matt Taibbi runs into Tom Vilsack's buzz in a public bathroom. From their encounter:

He handed me a Washington Post clip with the relevant quote. The headline of the story was 'Tom Vilsack's Democratic Optimism.' " I frowned again.

"I thought Al Gore already tried 'Democratic Optimism,' " I said.

"No, no, that was Kerry-Edwards," he said. "And that was just plain 'optimism.' They were reacting to Bush's 'pessimism never created a job' ad. Our thing is completely different. This is Democratic Optimism. Completely different."

I read the interview quickly.

"And this line here," I said, pointing. "This line where he says he's going to 'talk about health care, education and security from a values perspective.' What the fuck does that even mean? How do you 'talk about national security from a values perspective?' That's not even English!"

"Well, that just means that when we talk about security, we're doing it in the context of values -- and values are central to Democratic Party ideals," Vilsack's buzz said nervously. "If we Democrats can talk about values, we're going to win a lot of elections."

The 2008 Presidential race is going to be long. And painful.