Jeff Greenfield of Yahoo’s “The Ticket” blog thought this would just be a run-of-the-mill interview with Nancy Pelosi. Little did he expect to hear the most profound parable since Jesus dropped “The Prodigal Son”:

So, I asked House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi in an interview the other night, what could keep the Democrats from retaking the House of Representatives in November? She pointed to a cup on the table between us. “When the Republican leadership tells its members, ‘there is a blue cup on the table,’ every Republican repeats, ‘there is a blue cup on the table,'” she said. She sighed. “When I tell my fellow Democrats, ‘there is a blue cup on the table,’ one will say ‘there is a blue cup on a round table.’ Another will say, ‘there is a blue cup next to Nancy Pelosi’s cup.’ Another: ‘a blue cup on a brown table.'”

Now I understand why Democrats didn’t have time to read Obamacare before passing it. They were too busy getting stoned and contemplating that blue cup. I bet they really got off track when Joe Biden started arguing that it was actually a purple monkey. 

Instead of a reasonable follow-up question, such as “haha… wait… are you serious?”, Greenfield decides to play along:

And I say, ‘why did you say that?'” she went on. “And the answer is: ‘because it’s true.'”

It may sound as if the former speaker, who still holds the top Democratic leadership position in the House, is conducting a linguistics seminar. But her point is simple: Democrats are incapable of the clear, simple messaging at which Republicans excel. In 2006, Pelosi says, Democrats regained the House by hammering away at one message: “Protect Social Security.”

2006 was a long time ago, but I vaguely remember an unpopular war in Iraq having a lot more to do with the election results than Social Security. CNN and MSNBC would presumably be attuned to the Democrat’s main message, but neither even mentioned Social Security as a voting factor in their exit polls.

The truth of the blue cup is that Democrats would define it solely by its blueness, but I digress. Greenfield closes by pointing out what happens when “the party of government” is led by a person as disconnected from reality as Nancy Pelosi:

…a hefty percentage of voters still believe that if the government picks that cup up, it will drop it on the floor and break it into a hundred pieces.