Close observation of the Republican Party over the last 15 years had lead me to be very skeptical that they can be fruitfully engaged on a bipartisan basis.  It is delusional and perhaps dangerous to Democratic prospects to proceed on the expectaton that a candidate can "bring people together", "bridge our differences", or win over the other side to "transformational change".  Transformational change can come only when Republican numbers in the Congress are reduced to levels where they have been forced to change or become irrelevant.

Though there was a mandate for change in 1992, the Republicans set about at once to destroy the Clinton Presidency through a series of manufactured "scandals", gays in the military, Whitewater, Travelgate, etc.  I wonder how many of the young Democratic enthusiasts for bipartisanship were children then and not paying attention to politics.