Blanche Lincoln is between a rock and a hard place. She's a Democratic senator up for reelection in a relatively conservative state. Making it worse,

In terms of trends, Arkansas was Obama's worst state, by Superman-esque leaps and bounds. The president underperformed John Kerry by six points statewide, and underperformed in every congressional district.

The drops seen in Marion Berry's district, and Mike Ross' district, were the largest anywhere in the country, and from a position of relative strength. Generally speaking, we expect to win districts where Kerry got 47-48%. Those are definitionally swing districts, no more divided under normal circumstances than the nation itself.

Last year, however, Obama finished under 40% in both of them.

Lincoln cannot, in other words, hope to be bailed out by a few Obama appearances on her behalf.

Her response has been to run scared, abandoning all appearance of caring about any issue, doing the kind of waffling and wavering and caving that neither wins Republicans over on the merits nor earns the respect of voters who appreciate strength (or the appearance of strength, anyway).

It's the kind of performance that loses your own base without attracting anyone else, and Steve Benen has a suggestion for Lincoln:

I'd become the biggest champion of bold, progressive health care reform in the Senate. I'd show some major leadership, get out way in front, and position myself as a Kennedy-like guardian of those suffering under the status quo.

Look, Lincoln isn't going to out-conservative the Republican candidates in Arkansas. No matter how she votes on reform, the entire Attack Machine is going after her as some kind of radical leftist. It doesn't matter if it doesn't make sense, and it certainly doesn't matter if she votes with Republicans on the big issues of the day for the next year.

So why not go big? Why not announce that too many Arkansas families are being screwed right now by a dysfunctional health care system and Blanche Lincoln has decided to do something about it? Why not run ads saying, "I don't care what the insurance companies and their candidates say: I'm fighting for the families who can't afford their premiums, the workers who can't get coverage, the Arkansans with pre-existing conditions, the small businesses that can't afford insurance for the employees...."?

In other words, show some confidence. Voters can recognize fear, so stop being defensive. Arkansas has a high percentage of low-income families, struggling to get by, who are terrified of their health care situation. They're not going to vote Democratic on cultural and/or social issues, but they're open to the Democratic message on economic policy -- looking out for working families' interests. A candidate who positions herself as a populist people's champion has a better shot than an apologetic Democrat who hopes Republicans won't mind her party affiliation.

Exactly. Lincoln is guaranteed a Republican challenger. She's unlikely to get the Republican vote. Yet for some reason she continues to waver on popular things like health care reform, a move guaranteed to depress Democratic base turnout in November 2010 without winning over any independents.

Lincoln has time to turn it around or at least go out fighting. Instead, she appears determined to be the 2010 version of Creigh Deeds.