Drudge wins

The weekend collapse of the Administration's airline screening policy is hard to understand as a matter of messaging, with Clinton undermining the TSA's screening regime and the relevant official sending a hazy mixed message on the subject, even as the screening policy remains in place.

There's no doubt about who won on this issue: Matt Drudge chose it and drove it, illustrating both his continued power and his great sense of the public mood, and it now seems a matter of time until he gets results.

But the moment is also, a smart Democrat notes, representative of how this administration (and to be fair, everyone in public life) continues to wrestle with "populism as narrated by the Drudge Report." There are some echoes of the Shirley Sherrod mess in the panicked, mixed reactions.

The alternative, my correspondent notes, would have been a clear, strong message in response, something along these lines:

"People tried to kill us last Christmas. I'm sorry, it sucks, but this is the world we live in."

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this item overstated the tension between Obama's comment that he understands Americans' frustration and the policy; Clinton's remark, in the context of a defense of the screenings, that she wished they could be avoided was a bit further afield. My point, though, is that there's very little tough love here and no attempt to harden, rather than soften, the sell.