"Dear Democrats... Stop fretting and second-guessing... The great blues artist Muddy Waters put it best: 'You can't spend what you ain't got. You can't lose what you ain't never had.'"

Writes Eugene Robinson in "Democrats Have Nothing to Lose -- but a Majority (Or Two) to Win" (Real Clear Politics).

The appropriation of Muddy Waters for Democratic Party politics is irksome. That song came out in 1964. Lyrics here. Waters sang about losing "a pretty little girl," his "money in the bank," and his "sweet little home," then consoles himself with the line "You can't lose what you ain't never had."



When I heard the first verse, about the girl, I thought he was admitting that he never "had" the girl and he was looking at the bright side: At least he didn't lose her. But when I got to the money and home verses, it's clear that he had those things, so he must have had and lost the girl too, and the meaning of "You can't lose what you ain't never had" must be something like: 1. At least I once had these things (which can be reworded "Tis better to have loved and lost/Than never to have loved at all" or, more mundanely, It's better to be a has-been than a never-was), or 2. What I thought was good wasn't even good, because it only set me up to feel the pain of losing (basically, the opposite of #1).

In Robinson's use of the song, the man, with his elemental personal needs (love, money, and shelter), is replaced by a conglomerate, a party, and its drive for political power. The man lost what he had and is comparing his predicament to that of a person who never had anything. But in Robinson's deployment of the line, the political party ought to feel motivated by the idea that it has nothing now and therefore has nothing to lose. He says, "Democrats, who have so little to defend, can and should play offense with abandon."

Now, it seems less Muddy Waters and more football. The best defense is a good offense. Ah, there's a Wikipedia article on the subject. And it's not as football-based as I'd thought:

George Washington wrote in 1799: "…make them believe, that offensive operations, often times, is the surest, if not the only (in some cases) means of defence".

Mao Zedong opined that "the only real defense is active defense", meaning defense for the purpose of counter-attacking and taking the offensive. Often success rests on destroying the enemy's ability to attack. This principle is paralleled in the writings of Machiavelli and Sun Tzu.

Some martial arts emphasise attack over defense. Wing chun, for example, is a style of kung fu which uses the maxim: "The hand which strikes also blocks."

During World War I, Germany planned to attack France so as to quickly knock it out of the war, thereby reducing the Entente's numerical superiority and to free up German troops to head east and defeat Russia.

That has so little to do with what Muddy Waters was singing the blues about, but is it what Robinson is trying to explain? The column is padded out with the usual things — Trump is awful and the Democrats need to get out the vote. Then Robinson offers the advice "Don't be dour and doubtful, Democrats. Be joyous and determined," which seems more "Happy Days Are Here Again" than Muddy Waters singing the blues.

In his penultimate sentence, Robinson tries to drag the Waters line in again: "Stop worrying about losing what you 'ain't got' and focus on winning elections district by district, state by state." But in the song it's not "ain't got" — despite those quotes — it's "ain't never had." That it's "ain't never had"  doesn't seem to matter to Robinson. I suppose that's because he's a politics guy, and the meaning of words and the value of art don't count for much.

Robinson has one more sentence: "Don't let Republicans bluff you into folding. You're playing a very good hand." Now, the metaphor is poker, and now, the Democrats have got something, "a very good hand." How utterly tedious.

But I presume it's tedious for Robinson too. He's been writing in newspapers for 42 years. I looked up his Wikipedia page. He began his professional career writing about the Patty Hearst trial.