No, no, no!

Why, why, why?

A second Senate Democrat said Friday he was open to President Bush's idea of letting people divert some of their Social Security taxes to personal retirement accounts as Republican Party leaders tried to allay re-election fears among wavering GOP lawmakers.

Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., said any plan should be bipartisan, in part to give lawmakers from both parties political cover for supporting major changes to such the popular retirement program.

"I don't believe that we should rule out the accounts," Carper said Friday in an interview. "We have a very low savings rate in this country and clearly need to find ways to stimulate savings, and I think we should be open to a wide range of ideas and not dismiss them out of hand."

Carper does go on to say he'd rather see them as additions rather than in place of Social Security, but Carper seems to forget that a unified Democratic party has more power than a splintered one. Why not wait until everyone can get together and decide on a position before you come out on your own? If Democrats agree that private accounts as an add on to a saved Social Security system, then go there.

But Democrats should come up with a system saver first. Explain to the President that private accounts are not on the table because they don't solve the problem - the President himself admits to it. Then you have a clear message that saving Social Security is job one while exposing the President's plan to mask huge cuts in benefits with flowery talk of private ownership.

This from Carper, though, is just bad form all around.