There’s no message. At least that’s the message I got from a recent budget breakfast on Capitol Hill. Which isn’t to say there isn’t a message, just that nobody has managed to succinctly articulate one. Which, I think, is what the messenger meant. Maybe.

Sometimes in Washington, it’s hard to figure out what anybody means. Some people like it that way. Political communication is, after all, an art. And as I recall learning at some point in my life, great art is rarely appreciated while the artist is still alive. The corollary is that horrible art isn’t appreciated after the artist’s gone either.

In any case, the message of this budget breakfast was (depending on who was speaking):

a. This is a great day for America (and we’re screwed)
b. This is a terrible day for America (and we’re screwed)
c. This is an incredibly perilous time for our economy, requiring the greatest minds to do their best work (and we’re still screwed)
d. Let’s slow down, do exactly what we know will stabilize us immediately, and figure out as best we can what will get us out of this hole in the long run.

I gravitate toward the final message, not only because it advocates the helpful notion of injecting thought into the process, but because it makes sense. Who expects the entire economic crisis to be solved by one stimulus package? Who expects those assembling the package (Congress and the White House) to get everything right on the first pass? Only the unreasonable. Of course, the unreasonable are the ones practicing the “art” of political communication.

I’ve written previously of America’s shifting political landscape. I thought, and continue to think, that President Obama’s election was less a triumph of left over right than a victory of thought over reflex. If that’s true, then we’re about to embark on an era of reasonable responses to overwhelming obstacles.

Economically, “reasonable” translates as “triage, then recovery.” What seemed to send the budget folks into fits of hyperventilation is the idea that no one knows what the final solution will be, how we’ll pay for it, how everything will look five years down the road, or how to explain the (not-yet formulated) solution to the public. But how would that be reasonable? Demanding answers to a problem before understanding the problem is nonsensical. Though it’s a neat political trick. Insist on the impossible before authorizing the necessary. Recovery, before triage.

All of this brings me back to message. The new administration will be able to take care of its message for itself, and I don’t see reason for us to worry that the precise particulars of a plan weren’t produced, in triplicate, while the President watched bands march down Pennsylvania Avenue. That’s not the problem. The problem is that Congress, from what I can gather, is being bombarded by folks without a message complaining about the lack of a message.

We can do something about that. Courtney Hazlett, over at MSNBC.com, has written that the Obama Inauguration heralded the beginnings of a new era: Hollywood on the Potomac. It seems the stars are out, and aligned, so let’s use it. We can harness the power of Hollywood and make a positive impact on the understanding of our domestic politics. Hollywood is a message machine, so let’s craft a message that matters.

Here’s how: Take an issue. The economy. Boil it down to its essence. The problem. The solution. Take the best minds in the entertainment world, get them together, and produce a series of one minute spots. Start by explaining what’s wrong, in terms and images that everyone will understand and the American Public will applaud. Follow-up with additional spots as solutions are offered. There’s a credit crisis, a housing crisis, and an employment crisis. Why, and what does that look like? How does it manifest itself? Wouldn’t you like to see what Steven Spielberg could do with the concept? Or Aaron Sorkin? Steven Soderbergh? George Clooney? Let these single minutes change our understanding of where we are, and where we’re going.

Can’t be done? I don’t accept the premise of your disbelief. Ronald Reagan, with one line, changed the way a generation thought about the role of government. “Government isn’t the solution to the problem. Government is the problem!” FDR told us to believe in precious hope at a perilous time. “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” And two days ago, our new President, himself the embodiment of hope for so many, ordered us to, “pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.”

So let us do as he said. No longer art for art’s sake. Art for America’s sake.