This is a delicate time for Democrats. The Bush administration is falling apart all around them. Each day, it seems, brings another disaster: a rookie congresswoman from Ohio, taking her cue from the now-outdated Rove playbook, attacking Vietnam vet John Murtha and having to apologize; an unsuccessfully suppressed phone transcript suggesting the president wanted to bomb al-Jazeera’s office in Qatar.

Things are not looking good for Republicans anywhere. GOP officeholders and their colleagues are under indictment. Republican Golden Boy Arnold Schwarzenegger had his ballot initiatives knocked back down his throat. And New York Times columnist Tom Friedman – who thinks we should be in Iraq – described Bush last week as in danger of being “one of our worst presidents ever.”

Echoing a question I’ve posed myself, Friedman asked, “Where are the adults?” Democrats need to demonstrate that some of those adults, at least, are in their party and have an idea how they might run the country.

Recently they’ve been doing pretty well. Jay Rockefeller, along with his congressional colleagues, has been making all the right noises about the denial of real intelligence to the oversight committees.

Barack Obama has taken on the administration’s puerile black-and-white depiction of war policy: Either you’re for “staying the course” or you want to “cut and run.” Obama sensibly declared this week that thoughtful people want something else: a gradual withdrawal with many safeguards.

So far, so good.

Democrats seem to understand that as their political rivals flounder, it would be unseemly to go into bloodthirsty attack mode – and this is crucial. This is where they can demonstrate the attributes of adulthood so grievously absent from the Bush administration.

Note that I didn’t say “political enemies.” Many Republicans in recent years have forgotten the difference. They have treated anyone who questions their policies as a mortal foe.

Eventually divisiveness runs its course. An administration that came to office with this strategy is now floundering, since the substance of its policies is melting away. Failure is piling on failure with no convenient bogymen to blame. When we’re losing a war and Americans are drowning in their houses with no help, suddenly gay marriage doesn’t look like quite so big a threat.

But as Friedman also pointed out, we have three more years to go with this administration. It may have run out of steam, out of ideas and out of the nation’s trust – but there’s a long and crucial stretch of years ahead before we get to choose another crew.

Democrats need to bear this in mind. They should absolutely continue to pound the White House on the substance of its deceptions, mistakes and missteps.

But they also need to find ways to form alliances with moderate Republicans to present alternatives to disastrous policies. This is already beginning to happen, and it’s a hopeful trend.

If responsible Democrats and Republicans can manage this, Congress can begin to take back some of the power that has been usurped by the White House and start getting the nation back on track.

We desperately need an alternative to the partisan ugliness of the Rove Era: responsible criticism, outrage when appropriate, but no personal attacks or unnecessary vitriol.

These are dangerous times, and those dangers transcend party loyalties. The executive branch is only a third of the government. Democrats in Congress can start the rescue now.