Beltway insiders have asked for months whether Republicans must do more than oppose Democrats to win back power.

"Just say no" has historically sufficed. Democrats' offered no grand vision statement when they recaptured the House in 2006.

But Republicans are not taking their chances. The Contract with America's sequel is coming soon. It's debut, like the original, is expected in September.

In truth, waves are waves regardless of these public relations events. The Contract with America typifies the sort of campaign news that consumes operatives and reporters but only matters on the margin – if at all.

Polling cannot prove whether the 1994 contract helped win any seats. Indeed, only slightly more than a third of adults said they heard of the contract in 1994. That's before and after Election Day, according to Gallup. And within that minority, the contract won as many detractors as supporters.

Yet the case against mimicking the contract is even weaker. Critics question the wisdom of providing any alternative vision. Democrats fear a referendum on their majority. They want a "choice election." And a Republican plan would clarify that choice.

But 1994 rebuts this critique. Democrats spent millions on advertising that assailed the contract. Bill Clinton sought to nationalize the campaign as a choice between his programs and Reaganism.

Clinton pollster Stan Greenberg thought that choice would "energize prospective Democratic voters." In a memo leaked to reporters at the time, Greenberg painted Democrats as the party "of ordinary people." Republicans, he wrote, "want to go back to the Reagan policies of tax cuts for the wealthy, exploding deficits, and cuts in Medicare."

Replace Bush with Reagan. This sounds like the modern Democratic critique. But Reagan was a popular president. And the GOP had not controlled the House for four decades.

This is the best case for a contract 2.0. Democrats' numbers have plummeted. But Republicans have not recovered. Only 35 percent of Americans had a favorable view of Republicans in mid November 2006. Republicans entered this summer only one point more popular, according Gallup. Notably, in 1994, both parties enjoyed a more positive than negative rating.

What we have today is a failure at courtship. It's the mirror dynamic of 2006. The big middle separated from Republicans four years ago. But they did not marry the other guy. Polling found independents sour on Republicans but no sweeter on Democrats. Today, the middle's relationship with Democrats has soured. And Republicans are positioned for a second chance because they are not Democrats.

"Very few Americans are embracing the Republican Party. Rather they are rejecting the Democrats. And the GOP needs to understand that at their core," said Republican pollster Frank Luntz, one of several key strategists behind the Contract with America. This is why Luntz believes a new contract "is absolutely necessary."

"To distinguish between the two political a party requires something more than opposition," Luntz added.

Luntz, like so many Republicans, recently cringed at the sight of one GOP leader's inability to meet that bar. Texas Rep. Pete Sessions heads the GOP's House election committee. But Sessions found himself unable to explain what would distinguish a Republican House from a Democratic House on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"Name a painful choice that Republicans are prepared to say we ought to make," host David Gregory asked.

Sessions said his party would "look at all that we are spending in Washington." Then Sessions pitched the usual tropes. Big government bad. Free enterprise good.

"These are not specifics," Gregory replied. Sessions continued to avoid specifics.

"It was frightening to watch," Luntz said.

A new contract could help avoid such incidents. But even the most pitch-perfect vision statement will not dramatically boost Republicans' vote on Election Day. Voters vote prospectively. Tossing the bums out has long proven enough of a prospect.

Yet one question is going to keep coming at Republicans, "Well, what would you do about it?" A new contract provides a ready response. It's ammunition in debates. It will also, if done well, paint the picture of how the new GOP differs from the old. The original contract was, if anything, effective for its message of accountability.

Republicans also benefit merely by the chattering class chewing on that message. Political operatives call this "free media." The GOP's prospective message was discussed at 10,000 feet for weeks in 1994. It gave positive cover for Republicans to go negative in the trenches.

Yet it's still Democrats' accountability that is center stage. In April, Gallup reported that slightly more than a quarter of voters believed most members of Congress deserved reelection. That number never dropped below 40 percent in 1994 or 2006. This is tidal dismay.

And, contract or not, antagonism has long proven the most powerful of incentives for voters. As W.C. Fields once put it, "Hell, I never vote for anybody, I always vote against."