Archive [December 1999]

The party of the first President to be held in contempt of court, the party of the self-styled Inventor of the Internet, will lie any lie, defend any scoundrel, and sling mud at any opponent — whatever it takes to maintain and advance their power. As The Florida Times Union editorialized last month: “Apparently, for liberal Democrats, extremism in defense of vice is a virtue.” And now, they are taking a page from Joseph McCarthy.

Among the most venomous Democrat mudslingers is also the most soft-spoken: Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota. Daschle’s recent statements make the House Un-American Committee hearings look like an afternoon tea party.

A little background. In October, the Senate rejected liberal Missouri Supreme Court Justice Ronald White, whom Clinton nominated for a lifetime appointment to the federal bench. Last month, Republicans initially opposed the nomination of Carol Moseley-Braun as ambassador to New Zealand.

Though she was later confirmed, Republicans had every reason to balk. Moseley-Braun has been on the receiving end of Federal Election Commission audits, a lawsuit by her former campaign treasurer for misuse of funds, scrutiny from the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal division, criticism for going on a junket to Africa to hobnob with Nigeria’s murderous dictator. Her own staffers even accused her campaign manager/fiancé of sexual harassment. The voters of Illinois threw her out in 1996.

But Moseley-Braun also happened to be the first black woman ever elected senator, back in the so-called Year of the Woman, 1992. (Since that was also when Bill Clinton was first elected, it will actually go down in history as the Year of the Womanizer.) When the Republicans, predictably, objected to the New Zealand appointment, Daschle took to the podium.

“There’s a pattern here,” Sen. Daschle told reporters. “The pattern started, of course, with Ronnie White … The array of anti-minority sentiment expressed almost each week now by Republicans is historic. I have never seen a party become this defiant when it comes to protecting minority rights in my time in public life.”

Protecting minority rights, he went on. “Carol Moseley-Braun is just the latest victim of increasing sentiment expressed by an increasing number of Republican senators that I think is very dangerous for this country and very, very harmful to the progress we’ve made on minority rights over many decades.”

There’s more. “There is an apparent lack of sensitivity to minorities in this country when, regardless of whether one is a woman, an African-American, or an Hispanic American, you have more trouble getting nominated and you have more trouble getting a business loan.”

Asked if he was calling Republican senators racists, Daschle replied, “I’m not calling them racist, but I am simply saying this: it raises some very serious questions about the perception, the attitude of some on the other side when it comes to minorities. There is very little sensitivity.”

No, he’s not calling them racists. He’s just saying there’s the “perception” of racism. His strategic predecessor in the Senate, Joe McCarthy, couldn’t have done it better.

There’s more. “It’s a sad, sad commentary on circumstances involving minorities in the country and in the Senate,” said Daschle, “and I just hope that it’s recorded as such … I think there’s a pattern here, and I think we ought to be given some explanation for why this pattern has become so apparent and so dangerously ill-considered.” Democrats see racists under every bed, my friends. And behind every rock.

This has been a well coordinated campaign. Alphagore immediately announced that he was “deeply angered and disappointed” by the criticism of Moseley-Braun and wanted to put an end to all this “divisiveness.” Clinton had already accused 54 Republican senators of racism for their party-line defeat of the nomination of Ronnie White. Despite the fact that most Republicans weren’t even aware of White’s race. Despite the fact that law enforcement strongly opposed White’s appointment. Despite the fact that White was the first unsuccessful Clinton judicial nominee in six and a half years. Yet on the day the Senate rejected his nomination, the President demagogued: “The disappointing action of the Senate today provides strong evidence for those who believe that the Senate treats minority and women judicial nominees unequally. This is a sad day for the cause of equal justice.”

The next day, His Impeachableness added that it was a “disgraceful act of partisan politics” that is “adding credence to the perception that they treat women and minority judicial nominees differently.” (Are women treated “differently” in the Oval Orifice?)

A few days later, Clinton told the national Hispanic Leadership Conference that “It was a disgrace.” He complained that “the Senate’s treatment of Judge White, and its failure to vote on the outstanding Hispanic nominees that are pending, creates a real doubt about the Senate’s ability, to fairly perform its constitutional duties to advise and consent.”

Now let me tell you what is going on here, friends, as only I can. The Democrats are scared stiff that the Republicans will peel away the votes of blacks and Hispanics. George W. Bush in particular has been very successful in getting minority votes. John Zogby told The Washington Times: “Neither Gore nor Bradley is cutting it with blacks and Hispanics; two groups absolutely essential for Democrats to win the presidential election.” In a recent poll of 1,000 likely voters Zogby found that the Republican frontrunner has a significant level of support from minorities. Among blacks, Vice President Gore leads Gov. George W. Bush 59 percent to 31 percent. 31 percent! Democrats can’t have that.

The Democrats have no choice but to do everything they can early on to ingrain in the public’s mind the idea that the Republicans are nothing but a bunch of KKK members. There is no other way they can win next year.

Look at the fiasco of Algore’s campaign. Look at Hillary Clinton’s huge negative ratings in a state as liberal as New York. Race is the only card they’ve got left.