Trumping the race card

The other day, a liberal friend reminded me of what I expect to be a large part of the Democratic strategy for the next four years: "When all else fails, charge racism."\nWhen I told him I was generally in favor of a "one nation, one language" policy (having been born in Canada, that gives me a different perspective), he rebutted with one simple term: "Racist." \nMemo to Bush: Here it comes, the race card. I saw a microcosm of what we are already seeing at the national level. To me, it's a fascinating psychological phenomenon -- the use of emotional manipulation and insults to achieve degradation of one's political opponents.\nThe Democrats have so little ammunition to use on President George W. Bush, it's no surprise we are seeing signs of a return to this desperate strategy. What's surprising is that it is a strategy that rarely works. \nIn his brilliant and recently published book, "Ronald Reagan: His life in pictures," James Spada recounts how Reagan's opponent in the 1966 California gubernatorial race, Gov. Edmund Brown (D), sunk to an all-time low by running an ad linking actor Ronald Reagan to actor John Wilkes Booth, the man who shot President Lincoln. In the commercial, Brown's audience was a group of young black children. Reagan was shocked but assured of victory. "I knew he was in trouble," he said of Brown, who lost by one million votes. \nApparently, trying to portray your conservative opponents as closet Klansmen gives a liberal an invigorating sense of moral superiority. It's the same moral vanity that puts the swing in Dana Carvey's "Church Lady." After she would establish her moral superiority -- and declare "Isn't that special?"-- we were all treated to the best dancing since disco. Moral superiority should come in six-packs.\nBut this is politics -- and politics is business to the Democrats. One way to keep the home fires burning is to keep the liberal special interests happy, and part of that means seeing racist conspiracies under every GOP bed.\nThus, the Democrats find the most conservative Bush cabinet nominee and charge him with racism. The proof? The fact that he led the charge against an black judge for a federal post. The judge, Missouri State Supreme Court Justice Ronnie White, is a liberal Democrat who incensed John Ashcroft with a betrayal when they were both in state government and then issued an odd (and failed) opinion in favor of a cop killer.\nBig deal, most of America said to Ashcroft's opposition. They said the same about complaints both Bush and Ashcroft spoke at Bob Jones University, an evangelical college that admits students of color but forbids interracial dating. Americans were smart enough to figure out not every speaker is aware of every stupid policy accredited colleges enforce. \nAs for White, despite the fact every Republican in the Senate voted against his confirmation, Ashcroft was the only man accused of racist motivation. It gave ambitious Democratic senators like Evan Bayh of Indiana an excuse to show off their more liberal leanings and please the left-wing base of the Democrats (as Bayh ponders a run for the presidency). \nLarger facts are of no consequence to propagandists, and Republicans are due no credit. Ashcroft himself appointed numerous black judges and officials when he was governor of Missouri. Bush appointed Colin Powell Secretary of State, making Powell the highest-ranking black man in U.S. history (and fifth in line in presidential succession). \nAnd the main group that endorses an official language is U.S. English, a group headed by a Hispanic activist. U.S. English was founded by the late Sen. S.I Hayakawa (R-Calif.), a Japanese immigrant. Its director today is a Chilean immigrant, Maura E. Mujica. Its board includes Arnold Schwarzenegger, author Saul Bellow, and liberal Democrat and former Sen. Eugene McCarthy. Its goal? To empower immigrants, something made much easier in a nation that encourages one official language. \nBut hey -- to paraphrase Reagan -- facts can be inconvenient things. Emotional pitches work -- at least for the Democrats and their fragile coalition of race baiters led by Ted Kennedy. The nation deserves unity. Bush must ignore the old-time politics of poison and deliver it.