WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...
Democratic convention commentators are making much of the relative lack of "red meat" — biting political rhetoric, served raw — coming from the party's big-name speakers. Of particular note was vice presidential nominee John Edwards last night. It is a traditional role of v.p. nominees to serve as the ticket's attack dog, doing the dirty work for the man at the top of the ticket. Instead, Edwards gave delegates this of negative campaigning: "Aren't you sick of it?"
Those on the sidelines, however, have taken an entirely different tact. Talk to Democrats privately, and you'll find a resolve to play hardball that was missing before the 2000 election debacle. There's nothing like losing an election you feel you won to bring out the fight.
Consider a new TV ad released yesterday by the center-left group the New Democrat Network, targeted at Latino immigrants. It takes a tact once used most effectively by Republicans: Take a goofball suggestion made by a fringe member of the other party, and present it as official view of the other side.
Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo in May, briefly proposed — and then backtracked from — placing a 5 percent tax on all money transfers sent abroad by immigrants to their families in their home country. The amount is conservatively estimated at $30 billion a year, mostly wired back to parents in Mexico by sons and daughters who emigrated to the United States to escape poverty at home.
To Latino immigrants, especially, it is a matter of pride that they share their income, however slight, to uplift their families. That anyone would propose to tax these transactions is an idea sure to light a fire in immigrant communities.
Beginning this week, the New Democrat Network started pouring on the fuel. The ad on Spanish-language television goes like this: "The Hispanic immigrants are the ones that work the hardest in the United States. And every month they wire money in the amount of two to three hundred dollars to their families in Latin America. But a Republican leader in Washington has proposed a new tax. In addition to the normal charges, immigrants would have to pay 10 to 15 dollars more for each remittance. Incredible but true."
As Republicans seek to gain a greater share of the Latino vote — and hope to use an emphasis on traditional moral values to do so — the last thing they need is one of their own to suggest a special tax on people who financially support their families.
Maybe in past years, Democrats might have dismissed the proposal as an crazy idea from a Republican maverick. Not this year. As the campaign unfolds, expect to hear this proposal presented again and again as an idea sanctioned by the Republican Party establishment.
If their candidates aren't, the rest of the Democrats intend to play very tough.
