Inside Politics

Ironic turn

Both Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama “have eagerly donned the mantle of identity politics,” New York Times columnist David Brooks writes.

“A Clinton victory wouldn’t just be a victory for one woman, it would be a victory for little girls everywhere. An Obama victory would be about completing the dream, keeping the dream alive, and so on,” Mr. Brooks said.

“Fair enough. The problem is that both the feminist movement Clinton rides and the civil rights rhetoric Obama uses were constructed at a time when the enemy was the reactionary white male establishment. Today, they are not facing the white male establishment. They are facing each other.

“All the rhetorical devices that have been a staple of identity politics are now being exploited by the Clinton and Obama campaigns against each other. They are competing to play the victim. They are both accusing each other of insensitivity. They are both deliberately misinterpreting each other’s comments in order to somehow imply that the other is morally retrograde.

“All the habits of verbal thuggery that have long been used against critics of affirmative action, like Ward Connerly and Thomas Sowell, and critics of the radical feminism, like Christina Hoff Summers, are now being turned inward by the Democratic front-runners.”

’Typical,’ he says

Republican presidential hopeful former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, campaigning yesterday on what he calls the biggest tax cuts in U.S. history, criticized Democratic economic-stimulus plans to prevent a recession and said the key to U.S. competitiveness was to quickly cut corporate taxes.

“It’s a giveaway program. It’s a typical Democratic giveaway program,” Mr. Giuliani told the Reuters news agency, referring to small tax rebates or credits proposed by presidential candidates Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois. “As a giveaway program the amount of dollars it involves would have very little impact other than to slow the growth of the economy.”

He added: “The Democrats are talking euphemistically about the idea that the Bush tax cuts will expire. The American people have to realize that the Bush tax cuts expiring become the largest tax increase, maybe, in American history.”

Mr. Giuliani, interviewed by the wire service during a campaign swing through Florida, also urged the Bush administration to trim spending, saying he would ask nonmilitary government agencies to cut spending by 10 percent.

In his tax-cut program announced last week, Mr. Giuliani called for a reduction of the corporate tax from 35 percent to 25 percent, elimination of the estate tax and a reduction of the capital-gains tax from 15 percent to 10 percent.

He is promoting a one-page income-tax form that culls tax brackets down to just three — 10, 15 and 30 percent.

Cautionary tale

“Democrats never miss an opportunity to play the race card against Republicans and even black conservatives like Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas who dare to dissent from liberal orthodoxy. So it’s tempting to enjoy the political entertainment value of a race-based dust-up between Senators [Hillary Rodham] Clinton and [Barack] Obama,” the Wall Street Journal said yesterday in an editorial.

“But there’s also a cautionary tale here in how identity politics can come back to bite. The left’s color-by-numbers approach to attracting votes has essentially painted the Democrats into a corner, making it very difficult for them to prevail in national elections without winning nearly every black vote. The result is the very antithesis of what King fought for — an overreliance on blunt racial appeals instead of issues and ideas,” the newspaper said.

“Throughout the campaign, Mrs. Clinton has led Mr. Obama among black voters, thanks mostly to name ID and her husband’s popularity. With his victory in Iowa and close second in New Hampshire, Mr. Obama has started to cut into Mrs. Clinton’s black support. With her remarks, she’s now given him an opportunity to make further inroads. And as the fallout shows, she’ll have to be very careful about pushing back on this front if she wants to keep black supporters from abandoning her en masse, not only now, but in November when they could decide to stay home.”

Funny man

Confronted by a crying toddler yesterday, Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee quipped that the child must be for his rival Mitt Romney.

“He’s not the happiest boy today,” the former Arkansas governor said, smiling for a picture with the boy and his brother and sister. “I think he must be a Romney voter. Look at him. He’s so sad.”

Mr. Huckabee greeted their mother and other supporters outside a polling place in Warren, Mich., where he was hoping for a decent showing, but where Mr. Romney, a former governor of Massachusetts, and Arizona Sen. John McCain were vying for first place.

Mr. Huckabee’s wife, Janet, pelted him with snowballs as he shook hands, taking advantage of her last chance to play in the snow before heading to South Carolina yesterday afternoon. Her husband scooped up a couple of handfuls and returned fire as she darted toward the campaign bus, the Associated Press reports.

Petition drive

Supporters of a third-party presidential bid by New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg started a 50-state petition drive yesterday seeking to “draft” the billionaire, who is edging closer to entering the race while continuing to deny he is a candidate.

The petition effort was announced by Gerald Rafshoon, a former spokesman for President Jimmy Carter, and Doug Bailey, a longtime Republican consultant, the Associated Press reports.

BET interview

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton was scheduled to appear on Black Entertainment Television last night as part of a series on blacks and the presidential candidates.

Sen. Barack Obama appeared last month and yesterday was Mrs. Clinton’s turn.

“We have sent requests out to all of the candidates, Republican and Democrat, but we are still waiting to hear back from the others as to whether they will grant the interview,” said Pamela Gentry, senior political producer for BET News.

• Greg Pierce can be reached at 202/636-3285 or gpierce@washingtontimes .com.