By Colleen Carroll Campbell
Senator John Kerry likes to scold his critics for practicing "the politics
of division." But if practice makes perfect, his allies are more deserving
of his disdain.

In the run-up to Election Day, Democratic groups backing Kerry have used
every weapon in their arsenal to divide and conquer at the polls. Their
favorite tactic: fomenting racial tension and religious bigotry to Kerry's
advantage.
Last month, Kerry's friends at MoveOn.org placed a full-page ad in the New
York Times attacking the Gallup polling organization and its director,
George Gallup Jr. It seems that Gallup polls have consistently found
President George W. Bush faring better than Kerry, which led the folks at
Moveon.org to conclude that the poll's numbers were flawed. With
conspiratorial flair, the ad unveiled the reason behind George Gallup's
refusal to change the numbers for MoveOn.org: Gallup "is a devout
evangelical Christian" who considers his job "a kind of ministry."
That probably did not shock many committed Christians, who often talk about
their careers as "ministries" or "vocations" that allow them to serve God by
serving others in the various professions. But the revelation of Gallup's
religious leanings was not meant for a Christian audience. The ad targeted
Kerry's secular base - a group that seems to consider evangelical Christians
only slightly less dangerous than Islamic jihadists.
More recently, another Kerry organ entered the fray, this one opting for
race-baiting over religion-baiting. The group, which bears the Orwellian
name of Americans Coming Together, is blanketing African-American
neighborhoods in Kansas City and St. Louis with get-out-the-vote fliers that
show a black man being pinned against a building by water from a fire hose.
Under the picture are these words: "This is what they used to do to keep us
from voting." The flip side of the flier says, "This is how Republicans keep
African Americans from voting now," before belching a laundry list of
recycled rumors and outlandish assertions about "phony cops" being sent to
polling places to discourage black voters and the purported plan of Attorney
General John Ashcroft "to prevent African Americans from registering to vote
at all." "Don't let them do it again," the flier concludes, ". . . show them
who has the real power."
So much for subtlety. When questioned about the fliers by the St. Louis
Post-Dispatch, the state spokeswoman for Americans Coming Together seemed to
feel no need to document evidence for the fliers' claims. "We want people to
be aware that there have been increased reports of problems with voter
suppression," she said, as if describing a nonpartisan pamphlet produced by
the Federal Election Commission.
The reports and rumors in the ACT flier are a far cry from reality. But
distinguishing between fact and fiction may not fire up the base. And strong
turnout from the Democratic base is a major concern for Kerry, a candidate
who has failed to inspire enthusiasm among key constituencies that
Democratic presidential contenders usually take for granted.
Consider the black vote: A poll released last week by the Joint Center for
Political and Economic Studies found that nearly one in five black voters
now supports Bush over Kerry. Though the vast majority of African Americans
remain loyal to the Democratic party, Bush has doubled his percentage of
support from those voters, to 18 percent. Pollsters say those crossover
voters are attracted by Bush's conservative stance on issues such as gay
marriage and by his faith-based initiative for addressing poverty.
Recent polls have also found Bush luring away some of Kerry's Jewish
support. The American Jewish Committee's Annual Survey of Jewish Opinion
found nearly a quarter of Jews backing Bush this fall, up from 19 percent
who supported him in 2000. Kerry still attracts the lion's share of Jewish
support - 69 percent - but that's 10 percentage points less than Gore
attracted in 2000.
Among Catholics, another key constituency of the Democratic party, Kerry is
neck-and-neck with Bush. Polls released last month showed Bush pulling
ahead, particularly among white Catholics who tend to vote in higher
numbers. The Catholic vote remains in flux, but if Kerry loses it, he will
be the first Democratic presidential candidate to do so since 1988. And he
will face unflattering comparisons to John F. Kennedy, the last Catholic
presidential candidate, who handily won 80 percent of the Catholic vote.
Perhaps Kerry's desperation to secure a base that should already be solid
has led him to overlook his contempt for the politics of division - at least
long enough to allow his allies to inflame racial tensions and revive
religious bigotry to his advantage. If he cannot appeal to enough Americans
on the strength of his record or the sense of his policies - and the numbers
suggest that he cannot - then his supporters must divide and conquer,
pitting black against white, religious against secular, Christian against
Jew.
It is a cynical, arrogant tactic, one that arises out of anger at voters in
minority groups who refuse to toe the party line. It relies on the
assumption that the traditional Democratic voter is easily manipulated and
needs only the image of a fire hose or the mention of an evangelical
Christian to send him scurrying to Kerry's side.
Let's hope, for the sake of a united America, that the cynics are dead
wrong.