Dumb politics at its dumbest

Enough already.

The pathetic stream of Democratic candidates who are afraid to be seen as real Democrats if it means standing next to Barack Obama is disheartening at best, racist at worst and counterproductive for the party as well as the nation.

Polarization? Sure. And cannibalization, too.

At least Georgia's Michelle Nunn, the Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in the Peach State, finally had better sense than Kentucky's Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes when Nunn, after several days of hem-hawing, finally acknowledged that she had voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012. Grimes is still following very bad advice and not answering.

How hard is this, girls? Wouldn't it sound just fine to say: "Of course I voted for Obama. I may not agree with everything he's done, but I couldn't agree with anything offered by Mitt Romney who believed 47 percent of Americans are tax-dodging loafers dependent on government."

(Note: In 2011, 46.4 percent of Americans paid no federal income tax, but two-thirds did pay payroll taxes, along with some combination of state, local, sales, gas and property taxes. So most of those who didn't pay income tax were the working poor -- more than half had incomes less than $16,812 per year. But more than 100,000 Americans with incomes above $211,000 also paid no federal income taxes. Perhaps they were just on corporate welfare. As usual, Republicans bent the truth.)

Which is exactly why Democratic candidates like Grimes, Sen. Kay Hagan of North Carolina, Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, and Sen. Mark Begich of Alaska -- those who are shying away from being endorsed by the leader of the party -- are making a monstrous mistake: They are allowing the GOP's false mantra to look true.

As a New York Times editorial last week noted: "By not standing firmly for their own policies, Democrats send a message to voters that the unending Republican criticism of the president is legitimate."

Dems have been saying all election season that they need women and minorities to win. So what sense does it make that they down play the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, which has helped at least 10 million people get insurance for the first time? What sense does it make that they downplay minimum wage, which would raise a disproportionate number of minorities and women out of poverty? What sense does it make that they fall for the oldest GOP line in the book: Tell the lie -- "Grimes (or Nunn, Hagan, Pryor, fill-in-the-blank) is just another Obama lackey "-- enough times and perception becomes reality.

It's dumb politics at its dumbest.

Here are some facts.

• This year -- six years into Obama's presidency -- the U.S. has the smallest deficit since 2008. It's cut by more than half. And all that GOP tax and spend hooey? President Obama killed the F-22 in 2009, ending further purchases of Lockheed Martin single-seat, twin-engine, fighter aircraft, which cost $358 million apiece. Though the military had 187 built, the plane has never -- repeat, never -- flown a single combat mission. Eliminating it saved $4 billion.

• Unemployment is now below 6 percent, from above 10 percent in 2008. Despite naysayers, stimulus saved and created 2.5 million jobs.

• And while jobs are up, gas prices are down. We are producing more energy than we ever had before so foreign nations can literally no longer hold us over a barrel of oil.

• We are producing more clean energy than ever in our history. President Obama also ordered the Department of Energy to implement more aggressive efficiency standards for common household appliances. (Can you spell electricity conservation and bill savings?) And his U.S. Environmental Protection Agency put global warming on the priority list by ruling that excess CO2 is a pollutant.

• Let's talk economy. In September, the Standard & Poor's 500 index hit a milestone by crossing 2,000 for the first time. The Los Angeles Times has noted that had you bought stocks on the day of President Obama's inauguration, you would have notched a 148 percent gain at that 2,000-point S&P mark -- "another manifestation of the Obama bull market."

• President Obama ended the Iraq war and is ending the war in Afghanistan. He got Osama bin Laden and numerous other terrorist leaders, and he is quietly and determinedly -- without sending our kids to war on foreign soil -- countering the terrorism of ISIS. A recent CBS poll found that 64 percent of Americans believe the Obama administration makes the country safe. Meanwhile he is rightly leading a full-on assault on Ebola in West Africa.

• He continues to support diversity. He nominated Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court. Sotomayor is the first Hispanic justice in the court's history, and the women represent only the third and fourth women to serve on the court, out of a total of 112 justices. Obama also appointed the most diverse Cabinet in history, including more women than any other incoming president.

So enough already, Democrats. Either own this very fine president, or come out of the closet and call yourselves Republicans.

The New York Times said it quite well: "There is much that is going right in this country, and there is still time for Democrats to say so."

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