The text of the article points out that Republicans named Condoleeza Rice Secretary of State, that the Davis-Bacon act was passed with the declared intent to keep blacks out of government contracting jobs, that liberal policies for schools have failed (my observation, that’s not exactly true…the current school policy in Washington, DC is not so much liberal as corrupt, flat out and openly corrupt. Michelle Rhee was a liberal reformer, thrown out because her reforms failed to put the students last, behind the various interest groups in DC that profited and continue to profit from a comfy status quo). Liberal Rahm Emmanuel is having his difficulties with the same corrupt status quo but he seems to be, if not winning, at least getting a compromise that isn’t an utter defeat for education reform in Chicago.

Goldberg, in the same sentence, simply goes on to claim that liberal policies have failed with respect to crime and poverty. That isn’t entirely true either. It’s true, if failure is defined as worse than hoped for or expected. It’s not true, if failure is defined as worse than it used to be. Crime is down more in cities that have put in place semi-conservative policies such as broken-window theory, stop and frisk, and preemptive policing of computer-identified hot spots. But it’s down in general, and for that matter, some liberals have taken up some of the reforms mentioned above. As to poverty, it’s worse than it was four years ago but it’s not worse than it was 10 or 20 years ago. Overall standards of living have risen and though they’ve risen more in, say, Texas than in, say, California, that could be put down to a catch-up effect.

But this is par for the course with political argument. You stake your case out broadly. You interpret your claims charitably, and the other side’s failures, uncharitably. And then the debate gets under way.

Goldberg hasn’t actually called for the Republicans to be racist. Just to try and help minorities. Since liberals believe that what conservatives think will help, will hurt, they’ll call it racist, Goldberg says.