by Askia Muhammad
White House Correspondent

LOS ANGELES (FinalCall.com)�Few Democratic Party loyalists will admit it publicly now, but Black party leaders and labor leaders are quietly admitting that Vice President Al Gore�s selection of Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) to be his running mate may cost the party support among the very voters the Democratic ticket needs most to win the White House in November�Blacks, labor union members and environmentalists.

It was no accident, therefore, that Sen. Lieberman�who is an observant, Orthodox Jew�told members of the Democratic National Committee�s Black Caucus Aug. 15, that his very first convention appearance was before them.

 He was there, he said, to reinforce his long-standing commitment to the civil rights struggle and to issues that are important to Black voters. He told Black Caucus members that he wanted to put a damper on the smoldering resentment of his voting record that has been expressed in a variety of quarters.

Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) member Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) raised questions about Sen. Lieberman�s support of her state�s controversial 1998 anti-affirmative action Proposition 209 which passed, effectively banning state-funded affirmative action programs and university admissions programs which considered the race of applicants as an admissions factor. She also expressed concerns about his support of school vouchers, just three days after the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam, raised a variety of questions in many people�s minds, including one about the senator�s objectivity when it comes to U.S. Middle East policy and dealings with Muslim governments.

�I want to support the ticket, but I am not quite there yet,� Rep. Waters told reporters outside a CBC meeting before the convention got underway. �We were caught pretty much off guard, so everybody is going back and pulling up the records and the records don�t look too good right now,� she said. Later, following a two-hour private meeting with the vice-presidential nominee and his speech to the DNC Black Caucus, Rep. Waters did announce her support.

Caught off guard

Black Democrats in Congress had definitely been caught off guard and there may have been some jealousy nationally among Black Democrats that the first �minority group� member named to the party�s ticket was not Black, according to several political analysts. Blacks represent 12 percent of the nation�s population and an even higher portion of the Democratic Party�s base of support, while Jews�another loyal, but substantially smaller bloc of traditional Democratic voters�constitute only three percent of the total U.S. population.

When Republican nominee and Texas Gov. George W. Bush announced that Dick Cheney would be his running mate, another CBC member told The Final Call that she was disappointed that none of her colleagues had done enough to get a Black candidate on Al Gore�s so-called �short list.� When Mr. Gore named Sen. Lieberman as his running mate, all dissension over not having chosen a Black candidate was replaced by general agreement among Black leaders that Mr. Lieberman�s selection would open the door for all previously shut out groups.

 �As a Muslim, as a Black person, I have concerns,� Min. Farrakhan told a Los Angeles press conference Aug. 11 after expressing his agreement with the nominee over his stand against Hollywood �filth that is being poured on the American people in the name of the First Amendment.�

 �The State of Israel is not synonymous with the United States,� the Muslim leader said. �And the test that (Sen. Lieberman) would probably have to pass is, would he be more faithful to the Constitution of the United States than to the ties that any Jewish person would have to the state of Israel? That�s very real. Other people, fearing that they will be called anti-Semitic, may not raise such a point. I am not anti-Semitic, but I raise that point,� Min. Farrakhan continued.

Rev. Roderick L. Ewell of St. Mark Missionary Baptist Church and field representative of 52nd District Assemblyman Carl Washington said urban issues and problems were not inclusive and have not been addressed.

�If we are going to keep the African-American vote � we are going to have to be honest and focus on the issues that are real to us, and not just the country as a whole,� he stated.

Rev. Ewell said that Blacks do more damage to themselves in disunity than whites will ever do. And he cited the Min. Farrakhan as an exemplary leader, and feels people should look beyond his Muslim faith to the important issues he raised.

�He�s the only person I know right now who�s strong enough , no, bold enough, to get out there and tell it exactly how he feels. ... He�s talking what everyone else is saying behind closed doors, and as a Baptist and a Christian, I appreciate Min. Farrakhan for what he�s doing,� he added.

 Environmentalists, labor activists, and economic justice activists also expressed criticism of the ticket. �The (Clinton-Gore) administration has convinced most of the public that they are environmentalists, but if you look deeper, you find that their actions are token,� Tracy Katelman, Environmental co-chair of the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment, said in a statement. �The corporations are making money and the environment is losing.�

 �The Hollywood job base has been deteriorating because of NAFTA,� said Michael Everett, a labor activist and spokesman for the Hollywood Fair Trade Campaign. �Many movies are made in Canada because the Canadian dollar is soft and Canadian subsidies are permitted by NAFTA. These subsidies are supposed to protect the native Canadian film industry, but instead have been used to raid the U.S. film industry,� he continued, complaining that 24,000 jobs were lost to overseas productions in 1998 alone.

 Other labor leaders are silently re-directing their support away from the presidential campaign into support for Congressional candidates because of Vice President Gore�s and Sen. Lieberman�s support for the Clinton trade policies, according to informed sources.

 The president of a major labor union �told my boss that he would smile and shake hands while he is here at the convention,� a staff member of a CBC member with a strong, pro-labor voting record told The Final Call, but the union leader would re-direct the group�s campaign contributions into the Congressional fight, �as soon as he gets home.�

 �Both at the global level and at the local level, there�s a propensity to be guided by the corporate interest (while) being blind to the moral dimensions of economic decisions being made,� the Rev. William Campbell, co-chair of Ministers Against Global Injustice, said in a statement, referring to a just released report from the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy that shows that one-in-four workers are still below the poverty line.

 Critics point out that Sen. Lieberman was number one on the list of Senate members receiving contributions from the pharmaceutical industry, in a recent campaign finance report.

 The questions about Sen. Lieberman�s opposition to affirmative action go back to the Spring of 1995 when he told the National Press Club that preferential policies based on race and sex were �patently unfair� and had helped lead to a breakdown in society, according a New York Amsterdam News report at the time.

 �You can�t defend policies that are based on group preferences as opposed to individual opportunities,� the newspaper quoted him as saying. �When we have such policies,� Sen. Lieberman continued, �we have the effect of breaking some of those ties in a civil society that have held us together, because they are patently unfair.�

 In his remarks to the DNC Black Caucus and again in his nomination acceptance speech, Sen. Lieberman did not offer any mea culpa, or even an apologia for his positions. Instead, he recalled how he marched in Washington with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and how he went to Mississippi during the dangerous �Freedom Summer� times, in order to help register Black voters. He now agrees with President Bill Clinton�s view of the affirmative action, he said, that is: �mend it, don�t end it.�

The danger facing the Gore-Lieberman ticket at the end of their convention is that unlike the Republicans who placated their conservative base with a vice-presidential nominee from the far right-wing of the party, and then used their televised convention to present the illusion of an inclusive, diverse, moderate, �Big Tent� party, thus energizing the otherwise left out minority groups, Vice President Gore and the Democrats did nothing like that in Los Angeles.

At least two of Sen. Lieberman�s strongest supporters in the CBC agreed that Gore-Lieberman so-called �Dream-Team� has not done enough yet to solidify its support among its core constituency.

�The Republicans have 95 percent of their ducks lined up in a row,� Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) told the press conference. �The Democrats only have 70 percent of our base lined up,� she continued, pointing to the urgency with which Blacks voted in 1998, when the Million Man March, led by Min. Farrakhan, inspired an increase of 1.7 million Black men to participate in that year�s elections. At that time, many Blacks also feared that Republican impeachment efforts would be successful in removing President Clinton from office.

 Once again, just as it did in 1998, the party must �energize� Blacks and other voters they are going to need to turn out in large numbers on election day, agreed Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.). While this strategy has not yet been publicly articulated by Gore campaign officials, the Democrats will need to solidify their base, a CBC source said, before the presidential candidates can successfully launch a campaign in suburban districts that�s intended to appeal to white, so-called �swing voters.�