Identity Politics

Republican style:

When he replaced Sen. Trent Lott (Miss.) as Majority Leader, Sen. Bill Frist (Tenn.) was supposed to usher in a new era of good relations between GOP leaders and black voters.

But Democrats are howling about an e-mail Senate Republicans sent out in advance of Wednesday’s confirmation hearing for Janice Rogers Brown, a black woman who has been nominated to a federal judgeship.

The e-mail invited “black journalists and reporters” to participate in a conference call on the nomination battle, according to The New York Post.

Apparently realizing the odd nature of limiting the call to scribes of one skin color, the GOP quickly fired off a slightly improved — but still tortured — e-mail inviting all “reporters on the judicial nominees beat as well as African-American journalists” to join the call.