Wilson Hooks Racial Bait for Democrats : With affirmative action, he hopes to divert interest from issues the opposition excels in.

Pete Wilson, the seasoned angler, has tossed the bait of affirmative action into the political waters to jump-start his so-far visionless (and appropriately voiceless) presidential campaign, and to try to transform the politics of 1996 as he transformed the California political landscape of 1994 with illegal immigration.

Make no mistake, Wilson wants California Democrats to bite--and bite hard--on his bait and hook. He is hungry for office and anxious to feed the fear and discontent bred by the long siege of recession and economic insecurity. He wants to slice and fry Democrats on the griddle of race.

If Democrats want to be Wilson’s main course in 1996, then we should respond to his agenda. If we want to win at the ballot box, and thereby have a chance to govern, then we need to pass up that hook and find nourishment on our own terms that moves the society forward.

Affirmative action threatens to dominate our state’s political debate--not so much because of its genuine preeminence as an issue among the populace, but because of the blank slate upon which it is being written and upon which California Democrats facing the electorate in 1996 have yet to write a message.

The political premise of a 1996 California Democratic agenda is simple. Democrats win when we focus on economic expansion and opportunity and when we campaign and govern like we mean it. Republicans win when they successfully take the offensive on wedge issues like race and immigration, masking the interests of their narrow and powerful economic and religious-right elites. That’s why Bush won in 1988, Clinton in 1992 and Wilson in 1994.

The premise of such an agenda is equally simple--that the party purporting to best represent working Californians and those struggling to move up has an obligation to advance the cause of economic growth, to recognize the frustration that our own political base feels with the effectiveness of the public sector and to conduct itself as the agent of change interested in delivering results, not merely defending the clearly dysfunctional status quo. As much as I abhor the Republican agenda of 1995, I admire the zeal with which it is pursued and I want California Democrats to speak, with equal vigor, for policies that will give hope for the renewal of California.

The 1996 California Democratic campaign should be about economic expansion, educational opportunity and a government that is focused and efficient in the pursuit of both.

* We need to focus “like a laser,” to quote President Clinton from the 1992 campaign, on the economy and on expanding opportunity broadly. We need to advance policies on taxes, capital formation, deficit reduction, smart regulatory reform and investment incentives that fuel the economy for the working and middle class, not just the richest 1%.

* We need to be clearly committed to rebuilding the public education system as the foundation of economic success and social stability. Wilson’s operatives have admitted that their greatest fear in 1994 was that California Democrats would elevate public education to a front-tier issue. We failed to do so. California Democrats need to be the experimenters and risk-takers--from wider choice for inner-city residents, to curriculum reform, to overhauling the bureaucracy--doing whatever is necessary to best teach our children.

* To achieve these goals, we must take the lead in overhauling government so it directs its firepower on these central missions. We need to stop confusing liberalism with the defense of tired, bloated institutions that are marginal or irrelevant to our agenda. Change is coming to the public sector, with or without us. Instead of letting Republicans be the definers of the future public structure, let us lead the fight for a lean, efficient government with a new sense of mission.

Some Democrats think that the way to win in 1996 is to snap back at the Republicans’ lure. We should call Wilson on his racial and gender ploy and stand firmly for equality and justice--but in the broader context of our electoral agenda, not his.

One last fish story for Pete Wilson: There is a practice called chumming, in which meat and blood are thrown in the water to attract sharks to the surface. The practice can backfire, with the chummers--or innocent surfers--becoming victims. That Wilson should personally be snared by his own bait is not our concern. What is, is that the waters of our society should become so rough as to harm us all. It is particularly in that context that the politics of 1996 cry out for a Democratic agenda of opportunity and hope.