On the very day of a special election to fill a vacated congressional seat this week in Mississippi, The New York Times accused the Republican candidate of running racist ads against his Democratic opponent.

Talk about dirty tricks! By The New York Times, that is.

The Republican thus accused of racism narrowly lost the election the night the Times article appeared, so I guess the Times can proclaim: "Mission Accomplished."

The ad in question, on behalf of Republican Greg Davis, pointed out that Barack Obama had endorsed Davis' opponent, Travis Childers -- another in a long line of fake-American goobers claiming to be "conservative Democrats," but who get to Congress and promptly vote to ban guns, surrender in Iraq and fund full-term abortions.

These days, I guess you can call yourself a "conservative Democrat" if you refrain from being sworn into Congress with your hand on a Quran.

The ad showed a clip of Obama's pastor g-damning America and mentioned Obama's recent remarks ridiculing rural folks for clinging to guns. It then concluded that Childers "took Obama's endorsement over our conservative values."

The Republicans had also run ads connecting Childers with other Washington liberals, such as Nancy Pelosi and John Kerry. (Times editors are still looking for the racist angle to those ads.)

To call that ad racist is a monstrous libel. Greg Davis and the Mississippi Republicans should bring a defamation action against The New York Times -- although such an action might be perceived as "racist" because some black people work at the Times.

Republicans are constantly linking the local hayseed Democrat to national liberals like John Kerry. The technique goes back at least to Michael Dukakis in 1988.

It is beyond outrageous for liberals to complain about the practice of linking Democrats to the national party when their calculated strategy in race after race in the red states has been to run Democratic candidates who appear to be Americans. They're not Americans. They're liberals! I don't care how much hay is sticking out of their straw hats.

In the 2006 midterm elections, Sen. Chuck Schumer and erstwhile ballerina Rep. Rahm Emanuel (now there's a couple of raw-boned Americans for you!) famously rounded up yokels from the local square dance contests to run as "macho Dems" -- as the Times admiringly called them. Schumer and the ballerina were hailed for their brilliant strategy to fool the hayseeds.

The phony blue-collar Democrats won their elections by driving around in pickup trucks and shooting guns, then moved to Washington and began voting against war in Iraq and in favor of taxpayer-funded abortions.

One of the Democrats' paragons of regular guy-ness that year was Jon Tester of Montana, who wore cowboy boots and had a buzz cut. The crew cut absolutely transfixed liberals in places like Manhattan. Search "Jon Tester and crew cut" on Google, and you'll get mor