BY TONY BEST

THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE has Eric Holder, his Bajan heritage and his role as a key adviser to United States Senator Barack Obama on its mind, and not with good intentions.

As it steps up the drumbeat in the United States against Eric Holder, nothing escapes the party, including the former United States attorney-general's Barbadian heritage.

"Holder, a Barbadian immigrant's son who grew up in Queens and received a law degree from Columbia (University), has played major roles in the probe of Democratic (Party's) funny-money in the 1996 election, the sexgate scandal and recommendations to President (Bill) Clinton on whether to free FALN (Puerto Rican Armed Forces of National Liberation," complained the Republicans in a nationally distributed position paper that contended Obama should remove him from his vice-presidential vetting committee.

But has the party of Abraham Lincoln gone off the rails in its ranting and ravings against both Holder and the Democratic Party's presidential nominee?

The query is important because of the history of the Republicans.

After all, the party once epitomised the things many people considered decent and great about political organisations in a society struggling to deal with freedom for its citizens. Now it has become a symbol of what's wrong with the body politic.

We say struggling because with millions of black folks living under the evils of slavery during the 19th century, Lincoln's party led the country into a civil war that eventually ended up with the abolition of civilisation's most abhorrent practice – slavery.

Of course, that happened long before the Democrats came to their collective senses and saw the virtues in human rights and civil and political liberties.

In addition, it was decades ahead of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s that finally broke the last remaining links in the chain that for almost a century after the Reconstruction period in the United States, had kept Blacks in a different state of bondage.

The Supreme Court's ruling in the historic Brown v Board of Education decision in 1950s; the passage of the Voting Rights Act; the enactment of fair housing laws and the use of affirmative action to open the doors of opportunities to ethnic minorities, are some of the measures which many Republicans fought against but which recently culminated in a momentous and exciting chapter in America's history – the nomination of a black man as the presidential standard-bearer of a major party, the Democrats, in the November elections of 2008.

While no one would have expected the Republicans to accept the selection of such a striking candidate as Obama without staging a vigorous battle to prevent him from moving into the White House in January, the personal attacks, the vilification and the smear tactics targeting him and his wife, Michelle, have gone far beyond the pale.

But what is it that they are accusing Holder of doing?

Actually, the Republicans are going to the bottom of the proverbial barrel dredging up anything they can find to throw mud, hoping that something would stick. Chances are it's not going to work because Holder hasn't broken any laws, he has avoided any impropriety in and out of public office, and hasn't been involved in any sleazy conduct.

In the absence of any perfidious action, the Republicans are trying to convince people that Holder was unfit to advise Obama on his vice-presidential running mate or to be a member of the nominee's inner circle, the senior Working Group on National Security.

They are blaming him for everything, including the kitchen sink. For instance:

l "Holder defended the right of the (US) federal government to seize Elian Gonzalez, the six-year-old Cuban boy who was held against his will by relatives in Miami who wanted to prevent him from returning to his biological father in Cuba."

The law courts backed up the position taken by Holder and the Clinton Administration in general and the Justice Department in particular.

On the other hand, the courts have ruled against the Bush Administration's denial of justice to "terror suspects" held in federal detention in and out of Cuba and the United States.

l "Holder played a major role in the decision to grant clemency to 16 former members of the Puerto Rican Armed Forces of National Liberation almost a decade ago."

But the Republicans have remained silent on the fact that the Bush White House has declined to bring to justice a known Cuban terrorist who law enforcement officials insist blew up a Cuban plane after it left Barbados in 1976, killing scores of Cubans, North Koreans and Guyanese.

l "Eric Holder lobbied on behalf of Global Crossing after the company had accumulated nearly $12 million in debt."

Big deal!

On and on goes the rubbish.

That explains why the anti-Holder campaign has failed to gain traction. Unless the Republicans can come up with more potent ammunition, the demolition job isn't going to work.