No candidate for office can get elected nowadays without having a plan to keep their community safe from terrorism. And, while the administration in Washington and many of their partisans have raised the politics of fear to new heights, it doesn't diminish the need for Democrats to have a well thought out response to the question: "How do you keep us as safe as possible?"
Democrats faced a similar challenge in 1993 when asked about the rise in drug-fueled street crime.
Then, like now, Democrats were looked at skeptically by the electorate as being weak on crime. The infamous "Willy Horton" ads, which George H.W. Bush had used to sink Michael Dukakis' campaign for president in 1988, left voters with the impression that Democrats were incapable of tamping crime down.
But one term later, Democrats, lead by Bill Clinton, answered with the most far reaching and innovative federal anti-crime initiative ever -- the C.O.P.S. program. It did the most intuitive thing -- it hired more than 100,000 beat cops. It worked. It put police in every neighborhood, town and city. It brought crime down. And it changed the electorate's perception of Democrats.
Now the C.O.P.S. program is again the solution to the substantive challenge our nation faces and the political hurdles we as Democrats face in the wake of 9/11.
While President Bush has tried to use aid to state and local governments as a political trough, President Clinton ensured that every community benefited from the C.O.P.S. program. Sure, big cities like Chicago and L.A. hired officers with federal help. But so did small towns like Marengo, Illinois and Plano, Texas.
Republicans, despite adopting "tough on terror" rhetoric, have turned their backs on the state and local police and sheriffs who provide our first line of defense. In what can only be described as a double-whammy, they have not only left local law enforcement with more responsibility, they have cut the resources those local cops and deputies need to keep us safe. Let me explain.
Before 9/11, few of us expected our local law enforcement to keep tabs on international terrorist organizations like al-Qaeda. For the most part, that responsibility was left to federal authorities. Washington was tasked with protecting us from foreign threats, leaving our local police to focus on local crime prevention and investigation.
Over the course of the last five years, that has all changed. Local law enforcement is now deeply involved in homeland security. Big cities have been forced to upgrade not only their equipment and training -- but also the type of personnel they hire. Some cities have hired officers exclusively to focus on homeland security - police who work to gather intelligence, analyze terror threats, and monitor our most vulnerable targets.
And how have Republicans in Washington responded since coming to office? They have eliminated the program police departments big and small had grown to depend on: C.O.P.S. Funded at over $1 billion dollars a year at the end of the Clinton administration, President Bush, Tom DeLay, John Ashcroft, and Alberto Gonzales have zeroed out the hiring component of what some believe to have been the most successful law enforcement program in the nation's history.
The C.O.P.S. program showed that government could tackle tough problems -- which may explain why Bush's guys hate it so much. Sure, it was a Democratic program with a capital "D," but it also was democratic in the other way. It reminded us of our common aspirations. It didn't play one community off another. Big cities and small towns all benefited.
Nevertheless, despite their decision to zero out the program that most benefits the frontline in the war on terror, Republicans are still trying to maintain their "tough on terror" image. Despite their failures in Iraq, their incompetence during Katrina, and their failure to support local law enforcement, they are trying to paint Democrats as soft.
This week, we can put an end to Republican rhetorical jabs and prove that we are the real homeland security party. The Democratic Judiciary Committee will pass the C.O.P.S. Improvement Act to breathe new life into the C.O.P.S. program -- providing funding to hire as many as 50,000 new police over the next six years. And our bill will update the program to ensure that local police and sheriffs can use the funding to hire special "terrorism cops" who are focused on homeland security.
Last November, Democrats won control of Congress because the American people believed we had a better plan -- a new direction for America. We need to make sure that Americans see us put that plan into action. Together, we have to make sure the voting public knows that it's the Democratic Party that has a real strategy for homeland security.
Congressman Anthony D. Weiner (D-N.Y.), a member of House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security, represents Brooklyn and Queens.