WASHINGTON WATCH: YOU DECIDE WHO IS MORE EXTREME

The White House, after months of turmoil trying to develop a political strategy to make it a player in Washington again, has decided to return to the blame game of calling Republicans extremists. It is the one strategy on which it and the Democratic leadership in the Congress can agree. If the current issues on the table are any indicator, however, the strategy is unlikely to have much resonance outside of liberal special-interest groups and the left wing of the Democratic caucus.

Case in point is the debate over the bill, passed Tuesday by the House of Representatives, that repeals tax breaks to companies that sell broadcast stations and cable TV systems to minorities. Listen to the White House and Democratic leadership criticize the legislation, and you would think that the Republicans plan to send women and blacks to the gas chamber. For their efforts to remove a bad law, they have been called "racist," "fascist," "hateful" and "just like Hitler."

Unsurprisingly, when the rhetoric settled and a vote was finally taken, the legislation passed 381 to 44, with over three times as many Democrats voting in favor of the bill as against it. This begs the simple question: Who truly are the extremists? The Republicans and mainstream Democrats? Or those like Bill Clinton, Dick Gephardt and Barney Frank?

A look at the legislation itself is even more revealing. The bill repeals a long-standing tax break that allows a company to avoid capital-gains taxes if it sells a television, radio or cable television system to a company controlled by members of a racial or ethnic minority. It should be noted that these deals are usually in the millions of dollars, so we are not talking about anyone who is disadvantaged, as some in the Democratic leadership would have the public believe. In fact, other than creating a shell game for broadcast companies and enriching one set of millionaires over another, the current law is a fraud.

For example, look at the proposed $2.3 billion sale of TV properties by media giant Viacom Inc. Under the current law, Viacom, which also owns MTV and Paramount Pictures, would escape paying $400 million to $600 million in taxes simply because it arranged to sell its cable systems to a black entrepreneur. Nearly all of the money for the purchase, however, would come from a group called Intermedia Partners, which was formed by several billion-dollar companies, including the nation's biggest cable television operator, Tele-Communications Inc. Since the law requires that a company be at least 20 percent minority owned to participate in the program, the black entrepreneur would own 21 percent of the venture and Intermedia Partners 79 percent. However, Intermedia Partners has an option to buy out the black entrepreneur's stake after three years for as little as $3 million, with no penalty.

In other words, the entrepreneur makes $3 million for lending the color of his skin to the deal, while Viacom saves $400 million to $600 million in taxes, and TCI and Intermedia Partners achieve a purchase price significantly lower than would otherwise be possible. Finally, an estimated half-billion dollars isn't collected in taxes.While this abuse of the current law is egregious -- and perfectly legal -- there is a larger question in the matter. Should the federal government be engaged in such racial favoritism in the first place?

Republicans and moderate Democrats say no. They say the tax code should be color-blind. President Clinton and the Democratic leadership in Congress, on the other hand, argue for racial favoritism even in the case of millionaires.Who do you believe is the more extreme?Be careful, you might just be called "racist," "fascist," "hateful" and "just like Hitler."Jon K. Rust is a Washington-based writer for the Southeast Missourian.