What happened to the part about compassion?

Reuben Navarrette:

I realize it’s all about winning at this point. But someone has to ask: What has happened to the Democratic Party?

It seems like just yesterday that the party of Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy was talking about income equality and civil rights and worker protections and going to bat for the little guy, the blue collar laborer, the everyday Joe the Plumber.

Now, the well-to-do elites who run the Democratic Party — and their surrogates — greet these people with brickbats. They insult them, talk down to them, and even try to destroy them. Isn’t that the sort of war on the working class that Democrats are always accusing those greedy and heartless Republicans of waging?

In fact, since the Democratic presidential nominee isn’t exactly a drinking buddy of Joe Six-pack, he knew enough to recruit a regular Joe to be his running mate. What? Joe Biden wasn’t chosen for his eloquence or rhetorical discipline. It’s his job to schmooze so-called lunch bucket voters.

As long as, it seems, one of them doesn’t put down his lunch bucket, straighten his blue collar, and pipe up with an opinion. Or even deign to ask a question of a presidential candidate conducting an expedition through his working-class neighborhood.

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Not only are the modern Democrats a party without compassion, but they are also a party without shame. They are so desperate to win that there is no amount of meanness they will not stoop to. I think it will get worse if Obama wins. He is too intolerant of opposing opinions.