WASHINGTON -- The latest evidence that the Democratic Party is a glutton for punishment is its decision to select Boston -- that bastion of liberalism, Edward Kennedy and Michael Dukakis -- as the site of its 2004 national convention.
Coupled with the election of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, San Francisco liberal, as the party's new leader in the House, you can hear the Republican Party warming up its old liberal-bashing machine that has served it so well in the post-New Deal years.
The choices of both Boston and Ms. Pelosi are excellent in terms of their backgrounds and politics in representing the rich tradition of the Democratic Party.
Nowhere in the country is the party more faithful to that tradition than in Boston and Massachusetts, if you discount the occasional lapse, such as this month's election of Republican Mitt Romney as governor.
Even at that, when Massachusetts voters go off the reservation for a Republican, it is almost always a moderate who might pass as a Democrat elsewhere and who cozies up to "the party of the people."
Ms. Pelosi is the daughter of an old Democratic warhorse in Baltimore, a former three-term mayor of the city and congressman, Tommy D'Alesandro Jr., and the sister of his namesake, also a former Baltimore mayor. She is a dynamite fund-raiser with a record of charming and cajoling cooperation across the ideological spectrum of the party.
But the L-word clings to Boston and Ms. Pelosi, and you can count on the Republicans, to whom liberal remains a dirty word, to make the most of it, especially if Massachusetts presidential hopeful Sen. John Kerry is still in the running at the time.
Nearly two years out, you can already anticipate Republicans invoking "Teddy" Kennedy in their fund-raising direct mail as catnip for contributions to fight his evil influence. Mr. Kennedy no doubt will be prominently displayed at the convention in the Hub, along with recollections of the old GOP poster boy of machine politics, the late House Speaker Tip O'Neill.
Not far behind will be Mr. Dukakis and the ghosts of Willie Horton, pollution in Boston Harbor and the helmeted Mike in the Army tank, not to mention George McGovern, who carried Massachusetts in 1972 and nowhere else except the District of Columbia.
Against this assault, the Democrats can be expected to trot out the rich history of Boston and Massachusetts in the founding of the Republic -- the Boston Tea Party, Paul Revere and all that. At the same time, they can be counted on to soft-pedal Boston's reputation as the cradle of federalism and banking interests, fiercely opposed by the Democratic Party's forefather, Virginian Thomas Jefferson (though, ironically, at first under the name "Republican").
Much is made of the choice of a convention city in terms of the party's chances of carrying the host state. But if the Democrats can't carry Massachusetts without holding its biggest party extravaganza there, it's in worse shape than the most pessimistic crepe-hangers think after the Nov. 5 midterm election returns.
There never has been much evidence that bringing a party convention to a state has had much influence in how that state votes in the fall. What it does, if all goes well, is bring plenty of publicity and spending by the TV networks and celebrating delegates and hangers-on.
So more significant for the Democratic Party is the choice of Ms. Pelosi as the highest-ranking woman in Congress, and one with a conspicuous liberal voting record coupled with a more nonpartisan collegiality.
The major gripe against departing House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt of Missouri (and his Senate counterpart, Tom Daschle of South Dakota, who is staying in his post) is that in the crunch they chose to fold rather than fight President Bush on his Iraq war resolution and some other issues.
Ms. Pelosi didn't, and she offers at the start at least a more confrontational posture. Whether that will bring party solidarity or political suicide remains to be seen.
Jules Witcover writes from The Sun's Washington bureau. His column appears Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.