Let’s decode a fundraising letter signed by House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) for his congressional campaign committee.

The copy of the appeal landing in my e-mail was circulated by GOPUSA, a conservative group.

The letter chop-livers House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and makes a point of bringing up the names of Reps. John Murtha (D-Pa.), Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Barney Frank (D-Mass.).

Demonizing political personalities to trigger donations is a standard device. The technique stays the same; the names just change. Democrats are still using former Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas) to raise money, and invoking the names of President Bush and Vice President Cheney works for the Democratic National Committee.

Let’s look at the Hastert letter:

Pelosi wants to “take over my chair as Speaker of the House and control Congress. …”

“Under a Pelosi-led Congress, the conservative ideals of family values and an unwavering commitment to our troops will be ignored, while the interest of San Francisco liberals and trial lawyers will be heard loud and clear by her liberal friends.”

San Francisco should get a commission each time a Republican invokes the name of the heavily Democratic, left-leaning, gay-friendly city in a fundraising appeal.

The GOP also wields the words “trial lawyers.”

Yesterday, the Association of Trial Lawyers of America (ATLA), a dependable source of campaign cash for Democrats, was poised to change its name to the American Association for Justice at its convention in Seattle.

The new name is intended to reflect the ATLA position that Republicans are trying to tailor the justice system to benefit their corporate donors.

About the other Democrats cited in the letter:

• Murtha — This is the first cycle where the name of the lawmaker who has emerged as a leading advocate of bringing home troops from Iraq is being used. Invoking his name plays on the GOP theme that Democrats are weak on defense.

• Rangel — This Ways and Means Committee member is the ranking Democrat on the panel and presumably would become chairman if the Dems won control of the House. He is also a leading African-American lawmaker.

• Frank — Frank is the ranking Dem on the Financial Services Committee and would be in line to be chairman in a Democratic House. But is that why his name is in there? Frank makes no secret that he is gay.

• Hastert house call. Hastert spent four days in the Bethesda Naval Hospital stricken with a skin infection on his leg, a condition called cellulitis.

Sweet: How did you know something was wrong with your leg?

Hastert: There was something, the size of a dime — it was just an infection — and had treated it with a couple of courses of penicillin, and it wasn’t getting any better.

The doc said maybe go up and have some guys look at it, so I did. …

Sweet: Treatment?

Hastert: Medication and got me off my feet for four days.

Sweet: See any CDs or DVDs?

Hastert: I watched “Remember the Titans.”

Apt for the former wrestling coach. The sports movie, set in 1971, stars Denzel Washington and Will Patton, who play football coaches — one white, one black — at a high school in Alexandria, Va.

Sweet is the Washington bureau chief for the Chicago Sun-Times. E-mail: This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it