A Suessian Tale

H/T to Tina. This is really worth watching:

Sphere: Related Content

And We Reap the Whirlwind

This election cannot come fast enough. Last week, I wrote that the McCain campaign, along with supporters, were, to borrow a phrase from the Old Testament, "sowing the wind." With every day that passes, I fear more and more that we will all reap the whirlwind. I am worried about violence as election day approaches, and worried that an Obama victory will leave many people believing that a socialist-terrorist-anti-American who they should fear occupies the White House. All courtesy of John McCain and the RNC.

On Thursday night, on Letterman, McCain awkwardly interjected that regarding the financial crisis, the American people had been victims of "a drive by shooting" by Washington and Wall Street. Just a random statement, of course.

Last night, I listened in absolute shock as Rep. Michelle Bachman, a United States Congresswomen, questioned whether or not Sen. Barack Obama was "anti-American." Really?

I listened to network after network replay the vile robocall to swing state voters, warning them, essentially, that Obama and his terrorist friends plotted to kill Americans. Despicable. All paid for by McCain and the RNC-the same McCain who for a minute last week seemed to be tamping down the incendiary speech that has marked and marred his campaign in recent weeks. No more.

Yesterday, Republican women distributed fake food stamps with Obama's picture. And, today, McCain called Obama a "socialist."

And, tonight, this, a racist flyer, threatening Obama's life , distributed in mailboxes of an Atlanta subdivision. No idea who did this. Whether it is the KKK as the piece claims, or a group or individual seeking to influence the election. The Secret Service is investigating-and no matter who did it, they should go to jail.

I no longer believe that John McCain is a victim of this strategy, simply unable to lead. With his words today, it is clear, John McCain has sold his soul.

Sphere: Related Content

They Have Sown the Wind

For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk; the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up. Hosea 8:7 (KJV)

A stuffed monkey doll with an Obama sticker on the forehead-CBS News reports that's what one McCain supporter felt at liberty to show off at a rally this morning in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, where Sarah Palin was speaking. Initially, other supporters grinned as he showed off the monkey, but when the man realized a video camera was trained on him, he quickly ripped the sticker from the toy and gave the monkey to a random child in the crowd. This offensive display happened the day after John McCain finally either found his soul or checked his polls and began to try to calm the crowds that have become decidedly more like lynch mobs since Sarah Palin began repeatedly accusing Obama of "palling around with terrorists" and pressing the message: "We don't know who Obama really is, but what we do know is that he's not like us." It's easier to hate someone you believe is not like you. It's easier to fear someone you believe is not like you. The belief that the someone or something is not like us, is dangerous, and should be feared facilitates objectification that frees a mob, fueled by anger and fear, to act. This week, all of three messages-(1) he is not like us; (2) he is dangerous, and (3) he should be feared-have been front and center in the messages of Palin, McCain and their surrogates even as the crowds became more and more agitated. Ultimately, John McCain took a microphone from a women who was convinced Obama was "Arab" and was forced to defend his opponent to the very unhappy crowd.

Palin and McCain did not have to create this anger, these misconceptions about Obama. Palin simply planted her Naughty Monkey Double Dare pumps on the fire ant bed that has been growing on the Internet for over a year. And, despite what has happened, and McCain's desire to now reign in the hatred, today, Palin went after Obama on abortion, yet another emotional issue that has a history of inspiring violence. And, she went further than just saying he favored choice (he does), further even than saying he is pro-abortion (he is not). Palin cobbled together words and votes taken out of context and made the case that Barack Obama sees babies as a "punishment" and favors withholding medical care from babies, even special needs babies, born alive. The message? Obama hates babies. And that's not like us.

I do not believe that either John McCain or Sarah Palin want harm to come to Barack Obama. Palin, for her part, is reading what McCain's folks put in front of her. But if he is shocked, either by the reaction of the crowds or the response of civil right heroes like Congressman John Lewis, then it is, again, McCain's judgement that is in question.

There is a profound disconnect between the person I believe John McCain to be-a good and honest man who is a true American hero-and the campaign he fails to control. Every day ads run that advance the theme that Obama is not like us, every day campaign surrogates invoke Obama's middle name as if it is a slur, and every day the talking heads are unleashed to say what the candidate dare not, that dangerous disconnect continues and McCain's own legacy is threatened. This is no doubt a perilous moment in history. We are at war, and just as those buildings collapsed on 9/11, we are watching as our economy struggles to stand. One of these two men will be President in January, and the first task, for whoever is elected, will be to become a President for all of us, especially those who did not vote for them. For either McCain or Obama to spend the next three weeks trying to convince the electorate that the other is dangerous, cannot be trusted and is not like us does not serve that mission or this nation well.

Sphere: Related Content

We Are Ticked Off, Sarah

Unless Tina Fey actually shows up at the debate tonight, don't expect the event to be "Thursday Night Live" as some pundits suggest. Sarah Palin will do just fine tonight. At this point, all she has to do is show up and not cuss, and she'll be crowned the winner. After all, the neo-cons have spent two weeks lowering expectations to the point that most Americans are turning on the evening news just to hear the latest Palin gaff. I mean, seriously, I watched the CBS Evening News last night for the first time in years. If Obama is elected, Katie Couric should get a gift basket from the campaign-at least a tee shirt.

And, they've been working the ref, now suggesting that Gwen Iffil is biased because of a book she has written. Give me a break. Even McCain knows about "a google." Apparently Iffil was fine until McCain began to tank. And tank, he has, with the economy now tied to his ankle like an anchor. I am sitting in the reddest of states, Georgia, where the latest polls have McCain up by single digits. That has to have the McCain team working the Tums dispenser, not because it means that Obama will win Georgia, but because it reflects what is happening nationally. The combination of McCain's own blunders (see "suspending my campaign" and his testy interview with the Des Moines Register), the dire economic situation, the unending war in Iraq and the proclamation by David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, that we urgently need more troops in Afghanistan have now made McCain's judgement the central issue of this election.

No where was that judgement more flawed than in McCain's selection of "Joe Six Pack" Palin for his Vice Presidential nominee, a choice that is increasingly driving even conservatives from his side. Yesterday, Palin who refuses to list what she reads and who stubbornly clings to her claim that she's an expert on foreign policy because of Alaska's geography, said, "It's time that a normal Joe Six-Pack American is finally represented in the position of vice presidency, and I think that that's kind of taken some people off guard, and they're out of sorts, and they're ticked off about it."

Damn right we're ticked off about it, Sarah. This is not the time to elect an "average" president. I don't know what papers they have been putting in front of you, but, if you've been reading anything other than your briefing book, then you know that we need the brightest and the best at the helm, especially now. Joe Six-Pack needs a voice, a vote and most of all a President who cares about the middle class-not the guy and gal who want to give $174 billion annually in tax breaks to large corporations while the middle class picks up the scraps. If there are any scraps. If there still is a middle class.

It is indeed now the neocons left defending Gov. Palin, individuals who clearly value party and power over the good of the nation and who launch wholesale attacks on those whose ideas are not in line with their own. Calling for a "cease fire in the war of unwelcome ideas" conservative columnist Kathleen Parker, who has been the focus of neocon ire after being openly critical of the Palin choice, said today in the Washington Post:

Readers have every right to reject my opinion. But when we decide that a person is a traitor and should die for having an opinion different from one's own, we cross into territory that puts all freedoms at risk. (I hear you, Dixie Chicks.) I'm sure it is coincidence that, upon the Palin column's publication, a conservative organization canceled a speech I was scheduled to deliver in a few days. If I were as paranoid as the conspiracy theorists are, I might wonder whether I was being punished for speaking incorrectly. Unfortunately, that's the way one begins to think when party loyalty is given a higher value than loyalty to bedrock principles.
Our day of reckoning may indeed be upon us. Between war and economic collapse, we have enormous challenges. It will take the best of everyone to solve them. That process begins minimally with a commitment to engage in civil discourse and a cease-fire in the war against unwelcome ideas.

Parker's right. Party loyalty is not a reason to cast a vote in this election. The time is too short, the stakes are too high. In the end, while tonight may be interesting political theater, it cannot erase the weeks of silence, scripts and vacant responses that have marked Palin's introduction to the American people. There is increasing evidence that John McCain cannot administer an effective campaign, much less a country in crisis. We are ticked off, Sarah, not at you, but at John McCain, who in choosing you demonstrated that "County First" is nothing but an empty slogan.

Sphere: Related Content