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AND THE HATE GOES ON

There must be something about rabid Republicans that closes their minds - not just to facts, not just to reason - but to simple requests to stop annoying others with their fantasies and "truths" from the mouths of the Limbaughs and Savages and their ilk. I’ve said it kindly here on more than one occasion - most recently on October 9 - don’t send me links to nonsense because I don’t click on them and I don’t read the stuff that you glean from nonsense sites and include in your e-mails. But still they keep coming. I’m flattered that some conservatives read me on a regular basis but I wish they would try to understand what it is they are reading.

For example, I don’t know how many people have sent me the petition asking the Senate to rescind their "vote" to extend social security benefits to illegal aliens - even though they’ve never paid into the system. There was no such vote of course and I have sent the explanation of what actually happened in the Senate over two years ago and on which this silly rumor is based - to people asking me to sign on to the petition. I don’t know if this particular "rumor" was started out of ignorance or malice - but given the nature of the current presidential campaign I would suspect the latter.

I have yet to receive links to absolute "proof" that the reason Obama has gone to Hawaii is not to have one last visit with his ailing grandmother who is not expected to live long enough to witness her grandson become the next President of the United States - but to "doctor" his allegedly phony birth certificate to prove that he was actually born in Hawaii and not Kenya or Iran or Indonesia or wherever the crazed ones insist he was born. But I expect they’ll be arriving - as did the false report about a McCain supporter being attacked and having a "B" carved into her face. The right wing nuts bought this ridiculous story and spread it all over the Internet - and of course some of my right wing friends sent it to me with a see what your people are doing?

A small aside on this "your people" business. I have already voted. I voted for Obama/Biden. I also voted for some Illinois Republicans on a lengthy ballot who I think could do a better job than their Democratic opponents. The process is called thinking. Considering the issues and the candidates before blindly stabbing at the screen of the voting machine.

Something has gone wrong with the Republican party. It has lost its way. It is being dominated not just by the fanatics of the religious right but by crazed individuals who believe every crazed thing they hear about Barack Obama. In his endorsement of Obama last Sunday, Colin Powell made it clear that the party he has belonged to and supported for so long, no longer represented his views. And more and more Republicans around the country are publicly "defecting" to the Obama camp. They see the hate filled campaign that has been conducted by McCain - or at least in his name - and they can’t find any way to support it or vote for their candidate. Good for them. Whatever one may think of the Democratic candidate and/or the Democratic party, there has been nothing in any of the Democratic advertising or stump speeches that has questioned the patriotism of John McCain or suggested that there was something suspicious about him. And there has been no record of anyone at any Obama rally shouting the sort of hate filled things that have been shouted at McCain and Palin rallies. During the third debate, when McCain was defending the people who come to his rallies, he actually tried to infer that similar things go on at Obama rallies - but of course there are no recordings to back up such an assertion. They just aren’t there. The hate in this election is all coming from one side.

The question of course is why this kind of campaign? There was some underhanded stuff in the campaign against John Kerry - mostly the swift boat garbage which, along with Watergate, gave us another phrase to use in describing the worst of our political system - indeed of our country. Any scandal is now some kind of "gate" and any underhanded attack on a political candidate is now "swiftboating." There were no rumors of infidelity, drug use or anti-Americanism aimed at Al Gore. Infidelity was used against Bill Clinton - but no one tried to prove that he wasn’t from Hope, Arkansas - and infidelity wasn’t enough to sink him. And you can go back as far as you like and look at the kind of campaigns Republicans ran against their Democratic presidential candidate and you won’t find anything quite like what is being hurled at Barack Obama. For those ultra conservatives in denial who say that say it isn’t so and maintain he’s being attacked because of his policies - I wish they would tell me what policy difference is described in this latest mailing by the RNC with these kind of words - "Terrorists" "Not Who You Think He Is"


I do believe that Barack Obama will be elected president on November 4. I believe that there are enough fair minded people - Democrats, Republicans and Independents whose skin colors are white and black and olive, who will overcome the automatic votes of died-in-the-wool Republicans who would vote for Mortimer Snerd if that name was on the ballot with an "R" after it - and the rabid right wingers who are filled with hate and dread at the very idea that someone like Barack Obama could ascend to the presidency.

I wanted to get these thoughts down as an addendum - a companion piece if you will - to what I wrote two days ago - and try to stay away from writing anything more about politics until after November 4. I have both hope and fear in my heart at what awaits us ten days from now. I think the election willbe a test of who we are as a people and what kind of country and world we want for our children and grandchildren. We’ll either pass or fail that test on November 4. You decide what constitutes success or failure.
posted by Jeff Smith at 10/25/2008 01:22:00 PM