Party Of Hate

Another "lone wacko" says exactly the same thing at a McCain-Palin rally as the other "lone wacko." Funny how it seems so coordinated, like it's an expected response to fearmongering and incitement.

There were no incendiary outbursts from the crowd about Mr. Obama during Mrs. Palin's speech, as there have been during other recent McCain-Palin rallies.

However, someone did shout out, "Kill him!" during Republican congressional candidate Chris Hackett's remarks before Mrs. Palin took the stage.

The outburst came during a round of booing from the crowd after Mr. Hackett said Mr. Obama should come to Pennsylvania and learn what the state's values are.

I think we have to be clear where this is all going. We've seen this kind of hate before in America - it's a part of our legacy. And by running their campaign in this way, McCain and Palin aren't making it more likely they will win - the attacks are simply driving up their unfavorables. They are making it more likely that their supporters will be angry and resentful and hold the grudge long after Election Day - and more likely that they will take matters into their own hands.

Color of Change and Brave New Films put this together to show the accumulation of these remarks, and words can become action without much effort.



I mean, I suppose I could go ahead and mention that the guy running McCain's transition team lobbied for Saddam Hussein, and that means John McCain himself murdered our troops and gassed the Kurds. And if I were Barack Obama I could run an entire campaign based on that, suggesting that McCain was a risk because he's associated with radical figures. And he bombed the South Africa rugby team (man, I thought I kept up on all these Obama rumors and even I missed that one).

But that would be horrible for America, you see. It would debase the office to which I was trying to ascend. It would make it impossible for my supporters to accept my opponent if he were to win. It would debilitate the country.

There's nothing wrong with a politics of contrast on the issues; in fact, it's vital. The politics that tries to win through scare tactics and causing riots, for all intents and purposes, is beneath contempt.

(on a related note, what got into Campbell Brown?

...I guess Keith Olbermann was thinking the same thing tonight.