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Saturday, October 18. 2008
Bringing Back HUAC
Originally, this screed began with a 500-word essay on the use of Coca-cola products as birth control and female sexual gratification aids, but it’s been … err … replaced … by more important news.Maybe a tomorrow.
Notice where the presidential campaign is going lately? Bill Ayers is off the McCain campaign’s TV ads, but has now moved to “robo-calls” delivered by the Republican National Committee. You might get an automated call that starts with a slam of Obama working “closely with” the one-time Weather Underground member.
Has anyone asked the McCain campaign two simple questions?
When was the last time Ayers committed an act of terrorism?
If Ayers is a terrorist, why is he living free in Chicago as a university professor and a recent recipient of the Chicago Person of the Year award? If Ayers — and his wife — truly were terrorists, wouldn’t the federal authorities have arrested him, charged and convicted him and have the professor in prison?
Am I the only one asking the obvious questions?
And this question: What about McCain’s relationship to G. Gordon Liddy? He’s a convicted burglar who, on his radio program, told listeners how to kill ATF agents if the government ever came to take their guns away. McCain attended a fundraiser held by his friend, G. Gordon Liddy. And Liddy has never been contrite about his role in the Watergate burglary and the subsequent cover-up.Now, the Republican spin is that Senator McCain is in a great position to win the election. In most national polls, Obama is ahead of McCain by seven points at least and as many as 12 points in others. Take away the margin of error, which can be as much as 4%, and McCain is now — ta-da! — just three points behind Obama! If you take the favorable poll result and couple it with the most favorable margin of error.
To be honest, Gallup, using a poll they think is the most accurate, puts McCain just two points behind Obama. It’s their daily tracking poll and within that poll they have the “likely voter” scenario and historically, Republicans are most likely to vote than Democrats. That puts the Republicans within the margin of error.
The flipside to that scenario is the one that includes those people who “intend to vote.” In that scenario Obama has a five point a 51%-46% advantage. So there is a little something for both campaigns to spin when they are talking with the chattering class on TV and radio.
Just today (Friday, October 17, 2008) McCain is now on the campaign trail blaming his opponent for making the life of Joe the plumber miserable. NOW THAT’S FUCKING AUDACIOUS! No one in America knew of Joe the plumber until John McCain brought him up in the last debate, bungling the plumber’s last name in the process. McCain then went on in the debate to mention Joe the plumber 21 times (as compared to Obama mentioning him about five times).Consequently, every news organization with any kind of a budget and owns are could rent a news van camped out at the plumber’s house. On the McCain campaign trail, this is all his opponent’s fault because Obama thrust Joe Wurzelbacher into the national spotlight when Senator McCain mentioned him during the last debate, and Obama directed all the news organizations to park their news vans and reporters on Wurzelbacher’s block, trampling his grass and rhododendrons in the all-important quest to find out just what Joe the Plumber has to say.
Maybe McCain should have asked Joe to be his running mate.
Wurzelbacher, on the other hand, voluntarily appeared on the Fox News network and CBS Evening News with Katie Couric.
Listening to McCain’s current campaign speech, which still has much of the usual claptrap, you would think Senator Obama unconscionably set out to destroy Joe Wurzelbacher all in an effort to win the presidential election. As laughable as that is, there are a number of Americans who will think this is absolutely true.
It’s like those laughable chain e-mails we get saying Obama is a closet Arab/Muslim — as if there’s something wrong with being either Arab or Muslim — and is a sleeper terrorist in the hire of Usama bin Laden. Laughable, yet there are many, many, Americans who believe it, as evidenced by the woman at a McCain rally who, when handed the microphone by Senator McCain, called Obama “an Arab.”His surrogates are on TV and radio saying the most outlandish things, even going so far as to call Democrats in Congress “un-American.” Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachmann from Minnesota’s 6th District was on Hardball with Chris Matthews and called for the news media to conduct Joe McCarthy-type investigations into all the Democrats to expose all the un-American members of Congress, starting with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
You gotta be effin’ kidding me! Next she’ll be calling for a 21st Century version of the House Un-American Activities Committee.It started when she accused the news media of giving Senator Obama a pass on the Bill Ayers issue, even though he’s been investigated inside and out by every news organization and the only actual tie to Ayers anyone can find, including the McCain campaign, is that Obama and Ayers served on the same education committees together. Ten years ago. What more is there to find? Ayers and Obama were both members of the board of the Woods Fund and Ayers actually donated $200.00 to one of Obama’s Illinois State Senate campaigns.
That’s the connection, but the Republicans are trying to make more out of it, as if Obama is in close and constant contact with the old professor. Obama has consistently said he has no contact with Bill Ayers, yet the Republicans, without any proof of it, claim there is a much deeper relationship between Obama and Ayers.
The beauty of it is, you can’t prove a negative so all the Republicans have to do is insinuate Obama has some hidden, anti-American agenda and all Obama can do is deny it. There is no proof — there can be no proof —Obama can produce to prove he is not in league with terrorists so therefore, for the ignorant class, the Republicans have “proven” Obama is a terrorist.
Facts aren’t important for the ignorant class. All one has to do is send an e-mail around the world with insinuations, coupled with some actual facts — and maybe a snippet of video with one or both of the candidates saying it — and the ignorant will believe that information to be true.McCain is now over the top with his desperation. Instigating bigotry in his campaign, through his chief surrogate Sarah Palin and through these latest robo-calls, by tying Obama to present day terrorists through a tenuous (at best) association between Barack Obama and Bill Ayers.
As if that wasn’t enough, on Friday Sarah Palin actually said she prefers visiting “pro-American parts of the country.” Which parts of the country are anti-American? Governor, would that include the part of your own state that is home to the Alaska Independence Party, the party your husband once belonged to, the party that wants to have Alaska secede from the United States? Isn’t advocating secession from the U.S. anti-America?
And now McCain is blaming Obama for McCain putting Joe the plumber in the spotlight? Has this war hero no honor or dignity left?
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