He's Not...But Even If He Was, Who Cares?

This editorial from CNN really hones in on something that has been bothering me ever since that very ignorant and unfortunate woman said to John McCain, "I don't trust Obama. I have read about him and he's an Arab."

Okay, well, first off, he's not. The press has been quick to point this out, and John McCain himself instantaneously corrected her on this.

The problem is that this is as far as the conversation goes, when in fact we should be pretty pissed that people out there feel that, by virtue of being an Arab, a candidate would therefore be untrustworthy. After all, when McCain corrected his follower, he said, "No ma'am, no ma'am. He's a decent family man, [a] citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues."

Wait— so an Arab isn't a decent family man? Why not take this time to explain that there is a major difference between fundamentalist, extremist suicide bombers and mainstream Muslims, just as there is a difference between gay-bashing, science-denying Christian evangelicals and mainstream Christians like me?

Oh, but I know why— because, whether McCain likes it or not, his campaign managers have basically put all their eggs in the racism basket. I mean, that's why these "Who IS Barack Obama?" ads and slogans have offended practically everyone— they don't seriously suggest that we don't know about Obama's family life or policy initiatives, because he's been running for president for two years, and you can look that stuff up on the internet in five seconds. What they're suggesting is that Obama is the sinister "other", that there is something unknowable and untrustworthy about him because he's black, because he doesn't look (or, as the ads suggest, think) like us whitey whitertons.

Listen to this great piece on NPR about the undertone of racism and fear that has come out of the McCain camp quite recently. It's a fascinating examination of exactly what is being said in this election cycle and what exactly it is intended to mean.

Again, I don't think this is really the result of any policy that Senator McCain came up with himself. I think McCain is probably a very nice old man who likes black people just as much as he likes white people. But I think he is too easily manipulated by his managers and backers and all the hundreds/thousands of people who go into running a national campaign. You know what I think? I think McCain wasn't afraid to break with the party in the 1990s, when the party was still accepting dissenters and McCain was a younger man. But since the election of GWB in 2000, the Republican Party has grown more and more intolerant of dissent or disagreement within the ranks, and as McCain grew older and less able to deal with the pressure from all sides to conform, he began to give in, little by little, to the darker forces in the party.

And now, when he really needs to stand up and say, "NO! I will NOT use racism and misinformation and intolerance and ignorance and RANK STUPIDITY to win this election, because I am BETTER than that," he can't, because he is so dependent on these thugs in the party to tell him what to do. But you can see it on his face these days: he hates having to resort to personal attacks. He is seeing more and more that the majority of the country just doesn't want anything to do with most of his policies these days, and it pains him— because he really wants to win because the polls say he is the best man for the job, not because Billy Bob and Wyatt Jefferson over in Southern Ohio believe that those A-rabs are out to git us all, dang it.

But this is why we can't afford to elect McCain. He's a nice person, I'm certain of that— but if he can't find it in himself to refuse the machinations of his campaign aides, how will he refuse or resist the later machinations of cabinet officials and close advisors?

For more on McCain's inability to speak out about the racism his own campaign has been perpetuating, check out this nifty NPR story here.