Today, the WaPo brings us harrowing tales of racism encountered by brave and earnest Obama campaigners canvassing the smallminded local hillbillies of flyover country. Here's a paragraph which is worth noting:
"The bigotry has gone beyond words. In Vincennes, the Obama campaign office was vandalized at 2 a.m. on the eve of the primary, according to police. A large plate-glass window was smashed, an American flag stolen. Other windows were spray-painted with references to Obama's controversial former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and other political messages: `Hamas votes BHO' and `We don't cling to guns or religion. Goddamn Wright.'"
Vandalism is inexcusable, but is this is evidence of bigotry? Not at all - so what is it doing in this article? It's an effort by the Washington Post to delegitimize these issues because they're problematical for Obama. The Liberal MSM and likeminded pundits will be delivering this message throughout the campaign: If you don't vote for Obama then you are a racist. Only the more clumsy amongst them will put it so bluntly.
2 comments:
Alas, this is yet another example of the time-honored (though undeserving of any other sort of honor) tradition in politics of injecting a negative meme into the discourse, and letting it float free...even if you "officially" disavow it (but never in strong and unequivocal enough language to kill it quite dead). Kinda like Obama's "100 years of war" misquote of John McCain's statements that a peaceful presence in Iraq might go on as long as it has in Germany or S. Korea or Japan. It doesn't matter how often it is debunked or discredited; it's out there, bouncing around and doing random bits of damage like a free radical (hey, sorta like William Ayers...)
Ho-hum. Nothing new here. I suppose what makes this sort of shenanigans noteworthy is its tedious appearance and reappearance within a campaign which so tiresomely touts itself as Transcending The Old Politics, or somesuch dreck.
Obama is a politician. He is an eloquent, incompetent, naive, and overrated politician, but no more nor less than that in the end. What makes him more offensive than the sum of his idiotic policies, however, is his tendency of selling himself as a transcendent figure...then calling us names for not buying it.
Although the frequency of this kind of framing of the debate is, unfortunately, common enough, I think it merits noting on this blog. At any rate, pointing it out, pointing and laughing, or just heaping scorn on their shameless partisan spin is time not wasted for this writer. I'd like to make clear, though, that in this instance it is not an official arm of the Obama campaign trying to reframe these issues, but rather it is the Washington Post.
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