We don't follow the presidential campaign on this site -- not because we don't care about it, but because there's little about it that has much to do with the site's LGBTQ news focus, but there are some aspects that deserve yet one more tiny voice in protest:
John Lewis, the former civil rights leader who's now a congressman, has warned that GOP vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin and her running mate, Sen. John McCain have descended into dangerous territory with the hatred that's been stirred up recently -- especially at Palin's rallies. [see videos below]
Lewis compares it to the level of hatred to that engendered on behalf of one-time presidential candidate George Wallace:
George Wallace never threw a bomb. He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who only desired to exercise their constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed one Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama.
As public figures with the power to influence and persuade, Sen. McCain and Governor Palin are playing with fire, and if they are not careful, that fire will consume us all. They are playing a very dangerous game that disregards the value of the political process and cheapens our entire democracy. We can do better. The American people deserve better.
McCain, to his credit, has tried since yesterday to dial back the more virulent expressions of hate at his rallies (CNN video), and even Palin's stump speech was changed to focus on abortion rather than her previous attempts to paint Obama as unAmerican.
Although the record (aka facts) hardly matters in this kind of willful disinformation campaign, here's what FactCheck.org has to say about the silly charges that McCain surrogates are still spouting today:
We find McCain's accusation that Obama "lied" to be groundless. It is true that recently released records show half a dozen or so more meetings between the two men than were previously known, but Obama never denied working with Ayers.
Other claims are seriously misleading. The education project described in the Web ad, far from being "radical," had the support of the Republican governor and was run by a board that included prominent local leaders, including one Republican who has donated $1,500 to McCain's campaign this year. The project is described by Education Week as reflecting "mainstream thinking" about school reform.
Despite the newly released records, there's still no evidence of a deep or strong "friendship" with Ayers, a former radical anti-war protester whose actions in the 1960s and '70s Obama has called "detestable" and "despicable."
But it's not clear that the kind of willfully uninformed rage that has been unleashed by the McCain campaign can be easily stamped out.
Pam's House Blend offers video evidence of how bad it's become:
And here's McCain trying to dial it down a bit. (Although his surrogates were on MSNBC this afternoon repeating all of the same talking points being spouted by the crowd at the rally, but without the veneer of respectability carefully encapsulating the official talking points.)