John McCain and Sarah Palin have spent a lot of time recently whipping their yokel base into a frenzy over Barack Obama’s race, religion, and “associations.”
Yesterday, McCain appeared to try and dial back the bigotry:
Maybe McCain ought to get some credit for finally, if extremely reluctantly, rebuking the Republican mob for its misconceptions about his opponent (and getting booed for it). The most interesting thing about that clip, though, is not McCain’s correction. It is instead the explicit racism and implicit acknowledgement that belief about Obama’s racial makeup is itself a legitimate basis on which to criticise him.
What the questioner said was not that Obama is a “foreigner,” as others have suggested, but that he’s an “Arab.” That, in McCain’s supporters’ minds, is criticism enough to disqualify a candidate from office. That’s why the ignoramus in red felt so comfortable standing in front of thousands of people in the room and millions by television and expressing her mistrust of Obama for no reason other than that his ethnic makeup is other than white.
And McCain didn’t rebuke the questioner for her racism. His response wasn’t to tell the questioner that even if Obama were an Arab-American that would be irrelevant. He simply said, “no, ma’am, no ma’am, he’s a decent, family man, citizen. . .” Because Lord knows, Arabs couldn’t possibly be decent, family men, or citizens.
One can’t help but wonder what it might’ve been like if Republican former Senator, cabinet secretary, and Arab-American Spencer Abraham had been in the room. Or incumbent Republican Senator and Arab-American John Sununu. Or incumbent Republican Congressman and Arab-American Darrell Issa. How comfortable would they have felt standing among thousands of screaming morons, hearing “Arab” used as an epithet and their candidate responding not by pointing out that Arab-Americans are equal to the rest of us and people who believe otherwise are racists whose support is unwanted, but simply correcting the record?
McCain isn’t a racist. And it’s not entirely his fault that he’s profiting from racism. But he is a Republican and this is what large parts of the Republican party is in 2008: an organization in which plain-spoken, open bigotry is not only acceptable, but a legitimate part of politics. Despicable.
UPDATE:
Supporter holds up Obama monkey doll at McCain-Palin rally:
UPDATE TWO:
Ana Marie Cox agrees: Not All Arabs Are Terrorists.
