With the shrillness reminiscent of the Jim Crow era, the right-wing of the Republican party was whipped into frenzy of hate and fear by Ms. Palin. When she mentioned Obama at her rallies, there have been vocal shouts of “kill him,” “terrorist,” “off his head.” When you hear these epithets being shouted at Obama, you remember all the Black leaders who have been murdered in cold blood, all those who were lynched during Jim Crow, and you wonder whether there is a subtle message here about what should happen to Obama. Is it an indirect way of convincing someone to do to Obama what was done to President John Kennedy, Senator Bobby Kennedy, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, or even Reagan?
On Friday night, October 3, after I had finished my radio program, “StraightTalk with Chika Onyeani on the AllAfricaRadio,” I immediately jumped to my routine of checking the next day’s headlines. I always go to the Washington Post first, as I have come to find that it has more columnists writing about the election than the New York Times. When I got back to the Times, I was shockingly startled to find a potentially dangerous headline, “Obama and ‘60s Bomber: A Look Into Crossed Paths.” I started hyperventilating with anger, but decided nevertheless that I must keep calm and read what the article was all about - to what extent Obama was involved with this 60s terrorist bomber. I took time to read it, in fact, I read it twice. After reading, I asked myself what was the New York Times trying to achieve here; was it trying to throw the election to Obama’s Republican opponent John McCain, or trying to publish an innocuous article merely to absolve itself of accusations from the McCain camp that the paper was in the tank for Obama.
The article written by a Scott Shane, started with “At a tumultuous meeting of anti-Vietnam War militants at the Chicago Coliseum in 1969, Bill Ayers helped found the radical Weathermen, launching a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and United States Capitol.
Twenty-six years later, at a lunchtime meeting about school reform in a Chicago skyscraper, Barack Obama met Mr. Ayers, by then an education professor. Their paths have crossed sporadically since then, at a coffee Mr. Ayers hosted for Mr. Obama’s first run for office, on the schools project and a charitable board, and in casual encounters as Hyde Park neighbors.”
Then the article tried to imply that Obama had not been entirely truthful in his relationship with Ayers, when Shane wrote, “A review of records of the schools project and interviews with a dozen people who know both men, suggest that Mr. Obama, 47, has played down his contacts with Mr. Ayers, 63. But the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers, whom he has called “somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8.” Unless you were trying very hard to sew mischief or aid your party candidate, why would you write “A review of records.....suggest that Mr. Obama, 47, has played down his contacts with Mr. Ayers,” and in the same breadth write, “But the two men do not appear to have been close.” Already the implication has been sewn that Mr. Obama has something to hide.
You get disappointed in a Times that prides itself and recognized as such as the ‘paper of record’, that it would stoop so low to engage in this jingoistic and yellow journalism, because in the end the article concluded with, “Little Influence Seen: Mr. Obama’s friends said that history was utterly irrelevant to judging the candidate, because Mr. Ayers was never a significant influence on him. Even some conservatives who know Mr. Obama said that if he was drawn to Ayers-style radicalism, he hid it well.”
Before Saturday afternoon was even approaching, I turned my tv to CNN to see the “pitbull with lipstick,” all of a sudden having read a newspaper. We must remember this is the same lady whot Katie Couric of the CBS News had asked earlier in the week, what newspapers/magazines she reads as she had said she had gained her foreign policy experience through reading, couldn’t even name one. You could see the gloating in her face, which said “Thank you, New York Times, you have presented us with the prize, the winning formula, the swift-boat equivalent to finally vanquish this uppity nigger.” Earlier on Friday night, after the debate, her conservative base had acclaimed her performance with the lowest expectation of her, and she seemed to have gained new confidence that she hadn’t been such an abject embarrassment as she had been in her two earlier interviews with Charles Gibson of ABC News, and Katie Couric of CBS News.
She tore into Obama with her incendiary and racially charged attacks. Never mind that the Republicans have been boycotting the Times, but here found it convenient to quote the paper. She said she had read the Times that morning, ha! ha!, and went on to say about Obama, “This is not a man who sees America as you see America, and as I see America. Our opponent, though, is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect—imperfect enough that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country. Americans need to know this. ... I think, OK we gotta get the word out. This is in fairness to the electorate we gotta start telling people what the other side represents.” You could see the gleefulness in her face. She repeated this three times that day. The Republicans were on a role. This was their winning combination, forget the economy and divert attention to meaningless accusations.
It is interesting to note the group of blue-blood Americans who are behind the Annenberg Educational Challenge, for which Obama was asked to chair with Bill Ayers as a member of the board. This is what we learnt from Politifact.com, “Starting with the funder. Annenberg was a lifelong Republican and former ambassador to the United Kingdom under President Richard Nixon. His widow, Leonore, has endorsed McCain....
Among the other board members who served with Obama were: Stanley Ikenberry, former president of the University of Illinois; Arnold Weber, former president of Northwestern University and assistant secretary of labor in the Nixon administration; Scott Smith, then publisher of the Chicago Tribune; venture capitalist Edward Bottum; John McCarter, president of the Field Museum; Patricia Albjerg Graham, former dean of the Harvard University Graduate School of Education, and a host of other mainstream folks.
“The whole idea of it being radical when it was this tie of blue-chip, white-collar, CEOs and civic leaders is just ridiculous,” said the foundation’s former development director, Marianne Philbin.”
With the shrillness reminiscent of the Jim Crow era, the right-wing of the Republican party was whipped into frenzy of hate and fear by Ms. Palin. When she mentioned Obama at her rallies, there have been vocal shouts of “kill him,” “terrorist,” “off his head.” When you hear these epithets being shouted at Obama, you remember all the Black leaders who have been murdered in cold blood, all those who were lynched during Jim Crow, and you wonder whether there is a subtle message here about what should happen to Obama. Is it an indirect way of convincing someone to do to Obama what was done to President John Kennedy, Senator Robert Kennedy, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, or even Reagan?
Writing in Huffingtonpost.com, this is what Sam Stein had to say, “
The rabid nature of the scene has startled longtime political observers and even former associates of McCain himself.
John Weaver, the Senator’s former top strategist, has said McCain is making a tactical mistake by letting abusive hecklers have their voices heard during his forums. David Gergen, a longtime Washington strategist, has warned that the rhetoric from these attendees could “lead to some violence.”
Veteran Republican Congressman Ray LaHood criticized Sarah Palin in particular, saying her rhetoric did not “befit the office she’s running for.”
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney denounced the recent campaign stops as dangerous and expressed alarm that the top of the Republican ticket would not protest the crowd’s language.” He said, “"Sen. John McCain, Gov. Sarah Palin and the leadership of the Republican party have a fundamental moral responsibility to denounce the violent rhetoric that has pervaded recent McCain and Palin political rallies. When rally attendees shout out such attacks as “terrorist” or “kill him” about Sen. Barack Obama, when they are cheered on by crowds incited by McCain-Palin rhetoric—it is chilling that McCain and Palin do nothing to object.”
You remember during the first debate who McCain said would be one of the three wise men he would consult - Congressmen John Lewis of Georgia. But Rep. Lewis was forced to issue the following statement regarding the racially charged attacks against Obama.
Congressman John Lewis release a statement Saturday criticizing what he calls a “negative tone” in the McCain-Palin Campaign. The following his is his full statement:
“As one who was a victim of violence and hate during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, I am deeply disturbed by the negative tone of the McCain-Palin campaign. What I am seeing reminds me too much of another destructive period in American history. Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse.”
“During another period, in the not too distant past, there was a governor of the state of Alabama named George Wallace who also became a presidential candidate. 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 were simply trying to exercise their constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham , Alabama.”
“As public figures with the power to influence and persuade, Sen. McCain and Gov. 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.”
Lastly, we must remember that the person who has been making all these attacks is an individual whose husband, Todd Palin, was for six years a member of the Alaska Independence Party, whose avowed mission is to secede from the United States of America.
Fortunately for the Obama/Biden campaign, the financial crisis has immuned Americans against such vitriolic attacks as have been unleashed by the McCain/Palin campaign, at least according to poll results. But the McCain campaign has decided they are staying to be 100% negative, and all their ad buys reflect this. In 2004, Senator John Kerry lost the election due to being swift-boated. Perhaps, after the last 8 years, maybe Americans have learned their lesson. And get Obama elected.
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