Anti-McCain video seems a bit overrated
Let's hope crazies on both sides remain in the minority
Yes, I've seen the YouTube video titled "Liberal Outrage: A Pro-McCain March in Manhattan."
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Yes, liberals flipping the finger and shouting "Nazi Germany!" at the pro-McCain crowd is stupid and loutish.
However, the filmmaker ("Red Squirrel" at ThePeoplesCube.com) doesn't help his point with overreaching graphics with wild proclamation such as: "Fact: Islamic radicals would be more welcome on the Upper West Side than American patriots." Nor do I see anyone on THIS video making false accusations about McCain's personal or professional history, as with the case with the dunderheads on some of the anti-Obama YouTube hits.
But I think we can all agree that a number of people on both sides continue to engage in vicious, hateful rhetoric even as they deplore the other side for being vicious and hateful. (One suburban Chicago woman wrote to me on Monday to proclaim: "OBAMA HAS DONE NOTHING OF ANY SIGNIFICANCE IN HIS FOUR F- - - - - - YEARS AS A SENATOR.")
These home video-cam, YouTube-friendly, campaign-related videos are fascinating and often depressing glimpses into the national mood. But let's face it: It's not that difficult to wade into any political gathering and find a handful of rude, ignorant and intolerant people.
I'd still like to believe that MOST voters, no matter what their views, are a bit more tolerant, a bit more concerned with the facts than with spreading rumors --and not inclined to yell "terrorist!" or "Nazi!" at the other side.
If we can't be better than that, how can we expect our representatives to be better than that?
The New York Times has identified Andy Martin as the prime instigator of the Obama-is-a-Muslim urban legend.
Martin, who says in a press release he's "the leader of the national anti-Obama movement and [a] legendary Chicago Internet columnist," says he has been "smeared" by the Times and adds, "Obama was a Muslim at least until the age of 10, and there is increasingly strong circumstantial evidence he traded on his Muslim background until early adulthood . . . If Obama is elected, we should all read prior reports about Hugo Chavez's rise to power through 'democratic' processes, merely substituting Obama's name for Chavez. Obama's crew will make Chavez look like an amateur."
For the record: Obama is a Christian.
A few details about Martin from the Times story: "He is a law school graduate, but his admission to the Illinois bar was blocked . . . after a psychiatric finding of 'moderately severe character defect manifested by a well-documented ideation with a paranoid flavor and a grandiose character.' "
Martin has unsuccessfully run for public office in three states. "He prepared to run as a Democrat for Congress in Connecticut, where paperwork for one of his campaign committees listed as one purpose 'to exterminate Jew power.' " He ran for president twice. He is also "a prodigious filer of lawsuits."
Believe him at your own risk. But, hey, it's POSSIBLE that while Obama has been publicly professing his Christianity all these years, it's just a cover for his secret radical anti-American agenda, which he will put into motion as soon as he's elected president, at which point we'd all be powerless to stop him from destroying our way of life by next Christmas, which won't even be a holiday by 2009 anyway.
Even if Andy Martin didn't exist, there would be rumors about Obama being a Muslim. Why do some insist on calling the senator "Barack Hussein Obama," when they never refer to John McCain as "John Sidney McCain III?" Is it because they want to imply there's something nefarious and dangerous and foreign and scary about Obama's name? What do you think?
Most experts said the Bears would be lucky to be a .500 team this year -- but, after six games, they're three late meltdowns away from being 6-0.
Of course, that's kinda like saying "The Hottie and the Nottie" was three rewrites away from being an Oscar candidate. Close counts only in bean bags and the 2000 presidential election.
The 11 Seconds of Doom defeat on Sunday was maddening. It was like watching a romantic comedy where the guy convinces the girl to leave the cad at the altar at the last minute -- only to see the guy trip over the priest and get knocked cold, whereupon the girl decides to go ahead and marry the cad anyway.
In other words, the most unsatisfying ending of the year.