In a thoughtful and beautifully-written essay of that title, in Saturday’s Globe & Mail, Timothy Garton Ash raises the dreaded ‘A’ word in relation to Obama:
Where were you when Barack Obama was shot? The line we pray we will never have to say. A line I have hesitated even to write, as if the mere inscribing of the words could invite calamity. Yet, the fear preys on the back of our minds, as we see Mr. Obama plunging into those crowds. I have watched weeks of election coverage on the 24/7 television news channels, in the course of which every tiniest feature of the campaign has been examined to exhaustion, but not once have I heard this mentioned. Yet, almost every day, I have a private conversation in which the subject comes up, especially when talking to journalists. Is this self-censorship in the media right? Should I not even be writing this? There are unstable, suggestible people out there. Experts may argue about the psychological impact of media coverage of such stories, but it clearly has some. Earlier this year, a blogger pointed out that “assassinate Obama” had that day appeared on a list of Google’s top 100 search items. She suggested that newspaper stories about the danger had increased the number of such Google searches – and that her own blog might do the same. As may this essay.
I suspect many of those who lived through the assassinations of the Kennedy brothers and Martin Luther King Jr have thought along these lines, but mentally crossed our fingers, touched wood, and dismissed the idea before it was fully formed. I remember reading some time ago, during the primaries, that Obama had more Secret Service personnel assigned to him than Dubya. I don’t know if that was true; my reaction, at the time, was “ain’t nobody going to shoot Bush so long as Dick Cheney is VP.” But I remembered the story last week, when I saw the pictures of Obama standing high above a sea of supporters at a rally in St Louis, and I hoped those Secret Service people were really paying attention to their jobs.
A ghastly reminder on boingboing that rumours of the demise of racism in America have been greatly exaggerated.
Reading the New York Times’ coverage, in 1893, of the torture and death of former slave Henry Smith, before a huge, cheering, mostly-white crowd, I just can’t get my head around the mass psychosis that seems to have gripped so many white southern Americans of that time. Even though the events depicted took place at a time when bull-baiting and cockfighting were considered normal entertainment, especially for males, I cannot see a similar horde applauding, as a human set about torturing an animal in the way the NYT reporter describes. His matter-of-fact reporting of such unbridled savagery, as just another piece of news, makes the story even more horrific.
Henry Smith’s lynching took place 115 years ago, and there is evidence, as reported in this Associated Press story that points to Brandon McClelland’s gruesome death being the result of a horrible, drunken accident. But it is not hard to see why some people in Paris, Texas, are crying racism. From the same AP story comes this astonishing little nugget:
Paris, which is 73 percent white and 22 percent black, was in the news last year after a black girl was sentenced to up to seven years in a juvenile prison hundreds of miles from her home for shoving a teacher’s aide at school, while a white girl was sentenced by the same judge to probation for burning down her parents’ house.
Nice dissection by Slate’s Fred Kaplan of the McCain and Missus Palin mantra about his preparedness to handle security because he’s been “tested” in battle. Or, as McCain put it to a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, speaking about the Cuban missile crisis:
My friends, you know how close we came to nuclear war. Americans will not have a president who needs to be tested. I’ve been tested, my friends.
Which raises three questions:
One: Don’t you think it’s time to knock it off with the patently false bonhomie of “my friends?”
Two: Do you really believe that many of the “friends” who come out to your rallies know enough about the Cuban Missile Crisis to realise how close it came to a nuclear war between the USA and USSR?
And,
Three: Really, should you be reminding an electorate that is already leery about your great age, that you were old enough to fly planes forty-six years ago?
Their iPhone may be rubbish (okay, MY iPhone may be rubbish – see earlier post) but Apple has its heart in the right place. From Apple’s Hot News comes the following:
No on Prop 8
October 24, 2008
Apple is publicly opposing Proposition 8 and making a donation of $100,000 to the No on 8 campaign. Apple was among the first California companies to offer equal rights and benefits to our employees’ same-sex partners, and we strongly believe that a person’s fundamental rights — including the right to marry — should not be affected by their sexual orientation. Apple views this as a civil rights issue, rather than just a political issue, and is therefore speaking out publicly against Proposition 8.
I (heart) Apple. And, as an Apple shareholder, to boot, I heartily approve of this message
According to a post today on The Daily Beast, “the worst is still to come” in the closing days (13 and counting!!) of the US election.
Negative campaigning may become more apparent as the election looms closer. Even the McCain campaign is reconsidering its earlier decision not to make an issue out of Obama’s pastor, Jeremiah Wright, whose remarks dogged him in the primary, Rick Davis, McCain’s top campaign adviser admitted. “We’re in the process of looking at how we’re going to close this campaign,” Davis told talk radio host Hugh Hewitt.
Still, Marks said, even if McCain has a change of mind and gives the green light to an all out Jeremiah Wright inspired campaign, independent groups will be left to do the real dirty work. “It’s up to us to get the message out,” Marks said.
And he warned that the worst was still to come. “Guys like McCain just don’t have the stomach for it, and because of that the 527 groups are going to have to go very negative in these last two weeks,” he said.
And you thought Swiftboating was dead and gone . . .
