Monday, October 6, 2008

"We're Going to Lose"

From the NY Daily News:

McCain's course correction reflects a growing case of nerves within his high command as the electoral map has shifted significantly in Obama's favor in the past two weeks.

"It's a dangerous road, but we have no choice," a top McCain strategist told the Daily News. "If we keep talking about the economic crisis, we're going to lose."


In other words, they've got nothing. They lost two weeks ago on Iraq and Afghanistan, lost last week on judgment and temperament (the Palin pick), and will lose in the next 30 days on character.

I was speaking to a McCan't-supporting reader over this past weekend. In passing I said, "You do know that he's gonna lose, don't you?" "Not by much," was the reply. At first I laughed and thought this was a desperate rationalization. But in retrospect, there's some wisdom there.

This country is, in my opinion, more polarized now than ever before. Obama recognizes this, and has tried to run a campaign that does not go for personal attack of the nature that we are currently seeing on the other side. Sticking to the issues alone is all it takes, as McCan't has proven time and again to be out of touch and on the wrong side. But there is a fear that this election will be much closer than the polls suggest, and if McCan't continues to throw the implied racism out at independent voters (the questions about who the real Obama is, the Chicago politician coming out of nowhere with the shady past of associating with 1960s radicals, shady real estate investors, and incendiary clergymen), some might bite and pull the lever for him on November 4. I don't think it will be enough to sway the election, but it will leave a bad taste in the mouths of those voters who will now be citizens of a country with a black president. Like the white, elderly real estate agent I met two weeks ago who said her "whole life will change" because Obama would favor minorities over white people. Like some of the crazy people I've met (most of them Jews) who think Obama is a Muslim (terrorist). Like the crazy Christianists I've met who insist that his ascension as a Muslim would be the fulfillment of biblical prophecy heralding the end of the world.

I'll tell you, having a black president scares me in only one way: that some fucking right-wing nutjob decides to try to take him out because he refuses to be led by a black man.

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