If you were running for president, wouldn't your first concerns be that your vice-president is capable of holding the job, and keeping the country stable? And wouldn't your second concerns be that your vice-president would not engage in dishonest or corrupt activities---that is, outside of those dishonest and corrupt activities that are officially sanctioned in D.C.---let alone peccadilloes such as scamming a few free trips? I mean, if you're going to be a crook, go all the Abramoff way, right?
After those concerns are met, then sure, you're free to be as "strategic" (cynical) as you like in your choice.
McCain did not do this. McCain is a hotdog pilot who has clipped power lines and been involved in a number of air crashes. With Palin, he clipped his own power line, and the only thing preventing a crash of his campaign is the ignorance and hatred of the American right-wing.
That's correct. Hatred is what is holding his campaign together, and giving it any kind of fuel. It is not running on inspiration. It is not running on encouraging human cooperation. It is not running on even the commercial-slogan-deep ideals of change and hope, as Obama slickly did in the Democrat primaries. McCain and Palin tap directly into black bile.
Think about it. Their power base comes from resentment: resentment of "Hollywood liberals," blacks, minorities in general, Affirmative Action (can't blame them for that one), welfare abuse (can't blame them for that one, either), illegal immigrants (can't blame. . .) taxation of their hard-earned millions (or billions.) It comes from fear of terrorists and hatred for those who ridicule their generally infantile and often fascistic idea of "Christianity." It comes from hatred of "junk scientists" who want to take away their "Constitutional right to own an SUV" (as many have e-mailed this site through the years), and from hatred of those godless heathens who imagine that humans are descended from apes. It comes from hatred of anyone who does not claim to believe that all human life is sacred (unless they are Iraqis, apparently, or Darfurians)and hatred of anyone who will not allow so-called creationism to be taught in public schools.
It comes from hatred of absolutely anything that can be smeared as "liberal," "socialist," "leftist," when in fact these things are normal, integral parts of any successful society and government. Imagine "privatizing" (read: destroying) social security and veterans' benefits.
And it comes from ignorance. Republicans/McCain supporters are generally of the ilk that simply reads newspapers/websites that reinforce their dumb-as-dirt reactionary thinking and beliefs. To imagine that these people---stupid enough to believe that McCain is some sort of maverick, when he votes with Bush 90 percent of the time, and turned against his own campaign reform spending bill---can be persuaded, reasoned with. . .it's folly.
So write them off, Obama---write off their bile, their rage---and do what's right. Palin and McCain are a danger to the country, and nothing less. Now is the time to say it, and to say it bluntly. The clock is ticking on this election. If they are elected, the clock will be ticking on whatever is left of the country.
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