The Party of Lincoln
Newsweek (and Slate) ran a disgusting article last week implying that, if you don’t vote for Obama, you are a racist. I say implying because the article actually said:
If Obama loses, our children will grow up thinking of equal opportunity as a myth. His defeat would say that when handed a perfect opportunity to put the worst part of our history behind us, we chose not to. In this event, the world’s judgment will be severe and inescapable: The United States had its day but, in the end, couldn’t put its own self-interest ahead of its crazy irrationality over race.
This is a disgusting charge for many reasons. Not the least of which is that it makes the absurd claim that there is nothing in Obama’s policies with which reasonable people could disagree. Given the oft-repeated charge that Obama and Clinton ran on the same platform, what would this victimizer have said, had she won the nomination, but lost the general election? We’re too sexist?
Republicans are too skittish about race. McCain should put an end to this, and he should do it in his acceptance speech. Here is my suggestion for what he should say:
I commend Senator Barack Obama and the Democratic Party for nominating the first African-American nominee. Senator Obama’s meteoric rise has belied the claim that America is too racist to consider a minority candidate for president.
There are, however, those who may vote for me because of my skin color, or against Senator Obama because of his. To those people, I ask you to stay home. There is no place in politics or in America for racism. My differences with Senator Obama go to the content of his character; his policies, his judgment and his inexperience.