Intolerant Accusations

As we lurch closer to the final 24 hours before the election it seems important to correct a few misunderstandings that have developed. There has been some talk in class regarding the idea that the McCain campaign has, perhaps unwittingly, stirring up racial animosity in an all out effort to win the election. Two specific examples have been pointed to: First, that during a Palin Rally some one shouted out "Kill him" in reference to either Ayers or Obama, most likely Obama; second, that during another Palin Rally someone yelled out a racial epitaph and Palin continued to speak on, unconcerned by this bilious slur. Both of these, particularly the second, seem to have been proven false. On the first count an investigation by the secret service which included interviews with an undisclosed number of undercover law enforcement officials who were stationed among the crowd has found nothing that backs up the story. On the second even a member of the Daily Kos was forced to admit, and provides the relevant tape, that shows clearly that the word shouted was "redistributor". Below I also include a video of McCain supporters, including Muslims, at a rally telling off a kook who was trying to hand out stickers that implied that Obama was a secret Muslim and consequently that being a Muslim was a something shameful.

This contrasts with the recent news that a 53 year old Obama supporter hospitalized a 75 year old McCain fan. The older gentleman was displaying a Pro McCain sign and was shoved into a fire hydrant for his efforts. The photograph at the beginning of this post is one found in a Halloween display in California, showing a Palin like mannequin in a noose.

This is not to say that their are not extremists on both sides of the election, only to point out that we shouldn't be so quick to take the first reports of Republican intolerance as fact or believe that the unhinged exist only on one side of the aisle. Elections, as Tocqueville noted, are apt to stir Americans into a feverish state,  which, luckily, soon afterwords disipates.

"'Long before the appointed moment arrives, the election becomes the greatest and so to speak sole business preoccupying minds. The factions at that time redouble their ardor; in that moment all the factitious passion that the imagination can create in a happy and tranquil country become agitated in broad daylight. . . . The entire nation falls into a feverish state; the election is then the daily text of the public papers, the subject of particular conversations, the goal of all reasoning, the object of all thoughts, the sole interest of the present.'

"And then? 'As soon as fortune has pronounced . . . this ardor is dissipated, everything becomes calm, and the river, one moment overflowed, returns peacefully to its bed.'"