Be afraid. Be very afraid. The Hate Talk Express is speeding down the track, trying to distort and suppress truth and skewer reason. On Tuesday I received another email filled with hateful nonsense about Obama - lies that have been thoroughly debunked by numerous independent groups and fact-checking organisations. The message was sent to my business account, from a high school friend's second husband. I've never met him and didn't know he was a right-wing Conservative. And he apparently didn't know I have a blog and am an Obama supporter.
After reading the innuendo-strewn missive, I wrote him back, saying such idiotic allegations have been disproved. I directed him to some fact-check websites. I told him "I'm proudly voting for Obama, because he's the best man for the job. And all the smear campaigns in the world can't change that fact." After sending my response, I made another online donation to Obama for America. So there!
Speaking of which, the McCain campaign's conference call Monday with reporters called for transparency about individual donors making small donations. I think the Obama campaign's transparency is not an issue. Last week, Obama campaign headquarters in Chicago phoned me in Paris, asking for my passport number to verify I'm a US citizen. Because, unlike the previous donations I've made online to the campaign, the last one (before Tuesday) was made via my friend Tangobaby's Movie Marathon in San Francisco, a fund-raiser for Obama. As I couldn't attend the event in person, I sent money via Paypal for a donation in my name. Hence the Obama campaign's call to confirm that I was an American citizen abroad, as it is illegal to accept donations from non-American residents of other countries.
Bob Herbert writes in the New York Times about the Republicans' attempts to suppress votes. An excerpt:
"...Even
better than demonizing opponents is the more powerful and direct act of
taking the vote away from their opponents’ supporters. The Republican
Party has made strenuous efforts in recent years to prevent Democrats
from voting and to prevent their votes from being properly counted
once they’ve been cast.
"Which brings me to the phony Acorn scandal.
"John
McCain, who placed his principles in a blind trust once the
presidential race heated up, warned the country during the presidential
debate last week that Acorn, which has been registering people to vote
by the hundreds of thousands, was “on the verge of maybe perpetrating
one of the greatest frauds in voter history.”
"It turns out that a
tiny percentage of these new registrations are bogus, with some of them
carrying ludicrous names like Mickey Mouse. Republicans have tried to
turn this into a mighty oak of a scandal, with Mr. McCain thundering at
the debate that it “may be destroying the fabric of democracy.”
"Please.
The Times put the matter in perspective when it said in an editorial
that Acorn needs to be more careful with some aspects of its
voter-registration process. It needs to do a better job selecting
canvassers, among other things.
“But,” the editorial added, “for
all of the McCain campaign’s manufactured fury about vote theft (and
similar claims from the Republican Party over the years) there is
virtually no evidence — anywhere in the country, going back many
elections — of people showing up at the polls and voting when they are
not entitled to.”
"Two important points need to be made here.
First, the reckless attempt by Senator McCain, Sarah Palin and others
to fan this into a major scandal has made Acorn the target of vandals
and a wave of hate calls and e-mail. Acorn staff members have been
threatened and sickening, murderous comments have been made about
supporters of Barack Obama. (Senator Obama had nothing to do with
Acorn’s voter-registration drives.)
"Second, when it comes to
voting, the real threat to democracy is the nonstop campaign by the
G.O.P. and its supporters to disenfranchise American citizens who have
every right to cast a ballot. We saw this in 2000. We saw it in 2004.
And we’re seeing it again now.
"In Montana, the Republican Party
challenged the registrations of thousands of legitimate voters based on
change-of-address information available from the Post Office. These
specious challenges were made — surprise, surprise — in Democratic
districts. Answering the challenges would have been a wholly
unnecessary hardship for the voters, many of whom were students or
members of the armed forces.
"In the face of widespread public criticism (even the Republican lieutenant governor weighed in), the party backed off.
"That
sort of thing is widespread. In one politically crucial state after
another — in Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, you name it — the G.O.P. has
unleashed foot soldiers whose insidious mission is to make the voting
process as difficult as possible — or, better yet, impossible — for
citizens who are believed to favor Democrats.
"For Senator McCain
to flip reality on its head and point to an overwhelmingly legitimate
voter-registration effort as a “threat to the fabric of democracy” is a
breathtaking exercise in absurdity..."
Looking for a socialist? Uh, that would be Bush.
McCain and Palin, desperately trying to find smokescreens to detract from their lack of ideas, keep casting aspersions about Obama having socialist tendencies. Not only are their claims ridiculous, they're dead wrong. It wasn't Obama who nationalized America's banks: that would be the sociaist George W. Bush and McCain as his biggest supporter. I've said it before: Bush + McCain = More of the same. What a shame, McCain.