Conservative Values?

Family values and compassionate conservatism. Here is what the party of the "Moral Majority" has to say about Barack Obama. From the New York Times:
From the start, there have always been two separate but equal questions about race in this election. Is there still enough racism in America to prevent a black man from being elected president no matter what? And, will Republicans play the race card? The jury is out on the first question until Nov. 4. But we now have the unambiguous answer to the second: Yes.McCain, who is no racist, turned to this desperate strategy only as Obama started to pull ahead. The tone was set at the Republican convention, with Rudy Giuliani’s mocking dismissal of Obama as an “only in America” affirmative-action baby.

...

At McCain-Palin rallies, the raucous and insistent cries of “Treason!” and “Terrorist!” and “Kill him!” and “Off with his head!” as well as the uninhibited slinging of racial epithets, are actually something new in a campaign that has seen almost every conceivable twist.

...

What makes them different, and what has pumped up the Weimar-like rage at McCain-Palin rallies, is the violent escalation in rhetoric, especially (though not exclusively) by Palin. Obama “launched his political career in the living room of a domestic terrorist.” He is “palling around with terrorists” (note the plural noun). Obama is “not a man who sees America the way you and I see America.” Wielding a wildly out-of-context Obama quote, Palin slurs him as an enemy of American troops.

By the time McCain asks the crowd “Who is the real Barack Obama?” it’s no surprise that someone cries out “Terrorist!” The rhetorical conflation of Obama with terrorism is complete. It is stoked further by the repeated invocation of Obama’s middle name by surrogates introducing McCain and Palin at these rallies.

Speaking as an ex-Republican, I have to ask. If you are a conservative Republican, do you condone this sort of talk by your party? And if not, what are you going to do about it?

1 comment:

Not Important said...

For the sake of transparency, I am not a conservative (or any type of) Republican, so I can only speak of the reactions I've seen. It appears that some of the conservative Republican responses have been to deny that the video evidence actually represents people yelling for Senator Obama's head or life, but rather people yelling for William Ayers' head or life.

It's eerily ostrich-like.