Real Americans

The Crypt at Politico (a great source for behind the scenes news on Capitol Hill) reported on a McCain rally yesterday in North Carolina where some interesting stuff was said about "real Americans". Republican Representative Robin Hayes had the job of warming up the crowd, and told what seems to be a fiercely partisan audience that he "make sure we don’t say something stupid, make sure we don’t say something we don’t mean". He followed that point with this:

“Liberals hate real Americans that work and accomplish and achieve...and believe in God."

Hayes and others after the fact claimed that he never said that, but the Crypt has posted an audio file from the rally confirming his comments (also, did he say that when Sarah Palin was in Alaska, "she got her did"? What does that even mean?) Rep. Hayes' comment, while unfortunate on its own, is simply reprehensible when you see it as part of a more general assault by the McCain camp against "liberals", i.e. people who don't agree with them and their policies. Just look at recent events: Palin's decision to split the country into pro-American and anti-American sections, the omnipresent label of 'socialist' being pushed onto the Obama campaign (while McCain endorses the government using taxpayer money to renegotiate mortgates for homeowners), and even recent reports that the McCain campaign is going to bring up Reverend Wright again. The McCain campaign is resorting to increasingly divisive tactics while they seek to portray Obama as running the "dirtiest campaign in history" (thanks for stepping into the fray Cindy).

At this point, it seems difficult for McCain to win the race, barring some extremely unexpected, crazy event. By focusing on negative, divide-and-conquer tactics, McCain is doing terrible damage to his long-term legacy of an honorable and bipartisan politican. More importantly, he is stoking the fire of extremists to a passion not really seen since the Cold War and the civil rights movement, ensuring that there will be harsh, even dangerous, divisions throughout the country after this election. In his all-out grab to win the election, McCain is very likely sharpening the partisan polarization of the United States at a time when the country needs unity---doesn't sound like "Country First" to me.

And check out this clip (with terrible sound) of always on-point Jon Stewart at Northeastern responding to Sarah Palin's "pro-America" speech: