.. society based on 'rule of law' ...
.. how realistic are your expectations
-=*=-
G'day Bob,
.. following one'a your excellent links, i.e. the Lindorff:
«With the Bush Administration, the two leading presidential candidates, and the Congressional leadership, as well as a phalanx of Wall Street lobbyists all pushing hard for a massive transfer of taxpayer money to the coffers of banks and investment banks, the American people need to demand a halt to this bums' rush to a bailout.»
[BobW/opednews/Dave Lindorff]
(I repeat (looping): note that in a 2-party system, any bipartisan policy leaves the voters with zero choice and so is deeply undemocratic.)
-=*=-
"Here and now, boys!" (Huxley, Island.)
Starting at the beginning is problematic[1] for at least two reasons, a) it means going back and (perhaps worse), b) how far back is far enough? Take the example of "The Big Bang," the furthest back we can go (evidence-based) is to the CMB (cosmic microwave background, T0+~310,000 years), but theoretically to within a few seconds or less (a bi-i-ig theoretical stretch) - and the closer you go, the less accurate.
If we go back to the beginning of any individual's life, we find that 'the slate is not clean,' there is always an existing background of laws and morality (even the putative 1st 'bad-apple thief' was told beforehand "Do not do this!" - or so I recall the 'story.' Haw!) That morality and law differ is no surprise; there is no agreement on morality (partly for lack of trying and corruption both), and any law is a man-made construct, therefore by definition imperfect (for some of the very same reasons, namely lack of trying and corruption both. Boo! Hiss!) Nevertheless, each person has their own beginning; it is the responsibility of the primary carers to 'do their best,' and society as a whole to support this process, everywhere. This in turn invokes a loop; the primary carers and society have to a) know their business and b) carry it out responsibly. This is clearly hardly ever the (current) case: fail! Fail!
We can posit a practical 1st rule: "Get it right the 1st time!" A corollary is "... because there may be (Murphy: guaranteed) - no 2nd chance." Of course this seems, is, obvious - when you think about it, but popular culture depends heavily on "Der, I didn't think!" - I suggest that it's time (long overdue) for some effective change, to get us (i.e. our Anglo/Judaic society) 'back on track;'
"No more of the same!"
-=*=-
"In heaven there is no beer, that's why we have to drink it here!" (German quasi-joke.) As for no beer in heaven, so no police in Utopia[2]. (No joke.) Sooo, what about in our distopia[3]? Try this:
«The ignorant, uneducated masses outside the Party are not normally subjected to its propaganda: "They can be granted intellectual liberty because they have no intellect", and hence no impulse to rebel either. Party members, on the other hand, cannot be allowed any deviation of opinion whatsoever. The danger of growing liberalism or scepticism within the Party is eliminated by massive indoctrination and constant surveillance of every member. A Party member "is expected to have no private emotions and no respites from enthusiasm. He is supposed to live in a continuous frenzy of hatred of foreign enemies and internal traitors, triumph over victories, and self-abasement before the power and wisdom of the Party."
To safeguard the essential notions that Big Brother is omnipotent and the Party is infallible, history is constantly rewritten...»
[Nineteen Eighty-Four/The Book]
Rewriting of history occurs, the cynical victors' history. The most famous example, actually of course most infamous, is misrepresenting perhaps the largest single-item war crime ever, then stupefyingly doubled, namely the A-bombing, as having been somehow justifiable.
Before we leave dystopia, what we really have is an anti-utopia, a pretend-democracy - which is anything but.
Backing up a bit:
«The first chapter, Ignorance is Strength, begins with the observation that throughout history, all societies have been divided into a caste system of three groups or classes: the High, who are the rulers; the Middle, who yearn to take over the position of the High; and the Low, who are typically so suppressed that in their drudgery they have no goals beyond day-to-day survival (if they are at all able to formulate any political agenda, it is to establish a society where all people are equal).»
[The Book, ibid.]
I quibble; me'n me mates do not wish to overthrow our putative 'rulers,' to man the barricades would be madness in the extreme - under the current regime(s), they'd more'n likely machine-gun us. Nor do I suffer from the filthily-framed 'wealth-envy,' it should be obvious that we're not talking penniless paupers here, nor do I dream of "a society where all people are equal," since equality under the law would do: one rule for all. But a bit more than 'just' fair rules - in fact, a whole lot more - universal justice and nothing-but-the-truth would not go at all astray:
"Fair go, ya mugs!"
-=*=-
Some things have changed; even though severely deprived, Orwell's 'proles' could be trusted not to rebel and were thus spared the state propaganda - our sheople® clearly are denied such a luxury. It seems that the current 'rulers' dare not trust the sheople with a 'free' vote; the sheople are not only immersed in the lying pushed-paradigm propaganda (Hollywood rubbish, venal MSM lies, these lies both transmitted via *and* augmented by the corrupt MSM - and even then more and worse, keyword Bernays), the sheople are denied any effective choice (Lib/Lab ugly twins in Aus, Repug/Dummos 'over there,') and no matter who gets elected, they (the putative representatives) do not properly represent us, we the sheople (their electors) anyway, rather the reps are in league with the (shadowy?) true rulers, variously referred to as the M/I-plex, MNCs or just 'the big end of town.' Recalling my recent discoveries, we have Ponerology & Pathocracy, then my old stand-by kleptocracy, and all the usual et ceteras.
One of the comments to the Lindorff article includes this:
«A psychopath only thinks of themself. They don't care about all the chaos and destruction they cause. In fact, some of them FEED OFF the chaos, destruction, suffering, misery, death, poverty and illness they cause!
It's been proven by psychological research: Psychopaths actually get a buzz off of be-deviling [sic; bedevilling] those under them in power! They get a rush from harming others!
These guys are snakes in suits just like many politicians.
It's obvious they have a dark agenda because of the insistence to rush the legislation through.»
Sounds about right. Even the fact that politicians could be suspect is a shocker - but we know it's gone far beyond suspicion and on into actual, serious criminality - right up to murder for oil, say; 'the system' is not just 'slightly broken,' it's damn' near to if not actually terminal.
-=*=-
Some things have not changed; for our propaganda we have a modern MiniTrue, the corporate, corrupt and venal MSM - but not 'just,' the public broadcasters are in it too, *double* traitors. As already noted, our modern MiniTrue does not just conduit the lies, it often actively augments them. MiniPeace is out'a control, see murder for oil in Iraq, no honour there. MiniPlenty has been down-sized, out-sourced, sent off-shore. Like the spiteful 'junior spies' reporting to the thought-police/MiniLove, we have erring ideologue 'pushed paradigm' apologists, appeasers (a lot'a bad 'A's[5]) and then out-and-out blog-terrorists, aka utterly despicable, filthy, lying trolls.
Backing up to the psychopaths, and Ponerology & Pathocracy. Here is some of it:
«There are basic facts that all people of conscience need to grasp, fast. 6% of any given population are born genetic psychopaths. But then why do some fall under their spell and other not? The vast majority of 'paths remain undetected as they manipulate and plunder their way through human relationships consuming our emotional and financial energy. In this sense, they are 'successful'. They insinuate themselves into networks throughout society by sharp observance of our behaviour and mimic/act to get what they want: power over others - in fact, the pinnacle of achievement for a psychopath is TOTAL AND RUTHLESS DOMINANCE OVER 'THE OTHER'.
Political Ponerology expands this dynamic out onto the societal scale to explain that periodically a concentration of psychopaths (thanks to negative selection - think 'Old Boys' Network' taken to its extreme) coalesces 'at the top' to form a 'Pathocracy' wherein 100% of key positions of a state are run by people who have a permanent and incurable deficit in their worldview.»
[from a comment on a BobW/alternet/Naomi Wolf article]
-=*=-
Fazit: Power is fully half of the problem; misuse is the other. Power delegated must be responsible; no taxation without (proper!) representation. Power is delegated under a 'social contract,' force may only be deployed in support of the social contract, not - as with Bush&Co, actually against the very people who put them there (supposedly; doesn't help if the elections themselves are corrupted.) That psychopaths have infiltrated the 'leadership,' so widely and corruptly, must now a) be stopped and then b) prevented for all time. It's no good to talk about 'law and order' unless it goes for the entire population; one set of laws, applied to rulers and ruled alike.
We can make a start by identifying lies and liars, criminals and their 'A' retinues[5], and start lockin' 'em all up.
No destroyers, neither liars nor psychopaths nor any in between should go unpunished.
Oh, yeah; and no bailout for already obscenely rich fat-cats.
-=*end*=- (but don't miss [5])
Ref(s):
[1] problematic adj. (also problematical) attended by difficulty; doubtful or questionable. problematically adv. [Greek: related to *problem] [POD]
[2] Utopia n. imagined perfect place or state of things. Utopian adj. (also utopian). [ibid.]
[3] Distopia (actually, dystopia[4]) - a real or imagined society that is totally dysfunctional to its citizens, e.g. the society pictured in 1984, Doomsday Forecast - A forecast where a future catastrophe is the focal issue.
[mnfuturists/FuturistDictionary]
Comment: I think there are two entries run together here. Serendipity? Nope; (bad!) karma? Prolaby®.
[4] dystopia
«A dystopia (from the Greek d?s- and t?p??, alternatively, cacotopia, kakotopia, cackotopia, or anti-utopia) is the vision of a society that is the opposite of utopia. A dystopian society is a state in which the conditions of life are miserable, characterized by human misery, poverty, oppression, violence, disease, and/or pollution.
Some academic circles distinguish between anti-utopia and dystopia. As in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, a dystopia does not pretend to be utopian, while an anti-utopia appears to be utopian or was intended to be so, but a fatal flaw or other factor has destroyed or twisted the intended utopian world or concept.»
[wiki/Dystopia]
[5] Some real bad 'A's: actual criminals, i.e. active perpetrators, then accomplices, accessories, appeasers, apologists ...
Q: Any more bad 'A's?
A: Yes, the finance market smart-As, the ones who created this sub-prime mess in the 1st place. I saw this problem coming, although I didn't fully realise it at the time. I posed this Q to a mate of mine: "How can this be sustainable?" The finance market smart-As have built a bubble on consumer/household debt, at the same time as depressing the wages - and 'market share' of consumer/household income (the difference having been confiscated by the already rich fat-cats). What happens, I asked,
Q: When the consumers/households get maxed-out on credit - and run out of 'spending' money?
A: The whole consumer/household market house of cards will - must collapse.
Sooo, even if some bail-out does go ahead, that'll only be shuffling the deck-chairs; the toxic debt may be moved from one place to another (and in any case is only one half of the problem) - since the deficit of demand will - must only get deeper.
Wham! 1929 here we come.
2008/10/03
living off immoral earnings ...
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8 comments:
G'day Phil, a lot of work obviously went into that ... so it deserves this Joseph Stiglitz from the November Vaniity Fair.
G'day Bob,
.. the M3 debacle had me worrying about inflation.
You might recall the argument - XX mainly, YY/ZZ totally incompetently - as usual; habitual, no brains and illiterate with it (but coddled and covered-up; boo! Hiss!) IMHO there is wild printing of US$s, nothing else can explain asset-bubbles. (Q: Where does the *extra* money come from? A: You print it. Haw!) XX was - as an 'establishment apologist' - naturally obfuscating. Concentration on any CPI-index which does not capture the full picture is misleading and dishonest. No surprise.
This printing has accelerated, d*g knows how fast if they attempt a bailout. Most of it will stay 'quarantined' in the *stock* market, but there may be, probably will be, some overflow into commodities. But as I proposed in the headline post, the sheople have been driven onto some credit-limited edge with little dough left over for spending, let alone merely living. The recent petrol-price 'spike' (haw again; oil can never, ever, get 'cheap') showed how close to the edge a lot'a people are getting.
So the thesis, that the consumer-spending driven 'boom' economy will, must go downhill. (If not, where can the $s come from, now that the sheople are credit-maxed-out? Pay rises? Haw, a 3rd!)
Thanks for the Stiglitz. Reading, but so far this is the 'money para' (Haw, a 4th!):
«Economic theory—and historical experience—long ago proved the need for regulation of financial markets. But ever since the Reagan presidency, deregulation has been the prevailing religion. Never mind that the few times “free banking” has been tried—most recently in Pinochet’s Chile, under the influence of the doctrinaire free-market theorist Milton Friedman—the experiment has ended in disaster. Chile is still paying back the debts from its misadventure. With massive problems in 1987 (remember Black Friday, when stock markets plunged almost 25 percent), 1989 (the savings-and-loan debacle), 1997 (the East Asia financial crisis), 1998 (the bailout of Long Term Capital Management), and 2001–02 (the collapses of Enron and WorldCom), one might think there would be more skepticism about the wisdom of leaving markets to themselves.»
[vanityfair/Stiglitz]
G'day Bob,
.. two slightly off-track things need stressing here.
One is my contention, that the AusBC (as SBS) is part of the problem.
Try this:
China vulnerable to US financial crisis: Costello
Posted October 3, 2008 14:44:00
Former federal treasurer Peter Costello says there are flaws in China's banking system which make it vulnerable to the US financial crisis.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/10/03/2381652.htm
There may be nothing fundamentally wrong with the AusBC 'plugging' Costello (ethics would be another question), if Costello had a reputation for 'economic wisdom' or 'clever commentary' or whatever.
But recall that Costello created the final step (of three, the other two were negative gearing, thanks, but "No, thanks!" to Hawke/Keating, and low interest rates - more imported than created by Howard/Costello, there's lots to be said about interest rates - to correct the lying pushed paradigm, that is); it was Costello who presided over, encouraged (saying things like the sheople are getting rich! - My paraphrase, and referring to the largely illusory gains coming from vicious house-price inflation, more than a doubling, average house-prices now stand at roughly at nine times(!!?) average income), Costello demonstrated his economic idiocy by that one, single event. (There were many others, like GST say, a regressive impost on the lower-paid sheople. And the final, super-cynical inflationary attempt by Howard/Costello to buy the sheople®'s votes in 2007, just like Fraser/Lynch/Howard did, all those years ago in the 70s. About 30 years difference, and still nothing learnt, not a skerrick. Nothing but arrogance, and cruelly wedging the sheople over $s.)
Sooo, Q: Why does the (expletive deleted) AusBC (as SBS) keep 'plugging' Costello?
A: Good question; but one thing it fur shure *ain't*, is 'left-bias.'
G'day Phil, a double dose of Chomsky is prescribed.
Part 1.
Part 2.
He has his critics, and they are prone to claim more than they can prove.
G'day Phil, those links I sent earlier for the public's' benefit:
Paul Craig Roberts.
Mike Whitney.
Stephen Lendman.
From DemocracyNow! Naomi Klein.
Now to some more ...
Wall St shudders despite (?) the bailout .. but nothing new ...
On matters past, once upon a time people would leap from high buildings ... but now they have parachutes, golden ones.
WASHINGTON — Days from becoming the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history, Lehman Brothers steered millions to departing executives even while pleading for a federal rescue, Congress was told Monday.
Yes, well. What is the title of this thread again? Oh, "Immoral Earnings".
And what did the placard in the photo say? You remember the one.
Understandable.
Setting a standard suitable for this thread ... Glenn Greenwald on McInsane gettng so deep into the gutter ....
In the last two months of this election -- as the Bush administration winds down as the most unpopular in modern American history and the Right is on the verge of a desperately-needed collective death -- we see a perfect microcosm of what our country has been over the last eight years. The financial crisis is spreading, accelerating, and morphing across the globe in unpredictable ways. The economic anxiety levels are as high as one can recall, teetering on panic, and even the Wall St. Journal Editorial Page is acknowledging that America's days of economic dominance are over. The national debt is over a staggering $10 trillion and has doubled in the last 8 years alone. And the symbols of our nation have become gulags, the waterboard, an endless stream of bombs and occupations, and people imprisoned forever with no charges of any kind.
And as these flames engulf America's foundations, what is the Right doing -- the movement that brought us all of this through their virtually absolute control of our Government for the last eight years? They're spending all their time chattering with each other about an aging 1960s radical and giddily cheering the increasingly repellent Sarah Palin as she skips around the country in front of rambunctiously booing right-wing crowds accusing Barack Obama of palling around with The Terrorists and pointing out that he doesn't see America the way all the Normal, Good Americans do. For the last eight years, the opponents of the Right have been America-hating Terrorists and they still are.
It wil get uglier.
G'day Phil, I said it will get uglier ... arising from this attack comes such as ...
Radar reports that the Secret Service is investigating the potential threat against Barack Obama at a Sarah Palin rally:
The Secret Service is following up on media reports today that someone in the crowd at a McCain/Palin event suggested killing Barack Obama, according to Secret Service spokesman Malcolm Wiley. The shout of "kill him" followed a Sarah Palin rant on Obama's relationship with radical Chicagoan Bill Ayers.
More.
Everyone has their threshold. I've just reached mine. Thanks to AmericaBlog for pointing me to this and this. Also a hat tip to TPM Election Central.
John "Country Last" McCain and Sarah Palin held some truly hate filled rallies on Monday. Here's a montage from McCain's hatefest 2008
During this rally, a McCain supporter answers the question posed by Senator Country Last, "Who is the real Barack Obama?" The unmistakable answer: terrorist!
McCain says nothing.
From The Washington Post and AmericaBlog on Palin's rally:
"Now it turns out, one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers," Palin said.
"Boooo!" said the crowd.
"And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, 'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,'" she continued.
"Boooo!" the crowd repeated.
"Kill him!" proposed one man in the audience.
Palin went on to say that "Obama held one of the first meetings of his political career in Bill Ayers's living room, and they've worked together on various projects in Chicago."
Palin says nothing.
Glenn Greenwald.
Listening to a Sarah Palin rally is like visiting a museum exhibit of every empty, trite, manipulative right-wing political slogan from the last three decades. Today, an anti-war heckler interrupted her speech in Florida and this is how she responded, to cheers from right-wing throngs both at the rally and around the nation:
Bless your heart sir, my son is in Iraq fighting for your right to protest.
Right, because if Saddam Hussein had remained in power in Iraq -- or if we were no longer occupying the country -- then the U.S. would have been invaded by the Iraqi Army by now and we'd be living under the tyrannical rule of Ace of Clubs Quasy and Ace of Hearts Uday (and Five of Hearts Dr. Germ and cardless Mrs. Anthrax) and they would have abolished our First Amendment rights of speech and assembly. So that's exactly what the U.S. military is doing in Iraq: "fighting for our right to protest." And those who oppose that war, therefore, are unwilling to Fight for Our Freedoms. And Freedom is on the March.
That may be the motive driving many, perhaps most, citizens who join the military. But even under the most romanticized vision, whatever it is that we're doing in Iraq, fighting for our "right to protest" quite plainly isn't it.
Uglier by the day.
A matter of character.
G'day Phil,second debate is done and McInsane appears to have been dusted ... for the moment a trip to Huffpo will provide plenty of reports. One that follows on previous themes is this.
During a discussion about energy, McCain punctuates a contrast with Obama by referring to him as "that one," while once again not looking in his opponent's direction (merely jabbing a finger across his chest). That's not going to win McCain any Miss Congeniality points. Nor will it reassure any voters who believe McCain is improperly trying to capitalize on Obama's "otherness."
This goes beyond refusing to look at Obama in the first debate. With this slightly dehumanizing phrase, McCain may have just played into the emerging narrative of Obama-hate that has been sprouting at McCain-Palin rallies.
Who won?
The insta-polls, which provide viewers with a somewhat skewed but important insight into how each candidate fared say, by and large, that Obama scored a victory in the second debate.
NBC's focus group of undecided Pennsylvania voters had the Illinois Democrat winning by roughly a 60-40 split. Frank Luntz's focus group, over at Fox, showed undecided voters leaning towards Obama because of his position on health care. CBS's focus group of independents had the Democratic nominee winning the debate at 39 percent to McCain's 27 percent, with 35 percent of the respondents saying it was a tie. Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, a Democratic polling firm, had a focus group of undecideds leaning to Obama by a margin of 42 percent to 24 percent.
Meanwhile, SurveyUSA interviewed 741 debate watchers in the state of Washington, 54 percent of whom thought Obama was the "clear winner" compared with McCain's 29 percent. That same polling firm had the first debate as a tie. In tonight's survey: 42 percent of respondents said McCain was too forceful.
And the CNN focus group of undecided voters in Ohio had the margin at an even wider spread: Obama 54 percent to McCain's 30.
And.
On fundamentals - Tomdispatch presents Chalmers Johnson on matter electoral.
In his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention, Barack Obama called the forthcoming presidential election a "defining moment" in this country's history. It is conceivable that he is right. There are precedents in American history for an election inaugurating a period of reform and political realignment.
Such a development, however, is extremely rare and surrounded by contingencies normally beyond the control of the advocates of reform. So let me speculate about whether the 2008 election might set in motion a political reconfiguration -- and even a political renaissance -- in the United States, restoring a modicum of democracy to the country's political system, while ending our march toward imperialism, perpetual warfare, and bankruptcy that began with the Cold War.
The political blunders, serious mistakes, and governmental failures of the last eight years so discredited the administration of George W. Bush -- his average approval rating has fallen to 27% and some polls now show him dipping into the low twenties -- that his name was barely mentioned in the major speeches at the Republican convention. Even John McCain has chosen to run under the banner of "maverick" as a candidate of "change," despite the fact that his own party's misgoverning has elicited those demands for change.
Bringing the opposition party to power, however, is not in itself likely to restore the American republic to good working order. It is almost inconceivable that any president could stand up to the overwhelming pressures of the military-industrial complex, as well as the extra-constitutional powers of the 16 intelligence agencies that make up the U.S. Intelligence Community, and the entrenched interests they represent. The subversive influence of the imperial presidency (and vice presidency), the vast expansion of official secrecy and of the police and spying powers of the state, the institution of a second Defense Department in the form of the Department of Homeland Security, and the irrational commitments of American imperialism (761 active military bases in 151 foreign countries as of 2008) will not easily be rolled back by the normal workings of the political system.
For even a possibility of that occurring, the vote in November would have to result in a "realigning election," of which there have been only two during the past century -- the election of Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 and of Richard Nixon in 1968. Until 1932, the Republicans had controlled the presidency for 56 of the previous 72 years, beginning with Abraham Lincoln's election in 1860. After 1932, the Democrats occupied the White House for 28 of the next 36 years.
Recommended.
G'day Phil, you mentioned 1984, so here is Chris Floyd on the security state.
"technology to wipe out truth is now available. not everybody can afford it but it's available. when the cost comes down look out!" -- Bob Dylan, "World Gone Wrong"
"toleration of the unacceptable leads to the last round-up." -- Dylan, ibid.
In the whirlwind of anxiety and confusion surrounding the global economic meltdown, one thing is certain: governments will use the crisis to augment their own power.
This may occur directly, as with the Bush-Paulson bailout plan, which gives the Treasury Secretary virtually unlimited and unsupervised power to give billions of taxpayer dollars to his cronies on Wall Street, while also allowing him to override the few restrictions left on the machinations of raw greed in the financial markets. (Yes, of course, all of this will change completely after Barack Obama is elected: instead of Hank Paulson and George Bush doling out bailout pork to their Wall Street pals, a brand-new Treasury chief and Obama will be doling out bailout pork to their Wall Street pals.)
But the economic freak-out will also be employed as a distraction, with governments using it to enact measures hugger-mugger while public attention is obsessively focused elsewhere. A prime -- and chilling -- example of this can be found in a new law slouching its way through the legislative process in Britain, where it is likely to emerge in the stark light of day next year. And it is a very rough beast indeed; the measure will, as Jenni Russell puts it in the Guardian
[create a] centralised database that will track, in real time, every call we make, every website we visit, and every text and email we send. That information will then be stored and analysed - perhaps for decades. It will mean the end of privacy as we know it.
Or rather, what's left of privacy as we used to know it. And Americans should not take comfort in the fact that this truly Orwellian law is being prepared across the sea. Britain has long been a bellwether for repressive measures in the United States, blazing a path on detention without charges, omnipresent camera surveillance, "strenuous interrogation," and other liberty-stripping "counterterrorism" measures, many of them honed in the glory days of the dirty war with the IRA. [For more on how British dirty war tactics cross-pollinated American black ops in Iraq, see "Ulster on the Euphrates."]
They are on the way.
Glenn Greenwald on the matter of Fox News.
Others are saying it is ugly, such as the New York Times.
It is a sorry fact of American political life that campaigns get ugly, often in their final weeks. But Senator John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin have been running one of the most appalling campaigns we can remember.
They have gone far beyond the usual fare of quotes taken out of context and distortions of an opponent’s record — into the dark territory of race-baiting and xenophobia. Senator Barack Obama has taken some cheap shots at Mr. McCain, but there is no comparison.
Despite the occasional slip (referring to Mr. Obama’s “cronies” and calling him “that one”), Mr. McCain tried to take a higher road in Tuesday night’s presidential debate. It was hard to keep track of the number of times he referred to his audience as “my friends.” But apart from promising to buy up troubled mortgages as president, he offered no real answers for how he plans to solve the country’s deep economic crisis. He is unable or unwilling to admit that the Republican assault on regulation was to blame.
Ninety minutes of forced cordiality did not erase the dismal ugliness of his campaign in recent weeks, nor did it leave us with much hope that he would not just return to the same dismal ugliness on Wednesday.
Ms. Palin, in particular, revels in the attack. Her campaign rallies have become spectacles of anger and insult. “This is not a man who sees America as you see it and how I see America,” Ms. Palin has taken to saying.
That line follows passages in Ms. Palin’s new stump speech in which she twists Mr. Obama’s ill-advised but fleeting and long-past association with William Ayers, founder of the Weather Underground and confessed bomber. By the time she’s done, she implies that Mr. Obama is right now a close friend of Mr. Ayers — and sympathetic to the violent overthrow of the government. The Democrat, she says, “sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country.”
Her demagoguery has elicited some frightening, intolerable responses. A recent Washington Post report said at a rally in Florida this week a man yelled “kill him!” as Ms. Palin delivered that line and others shouted epithets at an African-American member of a TV crew.
Another matter of character piece.
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