Race baiting

Charles Krauthammer, despite his apparent recognition of the shortcomings of the Republican ticket, can still find a way to generate outrage.  Today, for instance, he complains about those who would suggest there is a racial element to the McCain campaign.  Here's the charge: 

Let me get this straight. A couple of agitated yahoos in a rally of thousands yell something offensive and incendiary, and John McCain and Sarah Palin are not just guilty by association — with total strangers, mind you — but worse: guilty according to the New York Times of "race-baiting and xenophobia."

Unsurprisingly, he doesn't have it straight. For in the rest of the article, Krauthammer rails against Obama himself for charges the New York Times made about McCain's campaign.  He concludes:

And Obama has shown no hesitation in doing so to McCain. Weeks ago, in Springfield, Mo., and elsewhere, he warned darkly that George Bush and John McCain were going to try to frighten you by saying that, among other scary things, Obama has "a funny name" and "doesn't look like all those other presidents on those dollar bills."  

Why would he say that?

 

That's kind of a dollar bill, I suppose.  Story here.  Now of course that's not McCain's campaign, but Obama didn't say that George Bush and John McCain were going to frighten you–he said, "they."  And if they includes any Republicans, he was right more times than just once.  

Update: 

Then there's this.

One thought on “Race baiting”

  1. From the Salon.com “War Room”, apparently the image is that of a food stamp:
    http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2008/10/16/newsletter/index.html

    No one can be — or, at least, ought to be — surprised by the speciousness of Krauthammer’s charges. To the list of bad reasoning, we might add suppression of evidence and strawman. The “yahoo’s” are merely the symptom of the deeper messaging, of which the image above is itself only an example. Even the official line from the McCain campaign and the RNC is one of paranoia and fear of Obama’s “otherness.” (I mean after 17 years or moreĀ as a public person, what could be sillier than wringing one’s hands about “who is Barack Obama?” If you don’t know by now then its due only to your own willful ignorance.)

    On the bright side, there’s been no wanting of examples for my Critical Thinking class this semester …

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