DEALING WITH AN OBAMA ATTACK VIDEO: HOW TO RESPOND, BECAUSE THERE'S MORE TO COME

Judging presidential campaigns by the company they keep? It's a wash- one deranged pastor ("God damn America!") = a second deranged pastor (The Catholic religion is a "whorish religion" and Jews were killed by Hitler because they refused to emigrate to Israel)



I got the following e-mail with a link to an Obama attack video from a former significant other whose political views swung from liberal Democrat in the early 1980’s to right wing Republican Bushbot in the early 2000’s. Following her letter was my response:

“At the risk of inducing a whole string of your too-long-to-read pontifical posts, I'd thought I'd send you this. I bet you will not forward THIS to your whole distribution list, if you even take the time to watch it. Actually, I'm sure you will try to discredit it in any way.

http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/video.aspx?RsrcID=2036”

Dear __________,

"Pontifical posts." Good alliteration!

When your name is "Finkelstein," as is mine and my family's, you learn early on that making fun of somebody- or judging them- because of their name or their religion, is neither fair nor logical. It is the path taken by bullies and bigots, and I've personally seen a lot of both because of my name and my religion. So I am not impressed by the name calling of Barack "Hussein" Obama or the references to his religious upbringing. Those references only serve to illuminate the lack of character of those who are trying to demonize him.

As for the substance of the Obama attack video- which I did watch- you will see a lot more of it from right wing sleazeball groups who realize that they can't win this election on the merits or on substance. As for me, when I vote for a person for public office, I use the leaky faucet analogy. When my bathroom sink is leaking and the bathroom is flooding, when the plumber shows up at my door, I don't ask what his race, gender or religion is. I don't ask if he is gay, or if he supports gay marriage, or if his pastor ever said anything stupid, or if he went to an Islamic school as a child. I don't ask if he has a flag pin in his lapel or where he puts his hand when the national anthem is played. I just want my leak stopped, and the sink fixed.

Well, America has a leak. A very big, very bad leak. And of the three remaining candidates, I think Mr. Obama will do the best job fixing what is broken. As for anyone who attacks him on trivial or irrelevant matters, then they are admitting that he will do the better job at getting us out of a devastating civil war in Iraq, and that his policy decisions on righting the economy will be sounder.

There are sick people out there- smart, but sick- who excel at "conflating." They put together the video, and they are shooting for the lowest common denominator in the general population. Ignorant people, bigots, narrow minded, fearful people. So they put images of Che Gueverra, the hammer & sickle, words like "mass murderer" and "Barack Obama" in consecutive sentences, the same way that George W. Bush conflated "9-11" and "Saddam Hussein" in successive sentences back in 2002 and early 2003 to get the majority of ignorant Americans to believe that Iraq and Hussein were behind the 9-11 attacks.

By the way, the Obama attack video has a nice juxtaposition of the Pope, Catholicism and the Cross versus the hammer & sickle (that is so 1950's!), with the Pope condemning "secular humanist Black Liberation Theology." Ironic as hell, considering what Pastor John Hagee, who endorsed and embraced McCain, has said about the Catholic religion. So when you are sending around the video on Obama, don't forget to include these clips, which are just as [ir]relevant to the Presidential race, pastors with whom candidates are affiliated, and the endorsements they seek and accept:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYjSfIIpIP0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qNi7tPanUA

Love,
Jim