It's a Mystery

by Steve Sack, who reminds us just how far McCain has fallen. When it looked like McCain was going to carry South Carolina in 2000, and win the Republican nomination, Bush let Karl Rove do his thing:

Rove invented a uniquely injurious fiction for his operatives to circulate via a phony poll. Voters were asked, “Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain…if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?” This was no random slur. McCain was at the time campaigning with his dark-skinned daughter, Bridget, adopted from Bangladesh.It worked. Owing largely to the Rove-orchestrated whispering campaign, Bush prevailed in South Carolina and secured the Republican nomination. The rest is history—specifically the tragic and blighted history of our young century. It worked in another way as well. Too shaken to defend himself, McCain emerged from the bruising episode less maverick reformer and more Manchurian candidate. 

A lot of people have made the mistake this cartoon does (including the McCain campaign). Racism and innuendo work on Republicans 99% of the time. They only work, like, 66% of the time on everybody else. Still effective, but far from a sure thing.

Comments

[Emily]

You know South of the Border in SC? Well, if the signs had some black guy with Ebonics on them, they would have been taken down a long time ago. At least I hope that's true. I think obvious racism, at least against black people, is distasteful to at least two thirds of the general population. I mean, the racism is there, it's just not in your face. I guess until some black guy runs for president and you have to give it one last shot.

[Ice Black]

In South Carolina? They'd have those signs in 3-D every 30 yards if possible. In the south it's strange, it's like this acceptable, out-in-the-open racism. Up here ins"liberal" Cambridge, MA, the racism is bottled-up, bubbling under the surface and just as ugly.