John Lewis was of course one of the genuine heros of the civil rights movement. John McCain apparently agrees with this assesment of his courage, and called Congressman Lewis one of the three wisest men he’d ever met when McCain appeared in Rick Warren’s church.
Today, Lewis reacted to the campaign McCain is running, tying it directly to the kind of campaigns George Wallace had run. The Politico blog quotes Lewis, and the responses from the two campaigns. What Lewis said is pretty strong, and uses the example of Wallace in much the same way I used the example of Ross Barnett in a comment earlier today. Here’s some of what Lewis said:
“What I am seeing reminds me too much of another destructive period in American history,” Lewis said in a statement issued today for Politico’s Arena forum. “Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse.”
Lewis didn’t accuse McCain of imitating Wallace, but suggested there were similarities.
“George Wallace never threw a bomb,” Lewis noted. “He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who were simply trying to exercise their constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama.”
John Lewis is not just a civil rights hero, he is a modest and reticent man who would only say this in an effort to prevent John McCain and Sarah Palin from inciting violence.
McCain is reacting strongly to Lewis’s statements … denying that he and/or Palin are engaging in toxic tactics. If McCain truly believes his campaign’s hands are clean, then it’s evidence he doesn’t understand America. There may well be blood on the floor before this election concludes, the responsibility for which will be traceable in large part to the McCain-Palin campaign. Richar Nixon would be SO proud.
IMO, if the McCain camp was smart (but who has accused them of that lately?) they’d move on and change the subject because there is no way they can win this one. His protests just keep it in the news cycle another day.
Political leaders cannot tell angry mobs that their fears and prejudices are not only justified but moral and patriotic. Most of the crowd will not be violent, but there are sociopaths out there who will take the rhetoric as approval of vigilantism.
As a campaign strategy, the appeals to fear and prejudice are backfiring magnificently. Hispanic voters in particular have responded negatively.
Obama is up 52 to 42 in a new poll in Colorado. In the past two weeks, Obama’s lead among Colorado Hispanics has increase from 57-36 to 71-21. The newest Nevada poll shows a similar bump due to Hispanic voters.
Excellent, Researcher. I swear, could you ever have believed anyone capable of winning a presidential nomination could turn right around and run a general campaign this stupidly?
If running a campaign is ANY indication of ability to run the country, I am VERY, VERY excited about an Obama administration. What I have seen indirectly on a national level is encouraging. The atmosphere at the local Obama office yesterday was absolutely electrifying.
Unlike every other Democratic election in the past, the Obama volunteer coordinators GET IT! The actual volunteers look like a cross section of America….old, middle age, and young people of all colors. Unlike previous Democratic elections, I didn’t see a SINGLE political hack in the room! The excitement and energy level was incredible.
Yes’m, lilaruby, yes’m, yes’m, yes’m.