I actually opted out of watching Morning Joe on Friday because I thought a few of the prior mornings' offerings were a bit on the wrong side of boring. At any rate, I decided to catch up today at msnbc.com and, as it turns out, I missed Chris Matthews rolling over for Joe Scarborough. Chris was on to discuss the poll results as of October 24 and, given that Senator John McCain was trailing by a significant margin in many states, whether the race was over. Matthews managed to sidestep a definitive ruling on the state of McCain's presidential candidacy by saying that McCain might be able to "poach Pennsylvania" and pull out the "Bush states" of Florida and Ohio but that "it's gonna be tough".
Scarborough went on to discuss the New York Times endorsement of Senator Barack Obama, noting that the Times "suggested that John McCain was racist" and that "his campaign bordered on being racist". Given the multitudinous analysis the New York Times editorial board gave for the endorsement of Senator Obama, it's interesting that Scarborough focused on what was a small element in that endorsement. Additionally, the fact that one white guy, I assume taking up the mantle of beleaguered white guys everywhere, sought the opinion of another white guy to defend a third white guy is laughable, if not just a little sad. But, after all this is Morning Joe, he only has white guys to ask. Mika doesn't count because her opinion rarely truly does anyway.
Matthews tried to give himself a little wiggle room bit by saying that he hadn't read the endorsement, that he didn't know its wording. Once Lawrence O'Donnell chimed in by paraphrasing the New York Times as saying that there were "hints of racism" in the McCain campaign, Matthews answered. Unfortunately for Chris, he missed the boat, saying that the McCain campaign "had not played the racist card".
One wonders if Chris Matthews missed the news cycles in which the McCain campaign pounded the "Who is Barack Obama?" message. A racist element within the campaign doesn't require that Senator McCain or Governor Palin scream "NIGGER", or in the case of the McCain campaign "SAND NIGGER", at the top of their lungs. They have been playing at anti-Islamic, anti-Arab hate speech warfare for sometime now. It is no coincidence that Lee County Sheriff Mike Scott referred to Senator Obama as "Barack Hussein Obama" at a McCain/Palin campaign rally. And, McCain supporters picked up on this racist theme and ran with it. That's why McCain had to negate concerns voiced by his supporters that Obama was a secret Arab. Sadly, McCain's answer didn't do nearly enough to eliminate the idea that somehow being an Arab or Muslim presidential candidate in America is unacceptable. The withdrawal of McCain campaign staffer, Dan Zubairi, who is a Muslim, from a planned interview on CNN with Rick Sanchez furthers the idea that Muslims are not fully American.
The whole "Is John McCain a racist?" theme seems to have preoccupied Joe, as evidenced by his subsequent interview with Walter Isaacson, President of the Aspen Institute. It might behove Joe to ask someone besides the people in his immediate circle. Of course, then, he might get an answer he doesn't like.
Sound like two point of views are held here, maybe it was just my reading of it.
Joe has left the right of center and left for the media darling role that isn't catching much traction. The Official Campaign has never given any hints of racism, whereas I cannot say the same for Obama or his Chicago style campaign.
I think Matthews articulates it well though - Republican operatives, myself included, do want to set the narrative to question Barack Obama's judgment and character.
Posted by: Ali A. Akbar | Monday, October 27, 2008 at 16:06