McCainthyism

Now, I'm just sayin'...

Wheeling, West Virginia, located in the northern panhandle of the state, 11 miles west of Pittsburgh, was the site where nearly 59 years ago a first-term senator from Wisconsin purportedly launched arguably the most shameful - and shameless - fear campaign in American history. At the heart of the machinations were Joseph McCarthy's baseless and unsubstantiated accusations of communist sympathies among certain Americans. Depending upon whichever label Senator McCarthy assigned to you, you were either one of the good, real, pro-America Americans or a godless, pinko commie. Over the next few years, Joseph McCarthy's deplorable, self-interested machinations would inflame national paranoia, exacerbate political divisions, and ruin lives.

Throughout the aftermath of 9/11, the Iraq War, and the 2004 election, a similar gauntlet was thrown down by the Republican party. The simplistic, accusatory, and ignorant question of "Why do you hate America?" became so pervasive that it evolved into a mockery of itself, becoming a reactionary, sarcastic semi-punchline. Again, though, Americans found themselves demarcated as either Pro-America or Anti-America, depending upon whether or not they supported the "right" policies.

Now, I know that you're already connecting the dots in your head between past and present, and so I want to take the opportunity to stress one important point - I am not comparing the man John McCain to the man Joe McCarthy. That's the kind of character assassination increasingly worthy of McCain's campaign. What is fair, however, is to discuss the deeds and rhetoric of the two, and to draw parallels where warranted. Here, we find an undeniable similarity between the tactics employed by the McCain campaign (and its Republican supporters) and those brandished by McCarthy and the Bush Administration. And while by my own standards, "McCainthyism" may be perceived as just the kind of name-calling I deplore, I am unapologetic in taking two similar series of behaviors and branding them a reified "ism".

Tell me how Sarah Palin saying this is fundamentally different from the rhetoric employed in McCarthy's witch hunt:

"We believe that the best of America is in the small towns that we get to visit, and in the wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation,"

Or this more localized gem from McCain campaign senior adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer:

On MSNBC this morning, McCain adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer asserted that “real Virginia” does not include Northern Virginia:

I certainly agree that Northern Virginia has gone more Democratic. … But the rest of the state — real Virginia if you will — I think will be very responsive to Senator McCain’s message.

MSNBC host Kevin Corke gave Pfotenhauer a chance to revise her answer, telling her: “Nancy, I’m going to give you a chance to climb back off that ledge — Did you say ‘real Virginia’?”

But Pfotenhauer didn’t budge, and instead dug a deeper hole.

Real Virginia, I take to be, this part of the state that’s more Southern in nature, if you will.

Corke ended the segment noting that Pfotenhauer was appearing via satellite from Northern Virginia. “Nancy Pfotenhauer, senior policy adviser for the McCain campaign, joining us from Arlington, not really Virginia.” “Alright, I’m just gonna let ya– you’ll wear that one,” Corke responded.

Got that? Sarah Palin will tell you whether you're a "real American" or "pro-America" just as Pfotenhauer will decide who's a "real Virginian" or not. (Presumably, those Virginia residents and soldiers who perished in the Pentagon on 9/11 weren't "real Virginians" according to the McCain campaign).

This isn't a question of who likes pancakes and who likes waffles. This is an attempt to directly label entire groups of people as "good" and "evil" (e.g. "Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists"). Couple these examples with the smearing of Obama as "palling around with terrorists", Michelle Bachmann's crusade against and proposed investigation into "anti-American" members of Congress, and the McCain campaign's labeling of Obama as "socialist", and the climate being created by this campaign - with John McCain's approval - is disgustingly resonant of the Senate's bygone blight from Wisconsin. "Are you going to support "the Mav'rick" or the terrorist, socialist, anti-American Other?"

Again, it makes me shudder to compare anyone's actions or words to those of such a reprehensible fear mongerer - not because it's inaccurate (it's not), but because it has become necessary. Once again, a national platform is being used to openly divide our citizenry along unnecessary and hateful lines. If John McCain wants to avoid the comparison, he should rebuke and cease these horrid tactics. With two weeks left in this election, I'm not holding my breath.

I'm just sayin'...