The shin splints are back with a vengeance -- like the scummy and vicious politicking of some members of the Republican Party over the last few weeks in the American elections. Today, Colin Powell, addressed a disease afflicting his fellow GOP members that has taken the party down the slippery slope of religious- and racial-bigotry. We are referring to a steady stream of religious and racial insinuations that are being inveighed at Senator Obama by GOP supporters while their party looks away in quiet consent.
Here's the exchange at a McCain rally that illustrates the fervor and magnitude of this bigotry:
GOP supporter to McCain, "I don't trust Obama...He's an Arab."
McCain stood shaking his head as she spoke, then quickly took the microphone from her.
"No, ma'am," he said. "He's a decent, family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with." '
Was McCain implying that law-abiding, American citizens of Arab descent are any less decent than other citizens?
A New York Times article today succinctly and stridently demonstrated that religious- and racial-bigotry is not cool. Here are some excerpts from the article about the death of a Muslim soldier, Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan, of Manahawkin, N.J., who was killed in Iraq on Aug. 6, 2007, and whose remains are buried in Arlington.
"Mr. Powell mentioned Mr. Khan’s death to underscore why he was deeply troubled by Republican personal attacks on Mr. Obama, especially false intimations that he was Muslim.
Mr. Obama is a lifelong Christian, not a Muslim, he said. But, he added, “The really right answer is, what if he is?”
“Is there something wrong with being Muslim in this country? No, that’s not America,” he said."
Thank you, Colin Powell, for articulating a matter that Senator Obama should have had the courage to address many months ago.
