Fellow OpenSalon blogger "JD in Scranton" has a great first-person account of a visit to a Sarah Palin rally in Scranton, PA earlier this week.
His -- or her -- final paragraph touches on an aspect of the Palin visit to Scranton that got a little wider play than just the local paper:
The problem is, the story may not be true.
After a two-day investigation, the Secret Service field office in Scranton says they have not been able to find a single witness who can corroborate reporter David Singleton's account of hearing someone yell out "Kill him!" during Hackett's pre-Palin speech.
Agent Bill Slavoski says that his office opened in investigation, as they do with all such alleged threats, and has interviewed over 20 people at this point. It wasn't picked up by any of the microphones set up on a nearby TV camera platform. He told the Times-Leader that "we had people all over and we have yet to find anyone who said they heard it." The investigation is now closed, "unless someone comes forward."
Singleton, who has been a reporter for over 30 years, admits there was a lot of noise and booing when he heard the words, but stands by his story, and his paper stands behind him.
Is this important? After all, we know that there have been calls of "kill him" or "he's a terrorist" at other events in other places, right?
Yes, it really does. Honesty in politics and journalism should be about more than just the veracity of individual facts, but about the storyline as a whole.
Political campaigns run on narrative -- positive ones about their candidate, negative ones about their opponents -- and then spin them relentlessly to the journalists who might carry the message out into the wider world. This does not always work, since journalists are often a cynical bunch. But there are themes that stick, and for the last month, the "all McCain-Palin rallies are lynch mobs" has been a winning formula for the Democratic Party.
I always think one of the hardest things for those of us who are genuinely decent people to accept is that there are just a certain number of jackasses in this world of our. And these jackasses in our midst will go out in public, and say and do things that the decent among us would never even think, much less do.
Thus, you get jackasses going to McCain-Palin rallies and yelling stupid crap like "off with his head." You get people showing up at Obama-Biden events wearing those classy "Sarah Palin is a C**t" tee-shirts.
How much weight we assign each of these individual losers is entirely up to us. And people are over-weighing the losers.
If 10 people in a crowd of 10,000 are yelling something incendiary, is this a universal trend? No, of course it isn't.
People booing an opponent at a political rally is not a lynch mob. It's just a political rally, like tens of thousands of others that have been held over the past 200-some-odd years.
But by promoting the storyline of the redneck "lynch mob," the Democrats are further dividing those of us who fall a little to the left of center from our right-leaning breathern. That may help them win a campaign, but it does not help us as a country -- especially not at a moment when we need to be working together as a people to rebuild our national economy on a more solid foundation.
As Joe Biden would say: That's not change, that's more of the same.
Reject it.
His -- or her -- final paragraph touches on an aspect of the Palin visit to Scranton that got a little wider play than just the local paper:
Afternoon news reports about the Palin rally have indicated that when Obama’s name was mentioned inside, somebody shouted “Kill him!” Palin wasn’t speaking at the time. The guy at the microphone at that moment was a blustery local Congressional candidate named Christopher Hackett, and no, he didn’t do anything to discourage the guy who yelled.
The Times-Tribune story ran under the headline "Palin rallies Scranton voters; crowd member calls to 'kill' Obama" Picked up by other news services and blogs, it came to rest on MSNBC's Countdown, when Keith Olbermann used it as the lead in his latest Special Comment on Tuesday night, castigating Sarah Palin and John McCain for not speaking out against these "thugs and psychos" who populate their events. He winds up here: There are some things to respect and honor about you, Sen. McCain, but on this you’re not only a fraud, Senator, but you are tacitly inciting lunatics to violence. If you want to again grand-stand and suspend your campaign here’s your big chance. Suspend your campaign now, until you, or somebody else, gets some control over it and it ceases to be a clear and present danger to the peace of this nation.
After a two-day investigation, the Secret Service field office in Scranton says they have not been able to find a single witness who can corroborate reporter David Singleton's account of hearing someone yell out "Kill him!" during Hackett's pre-Palin speech.
Agent Bill Slavoski says that his office opened in investigation, as they do with all such alleged threats, and has interviewed over 20 people at this point. It wasn't picked up by any of the microphones set up on a nearby TV camera platform. He told the Times-Leader that "we had people all over and we have yet to find anyone who said they heard it." The investigation is now closed, "unless someone comes forward."
Singleton, who has been a reporter for over 30 years, admits there was a lot of noise and booing when he heard the words, but stands by his story, and his paper stands behind him.
Is this important? After all, we know that there have been calls of "kill him" or "he's a terrorist" at other events in other places, right?
Yes, it really does. Honesty in politics and journalism should be about more than just the veracity of individual facts, but about the storyline as a whole.
Political campaigns run on narrative -- positive ones about their candidate, negative ones about their opponents -- and then spin them relentlessly to the journalists who might carry the message out into the wider world. This does not always work, since journalists are often a cynical bunch. But there are themes that stick, and for the last month, the "all McCain-Palin rallies are lynch mobs" has been a winning formula for the Democratic Party.
I always think one of the hardest things for those of us who are genuinely decent people to accept is that there are just a certain number of jackasses in this world of our. And these jackasses in our midst will go out in public, and say and do things that the decent among us would never even think, much less do.
Thus, you get jackasses going to McCain-Palin rallies and yelling stupid crap like "off with his head." You get people showing up at Obama-Biden events wearing those classy "Sarah Palin is a C**t" tee-shirts.
How much weight we assign each of these individual losers is entirely up to us. And people are over-weighing the losers.
If 10 people in a crowd of 10,000 are yelling something incendiary, is this a universal trend? No, of course it isn't.
People booing an opponent at a political rally is not a lynch mob. It's just a political rally, like tens of thousands of others that have been held over the past 200-some-odd years.
But by promoting the storyline of the redneck "lynch mob," the Democrats are further dividing those of us who fall a little to the left of center from our right-leaning breathern. That may help them win a campaign, but it does not help us as a country -- especially not at a moment when we need to be working together as a people to rebuild our national economy on a more solid foundation.
As Joe Biden would say: That's not change, that's more of the same.
Reject it.
TIP:
Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
Max Rivlin-Nadler
Janis Jaquith
Emily Holleman
Dave Cullen
Akopsa
iamsurly
Salon.com
Comments
(rated)
So while I'm not saying that it isn't possible that the report was incorrect (I'm sure plenty of people on the Democratic side would gladly make up stuff like that), I wouldn't necessarily trust there not having been witnesses.
In fact, that would sit well with trickle down morality - when the top has no problem blatantly lying on a regular basis, those who look up will follow the example.
Senator Obama doesn't even allow crowds at his rallies to "Boo!" his opponent; he stops it. I hadn't heard about the t-shirts, and don't know how his campaign handles that.
Governor Palin encourages her crowds to "Boo!" her opponents; stirring up rage is part of her routine. Will she (and Senator McCain) carry some responsibility for any violence that their followers -- stirred up by such rhetoric -- might perpetrate?
Yes.
"The reception had been better in Clearwater, where Palin, speaking to a sea of "Palin Power" and "Sarahcuda" T-shirts, tried to link Obama to the 1960s Weather Underground. "One of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers," she said. ("Boooo!" said the crowd.) "And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, 'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,' " she continued. ("Boooo!" the crowd repeated.)
"Kill him!" proposed one man in the audience. "
(Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/06/AR2008100602935.html )
The reporter heard it, and reported it.
Look, the McCain campaign is desperate. They're throwing everything they can up and hoping some of it sticks.
True, it's not right to spread reflexive prejudice about all people who attend Republican rallies, but it's also not true that these rallies have been harmless or are somehow morally equivalent to the kind of routine politicking that goes on in all elections.
Comparing the t-shirts is not only disingenuous it's irresponsible. How many of you are HONESTLY going to say that's the same thing? With the ten foot pole the Obama campaign's been using to keep its distance from Palin? Obama hardly even mentioned her name last night when asked directly about her. Are you HONESTLY saying Biden and Obama are creating an atmosphere where sexist behavior is encouraged? If I were so cynical as to assume their only motive was to be elected, didn't anyone think that would backfire?
It only takes one person, who believes him or herself to have received "the message" that Obama is dangerous, or un-American, or "not like us," or an Islamic "Manchurian candidate." One person, one gun, one opportunity. And what Palin has been doing (and McCain is guilty by association) is loading the gun.
It's simple really. Long, long before the pretty pit bull was even on the scene, many of us were already pondering the odds of some nut case taking a shot at the first black candidate for president . This has been a sensitive subject since the primary season. (See Hillary Clinton: ill chosen analogy.) No one, not even the intellectually challenged Palin, could have failed to see the warning signs in this mine field.
I contend that Palin and McCain carry this burden with them for perpetuity. If an attempt is made on Obama's life and it happens tomorrow, or in 2 months, or in 2 years, I argue the bullets were put into the gun in these past few weeks. And the gun and the bullets have Palin's and McCain's fingerprints. (I've posted on this topic as well ...Is There a Statute of Limitations on Rabble Rousing.)
this issue, your post and the comments.
I have heard many comments shouted out at those GOP rallies right on TV. I guess I should believe the attendees with an agenda and not my own ears.
P.S. Ironically, Obama stops the booing at his by just a simple gesture and a comment. "We don't need that. Just vote!"
Thumbs up on the post although this is not what the Obama whorshipping people here want to hear. Notice how a certain blinded by partisanship commenter up thread asserts we should take a reporter at his word because he is a reporter. Gee, really? What a presumptuous, illogical, unthinking...
has stirred up some nasty brews in this campaign. And yes the MCCain side has done a lot too.
D La Cava states that "Obama stops the booing at his by just a
simple gesture and a comment..." I find THAT way more
alarming. That these people are so under his control, it's like
they are hypnotized.
It also seems disingenuous to suggest that Obama calling for respectful treatment or his audience actually wanting to listen to his words, instead of shouting him down or demanding he attack McCain, is somehow evidence of mind-control. It seems we need more such cases where a candidate can say, either with humor or with gravitas, let's stay on the issues, and where people actually care about the manner in which that is done.
what I have seen and experienced from the Obamphiles is
that they are mesmerized by him and I truly believe that
is a danger.