A while ago I talked about an upcoming GOP smear campaign of Obama. I was out of line there, since I couldn't know what was coming up in the future. But it does seem that a very ugly campaign against Obama is going on. What is ugly about it is that it appears to encourage, or at least not discourage, Republican crowds to basically cry out for Obama's blood. Frank Rich, who - I know, I know - is one of the most left-wing of the Op-Editors of NYT, says this today about crowds that have appeared at McCain rallies:

Quote
At McCain-Palin rallies, the raucous and insistent cries of “Treason!” and “Terrorist!” and “Kill him!” and “Off with his head!” as well as the uninhibited slinging of racial epithets, are actually something new in a campaign that has seen almost every conceivable twist. They are alarms. Doing nothing is not an option.
Frank Rich's point is that the McCain campaign encourages, or at least not discourages, Republican crowds to work themselves into such a frenzy that they might actually, truly, want to kill Obama. And they might actually, truly, try to act on that death wish, too. Remember that some American Presidents, Presidential candidates and other important policial figures have indeed been killed because of what they stood for and fought for. Perhaps not coincidentally, many of those who have actually been assassinated have been prominantly associated with the fight for the rights of black people - I'm talking about Lincoln, JFK, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, of course. It is hard not to think that Obama's life might in fact be in very real danger.

I don't know if this can be described as a GOP smear campaign, but I do know that it gives me the creeps, all the same.

The full Frank Rich editorial is here .

Ann