McCain Dances With The Dark Side

And Jonathan Capehart shows how chilling it is.

This is what McCain and Palin have engendered.

They seem to have no qualms appealing to the cultural fears of their agitated, and now energized, base by practically branding Obama as un-American or anti-American. And this is eliciting an ugliness at McCain-Palin events that is justifiably raising alarms that some nut job is going to act on the Republican ticket’s cynical campaigning.

Their lack of willingness to confront shouts of “terrorist!” and “kill him!” at their rallies, and their decision to push the Ayres story as they have, has made this perhaps the dirtiest, most despicable presidential campaign ever.   One can certainly bring up past and present associations, but the mud-slingers won’t accept the answers once the question is asked.  They won’t let go, even after Obama has fully answered about Ayres.

Should John McCain have to answer about his long-time friend and political donor, G. Gordon Liddy?

…G. Gordon Liddy, the convicted Watergate burglar whose colorful history includes telling listeners to his radio show in 1994 to shoot federal agents in the head. When McCain went on Liddy’s radio show in November 2007, he told Liddy, “I’m proud of you, I’m proud of your family… It’s always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great.”

What else has Liddy done?

Liddy served four and a half years in prison in connection with his conviction for his role in the Watergate break-in and the break-in at the office of the psychiatrist of Daniel Ellsberg, the military analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers. Liddy has acknowledged preparing to kill someone during the Ellsberg break-in “if necessary”; plotting to murder journalist Jack Anderson; plotting with a “gangland figure” to murder Howard Hunt to stop him from cooperating with investigators; plotting to firebomb the Brookings Institution; and plotting to kidnap “leftist guerillas” at the 1972 Republican National Convention — a plan he outlined to the Nixon administration using terminology borrowed from the Nazis.

But I don’t care that John McCain is friendly with and likes G. Gordon Liddy.  I like the guy, too, and have had a cordial relationship with him.  But using the Ayres/Obama argument, no one who ever palled around with G. Gordon should ever run for president.

Palin cites the Times story to validate her continued attacks.  But executive editor Bill Keller says it’s the other way around.

He told Politico that the paper was motivated to report out the Ayers link because the McCain campaign has been pushing it – not the other way around.

“We’ve reported the Ayers relationship before, and we had it on our to-do list for a while to take a more comprehensive look,” Keller said in an e-mail. “When the McCain campaign began to make it a major focal point of ads and stump speeches, we decided the time was right.”

But if Palin wanted to use the Times story to bolster her argument, she should have noted its conclusion:

The Times’ 2,100-word piece concluded that while Obama “has played down his contacts” with Ayers – a former leader of the Weather Underground who’s now an education professor at the University of Illinois – “the two men do not appear to have been close.”

A McCain strategist told the New York Daily News, “It’s a dangerous road, but we have no choice.  If we keep talking about the economic crisis, we’re going to lose.”  But the man who once said, “I won’t take the lowest road to the highest office in the land.” should know by now that it’s better to lose with honor than to win with none.  As things are looking now, he’ll probably lose with dishonor.

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.