UPDATE: word to the folks in the comment section. take a deep breath before you post please.
Last night, on CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360, respected analyst David Gergen (former director of communications for President Reagan) said the angry rhetoric coming out of the McCain/Palin rallies could lead to violence. "I think we’re not far from that," warned Gergen.
UPDATE: today, Senator John McCain rights his ships and calms the crowd in Minnesota. Per this Time Magazine blog:
[McCain] just snatched the microphone out the hands of a woman who began her question with, "I’m scared of Barack Obama… he’s an Arab terrorist…"
"No, no ma’am," he interrupted. "He’s a decent family man with whom I happen to have some disagreements.
The NYT reports, however, that moments later McCain resumed the very same attacks - designed to paint Obama as a terrorist sympathizer - that have so stoked the crowds in the first place.
Per the NYT: But moments later, Mr. McCain, the Republican nominee, renewed his attacks on Mr. Obama for his association with the 1960s radical William Ayers and told the crowd, “Mr. Obama’s political career was launched in Mr. Ayers’ living room.”
The dizzying statements came on a confused day when Mr. McCain’s campaign pounded Mr. Obama as a “liar” in an incendiary television commercial about Mr. Ayers and as Mr. McCain abruptly announced another economic policy proposal, this time a plan to suspend mandatory withdrawals from 401(k) retirement accounts.
The Gergen comments:
UPDATE: The New York Times linked to these videos in an article titled "McCain Supporters Gone Wild." The videos were among the most viewed on Youtube today.
Here’s bystanders (obviously responding to some Obama supporters across the street) parrot McCain/Palin rhetoric, calling Obama a "terrorist" and "muslim;" and protestors were labeled "socialist swine," and "commie faggots."
