Monday, September 22, 2008

Calling out ol' Two-Face McCain




-- By Dave

John McCain's campaign-long attempt to play it both ways on immigration -- pandering to his party's nativist wingnuts while attempting to tell Latinos he's their pal (just don't tell anyone) -- is finally starting to catch up with him.

America's Voice has an ad calling him out on it. As you can see from watching it, it's very effective in making clear his hypocrisy in falsely blaming Obama for the failure of comprehensive immigration reform in 2006 -- when in fact the fault lay with the raving xenophobic wing of the Republican Party.

The ad substantiates the thrust of Obama's own Spanish-language attack ad nailing McCain along similar lines. And the best part of all this has been watching the right wing howl in protest. (Score!)

Rush Limbaugh (whose constant use of demeaning stereotypes when he talks about Latinos played a substantial role) in particular has been whining that "Obama is stoking racial antagonism" by supposedly taking his quotes out of context. But when Limbaugh offers the actual context, it's clear that, indeed, he was indulging demeaning stereotypes as usual. Epic fail, dude.

Indeed, it is to laugh: Obama is stoking "racial antagonism"? This, from the guy whose unending defense of "white culture" and constant attacks on multiculturalism are staples of his massively popular radio show? This, from the guy who told his audience that Obama should just "renounce his race" and "become white"? The guy who informed us that Donovan McNabb got ahead in the NFL because he was black? The guy who calls illegal immigrants an "invasive species"?

Also muddying the water has been conservative Latino columnist Ruben Navarette, who insists that the McCain ad is perfectly accurate. Um, well, maybe not so much: Frank Sharry has the definitive response to Navarette.

Oddly enough, McCain's prevarications on immigration haven't been tallied among the naked falsehoods he's been peddling lately. But really, they are among the clearest examples of his two-faced approach to politics.

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