Forget the Muslim talk: John McCain supporters are calling for Barack Obama's head — literally!
Yesterday, at a Pennsylvania McCain rally, someone yelled "Kill him" when a speaker mentioned Obama. (h/t to Pushing Rope).
On Oct. 10, the very same words were uttered by a crowdmember at a Sarah Palin rally in Clearwater.
In August, Brad Blog found numerous instances of death threats on right-wing site Townhall.com, which is often praised by Fox News' Bill O'Reilly.
Those incidents followed a high-profile death threat (that was later dismissed as "racist ramblings from three meth heads") preceding Obama's speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver. And the more recent arrest of a man holed up in a Miami hotel room with stockpiles of weapons and ammo.
Scary news for Obama supporters, many of whom secretly fear an assassination attempt on the country's first African-American nominee of a major party. Of course, nobody says that publicly (except maybe Hillary Clinton) for fear that it might dissuade voters. Nobody wants to support a dead candidate, even if it might create a sure win (see Ashcroft v. Carnahan).
Of course, this is no small thing to Mr. Obama who, in 2007, became the first presidential nominee to request secret service help so early in a campaign.
But perhaps even more disturbing than these (most likely) empty threats is a political culture that breeds such vitriol. Other examples, anyone?
UPDATE: TBO reports that Al Austin, a Tampa-based Republican fundraiser sent out an e-mail today with a joke about killing Obama. He apologizes.
This article appears in Oct 15-21, 2008.
