War Handwavium

 The nation straddled with all the damage that comes from failure to win a long and bloody war.

 The country spiraling into economic ruin.

A war veteran turned national leader enters the scene and doesn’t offer solutions but rather looks for someone to blame.

The population, wanting to blame someone for their troubles rather than accept their own contribution to national ruin, eat it up.

McCain in 2008?

How about Hitler in 1933.

I’m not going to go into the specifics of McCain’s flame-baiting and trollery, but rather point you to Glen Greenwald who has a fairly good write up here:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/10/09/balz/index.html

Calling Obama a “terrorist”, saying he is funded by “secret arab sources”, saying he ”hates the troops”, saying he “hates America”. These are the tactics of John McCain and Sarah Palin and the facists who would do anything, including inciting a nation to riot over an innocent man, to get McCain into the White House.  Right wing “news” channels ponder if Obama and his wife are committing some sort of secret Terrorist Fist Jab. Right-wing fringe-cakes protest “baby-murdering muslims for president”. No, really.

After WW1, Germany was forced to sign the Treaty of Versailles, which blamed Germany entirely for the war, forced Germany to pay massive reparations, make substantial territorial concessions, disarm militarily. In the ensuing economic ruin and military ineffectiveness, Hitler stepped in, blamed all of Germany’s problems on scapegoats to the point that German’s were in no way responsible for its current state of ruin, promised to rebuild Germany’s weakened military, and promised an empire that would last a thousand years.

McCain’s latest tactic is to ask “Who is the real Obama?” and then allow the fascists in his audience answer the question for him. Here’s a clip where McCain asks the question and someone in his audience yells “Terrorist!”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buyVS9fRqkw

Note that McCain didn’t correct the racist pig on this outburst. This is exactly the response McCain wants. McCain can’t come out and say “here’s the hard evidence that Obama is a Terrorist” because Obama isn’t a terrorist and McCain doesn’t have any evidence. He can’t give specifics without lying. Instead, McCain leads people down the road of generalities and scapegoating, points people in the direction of finding someone to blame rather than offering solutions, and then drops Obama’s name.

America is spiraling down into economic ruin. Our military is stretched so thin that we could do nothing when Russian invaded Georgia. We’ve been bogged down in a war in Iraq that has no end in sight. McCain refuses to accept an 18 month deadline for withdrawal because he knows 18 months isn’t enough for the total victory. McCain says the reason we haven’t won the war is because we were betrayed from the inside. Obama voted against funding troops, McCain points out without mentioning his own votes against troop funding.

McCain will tell you that we haven’t won the war because we have been stabbed in the back by people like Obama.

This is McCain’s campaign: An appeal to people’s baser desire to avoid responsibility for the damage their own actions have caused themselves and their country. An attempt to demonize and scapegoat people like Obama who were pointing out the foolishness of invading Iraq from the beginning, who have been calling attention to the problems of complete deregulation of the capitalist markets.

McCain wants you to know it isn’t your fault that we have global warming, even if you own a fleet of SUV’s. No, it’s Obama’s fault because he’s a terrorist funded by Arabs. McCain wants you to know that it isn’t your fault that we’re stuck in Iraq, even though you were beating your chests to invade in March of 2003. No, it’s Obama’s fault because Obama voted against funding the troops in 2008 and hates America. McCain wants you to know that it isn’t your fault that Wall Street has collapsed, even if you are a devout worshipper of the Invisible Hand of Capitalism and even if you howled against restrictions on corporations. No, it’s Obama’s fault because Obama is a sleeper agent for muslim terrorists.

This is McCain’s Big Lie.

All we need now is a October Surprise and watch the fascists try to blame it on Obama.

update: When the overall lies are so big, the little ones go by without so much as a “Say what?” After the Troopergate report finally came out, McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said: ” absolutely no wrongdoing found in the report … no violations of any kinds of laws or ethics rules.” Palin said she was “cleared of any legal wrongdoing … any hint of any kind of unethical activity there.”

 For those not keeping score, I refer you to “Finding Number One” of the report, which says “Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alask Executive Branch Ethics Act.”

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/10/12/davis/index.html