All presidential campaigns come to an end. So will this one. In most presidential campaigns, sometime in October the realization sinks in that victory may be out of reach. This week that realization came to the McCain campaign.
This is a time when the candidate needs to exert control over his campaign to keep the desperation of a losing fight from spilling over into rage and worse. American presidential campaigns have always gotten very negative in the last month, but seldom has one crossed over to the kind of violent territory that we are currently seeing. At the incitement of both Sarah Palin and John McCain, the crowds at their rallies have cried out "terrorist", "kill him", "off with his head" when referring to Barack Obama. Both McCain and Palin have cultivated this anger and rage this entire week. The GOP rally held in Wisconsin today was seething with anger that seems ready to boil over. The rallies promise to get worse in the coming days.
This is no small matter. The Democratic nominee for president is an African American who finds himself at the cusp of victory. There is a minority of Americans who will find this very difficult to swallow. John McCain must not incite this minority. John McCain must resist the impulse to feed the perception of "otherness" that his campaign has been actively pushing. The McCain campaign is now actively inciting violence.
John McCain's, and especially Sarah Palin's, rallies are increasingly resembling angry mobs. This must stop. American democracy sustains itself, in part, by an orderly and peaceful transition of power between one democratically elected leader to the next. This smooth transition relies on wise and mature leaders who understand that electoral loss must not be allowed to collapse into violence. The success of a democratic election relies as much on the leadership of the loser as it does on that of the winner. Anger needs to be checked before it consumes the process.
Violence is being cultivated by the McCain campaign. It is up to John McCain to put a stop to it. Fight Senator Obama on the issues, challenge his judgment to lead, call him green and inexperienced - fight hard to sway the polls in your direction. But do not again charge that Barack Obama is un-American, that he is by association a terrorist. Senator McCain, show some leadership before you lose control of your supporters. Senator, you are running in the presidential election against a candidate for president chosen by the majority of voters of the other major American political party. You may not like the verdict of the Democratic party voters, but American democracy demands that you accept it. American democracy demands that you urge your supporters to accept it. American democracy demands that you and your supporters accept the possibility that your opponent - the Democratic nominee for president - may win this November.
Senator McCain, American democracy demands that you put your country first.
[Cross posted at my blog.]