Of all of John McCain's faults that have all been examined since the 2008 Presidential Election swung into General Election mode, the one fault that has been glossed over but is now being blasted front and center (but again ignored) is John McCain's racism. John McCain's unrepentant use of "gook" lasted until his presidential run in 2000. I found this video of Irwin Tang, author of "Gook, John McCain's Racism. And Why it Matters" in a blog entry on Racism Review..
Tang quotes McCain: "I hate the gooks, I'll hate them for as long as I live." He adds that McCain used the racial slur for 27 years until he realized that it would put his presidential campaign [in 2000] in jeopardy.
Tang goes on to say that the term "gook" evolved from US troops' reference to enemy Filipino enemy combatants as "goo goo" during the US Occupation of the Philippines, to calling Haitians "gook" during the US Occupation of Haiti. The perjorative reference to Asians stuck with the Vietnam war, where the motto of the war was "The only good gook is a dead gook". The troubling thing, Tang goes on to say, is that while most veterans stopped using the term when they returned from the war, McCain continued to use it, even in the mass media.
One of the respondents the Racism Review blog entry, posts a link to a March 2, 2000 OpEd piece in the Seattle PI where Katie Hong calls McCain out for his racist views and asks why with all of the social advances people of color have made in this country, is McCain still running for president:
(block emphasis mine)
On his campaign bus recently, Sen. John McCain told reporters, "I hated the gooks. I will hate them as long as I live." Although McCain said he was referring only to his prison guards, there are many reasons why his use of the word "gook" is offensive and alarming.
It is offensive because by using a racial epithet that has historically been used to demean all Asians to describe his captors, McCain failed to make a distinction between his torturers and an entire racial group.
It is alarming because a major candidate for president publicly used a racial epithet, refused to apologize for doing so and remains a legitimate contender.
McCain seems to have gotten a free pass for use of the racial epithet because of his time as a POW. As a person of African descent (my parents are Haitian. Who knew I was a gook?!), I'm insulted by this exemption logic: nigger is no less incendiary. But McCain's use of the word points to something more disturbing. Most Vietnam veterans didn't use the term, at least not in public, because they understood that it was racist. This refusal to acknowledge the racist nature of the g-word points to a couple of issues. We've seen McCain's tendency to hold grudges and to see political opponents as mortal enemies. But the larger issue with McCain's stubborn use of the racial slur points to his mentality of dehumanizing people of color.
Many people say that political campaigns are war. It seems that John McCain is reliving the Vietnam War all over again. And this time his political enemy is a person of color, so it should come as no surprise that McCain has no shame in whipping his crowds up into a hateful frenzy. If John McCain isn't a racist as his past would lead us to believe, I think John McCain should publicly denounce the vile expressions of racism that bubble from his campaign's rallies. And he should probably once and for all renounce his racist past while he's at it.