Palin visted my hometown of Scranton on Tuesday. Of course, there was hate.
On Tuesday, October 14th, Sarah Palin visited Scranton, PA, a microcosm of working-class America that happens to be the setting of NBC's The Office. This is my hometown. It is a sexy place. And strangely, it gets a lot of political attention. Maybe it's all of the conservative Democrats. I wouldn't know, I only associate with leftists. My bad.
Anyway, a Palin rally wouldn't be a Palin rally without some hate-mongering hick/moron/village idiot yelling out something hateful, and, of course, this one didn't disappoint.
The local newspaper, The Scranton Times, covered the story. Shortly after they published it, the Secret Service jumped in. It really pissed off Keith Olbermann, who went off about it. And then, coming full circle, the Secret Service says they can't corroborate it.
Now, it's important to look closely at this article. They interviewed 20 people. Twenty people who are inevitably McCain-Palin supporters. Let's just suppose the first person interviewed actually was the perpetrator. Let's imagine this dialogue:
SS: Did you or anybody you know yell "Kill him!" in reference to Obama? Keep in mind that saying "yes" will mean you or the person you know who yelled this will be charged with a multitude of felonies and go to jail for a long time.
Guilty Person: Hellz no! I didn't hear nuttin'.
See? Who would incriminate themselves? And then on top of that, who would out their own? Give me a break.
While I understand that chances are none of the people who yell these things will ever be found unless a video camera is trained in on them at the time of the yelling, I do believe the threat needs to be acknowledged and taken seriously. This is a mob mentality and it's not being dealt with appropriately by the McCain-Palin campaign. Yesterday, at the debate, McCain actually DEFENDED the people that come to his rallies, calling the yellers only "fringe". Give me a break. Palin is saying Obama "pals around with terrorists". Plural. That's incitement if I've ever heard it.
So, two days ago, in Scranton, PA, birthplace of Joe Biden, early childhood hangout of Hillary Clinton, and center of the political universe, a Palin rally got typical. Which, of course, meant that it got ugly.
My message to the world: The rest of us in Scranton are pretty cool. Don't judge.
Peace.
UPDATE: This is my first Kos blog, and I'm really excited to see so many comments in a short period of time! I love it here!
Shameless plug: I have my own blog, upon which I post regularly: theborthwickblog.blogspot.com It's a vehicle for me to rant about the things Republicans do that upset me.
Thanks guys!