Khaled Hosseini, author of "Kite Runner," "Thousand Splendid Suns": McCain, Palin Playing With Fire

[DeepModem Mom]

WP: McCain and Palin Are Playing With Fire
By Khaled Hosseini
Sunday, October 12, 2008; Page B05

I prefer to discuss politics through my novels, but I am truly dismayed these days. Twice last week alone, speakers at McCain-Palin rallies have referred to Sen. Barack Obama, with unveiled scorn, as Barack Hussein Obama.

Never mind that this evokes -- and brazenly tries to resurrect -- the unsavory, cruel days of our past that we thought we had left behind. Never mind that such jeers are deeply offensive to millions of peaceful, law-abiding Muslim Americans who must bear the unveiled charge, made by some supporters of Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin, that Obama's middle name makes him someone to distrust -- and, judging by some of the crowd reactions at these rallies, someone to persecute or even kill. As a secular Muslim, I too was offended. Obama's middle name differs from my last name by only two vowels. Does the McCain-Palin campaign view me as a pariah too? Do McCain and Palin think there's something wrong with my name?

But never mind any of that.

The real affront is the lack of firm response from either McCain or Palin. Neither has had the moral courage, when taking the stage, to grasp the microphone, turn to the presenter and, right then and there, denounce the use of Obama's middle name as an insult. Instead, they have simply delivered their stump speeches, lacing into Obama as if nothing out-of-bounds had just happened. The McCain-Palin ticket has given toxic speeches accusing Obama of being a friend of terrorists, then released short, meek repudiations of some of the rough stuff, including McCain's call Friday to "be respectful." Back in February, the Arizona senator apologized for the "disparaging remarks" from a talk-radio host who sneered repeatedly about "Barack Hussein Obama" before a McCain rally. "We will have a respectful debate," McCain insisted afterward. But pretending to douse flames that you are busy fanning does not qualify as straight talk....

Is inaction tantamount to consent? The McCain campaign certainly thinks so when it comes to Obama and incendiary remarks from the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. By their own inaction, then, are McCain and Palin condoning these slurs? Or worse, are they willfully inciting the angry and venomous response that we have been witnessing at their rallies? If not, then what reaction are they hoping to evoke by their relentless public suggestions that Obama is basically an anti-American liar who won't put "country first" and has an affection for terrorists? Do they not understand the kind of fire they are playing with?

I -- and, I suspect, millions of Americans like me, Republicans and Democrats alike -- couldn't care less about Obama's middle name or the ridiculous six-degrees-of-separation game that is the William Ayers non-issue. The Taliban are clawing their way back in Afghanistan, the country that I hope many of my fellow Americans have come to understand better through my novels. People are losing their homes and their jobs and are watching the future slip away from them. But instead of addressing these problems, the McCain-Palin ticket is doing its best to distract Americans by provoking fear, anxiety and hatred. Country first? Hardly.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/10/AR2008101002456.html?nav%3Dhcmodule&sub=AR

[knowbody0]

1. perfect...msm blatantly asserting that being called Arab

is akin to being called the enemy. unspoken insults bore deep into conscience

[malaise]

2. Excellent

K & R

[CADEMOCRAT7]

3. Very well said. Thanks for the post. n/t

[Wind Dancer]

4. K & R!

Thanks for posting - this is such a powerful piece!!!!

[JitterbugPerfume]

5. If any of you have not yet read his books

you are missing a real experience! He is a compassionate and talented author.

[fla nocount]

6. What is it that Whitey hates about the agrarians,

the indigenous, the cultural descendants of civilizations that are truly ancient? Afraid of our garden, perhaps the food that we put away, knowledge that given no choice we will simply go home and and he'll be faced with a nation of prodigal sons and the population will be instantly organized by those who have seen the elephant in the room?

Afraid that we will go to the middle and see in both directions and heaven forbid, make a choice?

Whitey is not a race, not a culture, not a people, not a nation nor a religion. Whitey is a packaged
and promoted mind-set and he's lost. He's desperate and dangerous, but in the end powerless to stop what he's put in motion.

That's my Rant-A-Day, gotta do it, back to DJ mode.

Great pic of an indigenous agrarian and citizen of the universe.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW46zqIxnx0

Maybe it's our music.

[ihavenobias]

7. K & R