Earl

I won’t dignify the publication by naming it, but I’m talking about their May 14, 2008 issue.  As for identifying the publication, it’s the one that prints several pages upside down, has pages offset so far that you can’t read the phone numbers from some ads, the publication that is so full of typos and misspellings that they hardly need to include two pages of jokes when you have ads for things like “portable basketball goat”, and has spotty and blotchy printing that prevents you from reading some of their ads.

In this issue, they stepped way out of bounds and included a full page of lies, innuendos and smears against Barak Obama.  As of today, we still have three candidates running for the office of president, and though I have my preferences, just like anyone else, I have absolutely no doubt that each and every one of the three are patriotic, red-blooded Americans who would do their best, if elected.

One part of this poorly written garbage which by the way, hides behind a screen of anonymity by

I think it was three weeks ago that CNN covered this issue when many websites were talking about Obama not placing his hand over his heart during the playing of the national anthem.  The talking head said that they researched the issue and there is no U.S. law about how a civilian should respond to the playing of the anthem.

And wouldn’t it be scary if there was?  Shades of 1984!  Would you want to live in such an Orwellian world where people could be taken away and locked up for failing to follow protocol during playing of a national anthem?  Heck, it's not even illegal to burn the U.S. flag, but you'd better not do that around me!

Another part of this full-page tirade says “Check out his books at the Library (don’t buy them). He says some things that are really scary.”

OK, I’ve read one of Obama’s two books and I haven’t come across anything scary, quite the contrary.  I’ll gladly read the other and then I’ll be happy to meet the writer in a public forum and debate them about anything within those books.

The writer continues by remarking in a disparaging tone that "he and his wife went to the 3 most prestigious colleges in this country" and "They make over a million dollars a year & their home is a 1 1/2 million or 2 1/2 million house. They have no idea what is like to be an American like us."  (The grammar mistakes are the writer's, not mine.)

Well, there is a big difference between 1.5 and 2.5 million, so it would appear that this writer does not have his facts together.  I suppose John McCain and Hillary Clinton live in the projects or perhaps a row house somewhere?  Hillary graduated from Yale.  There is hardly a more prestigious school, yet the writer does not take issue with her.  Hillary is so rich that she was able to lend her campaign millions out of her own purse, yet the writer does not take issue with her.

The writer complains that Obama went to a prestigious college and makes a lot of money and therefore has "..no idea what is like to be an American like us."  What does "like us" mean?  From his statement, I suppose it means uneducated and poor?  In those respects, McCain and Clinton aren't "like us" either.  How is the writer differentiating Obama from them?  Is "like us" a not-so-subtle reference to skin color?

I would hope that our readers and theirs are intelligent enough to spot ignorant radical ranting when they see it and refuse to believe such nonsense – and moreover, to spot it for what it is, nothing more than subtle racial bigotry.   Did this writer compose similar nonsense against any of the participants in either the 2004 or 2000 elections, when both candidates were white?  Hmmm…  Probably not.

If we don’t stand up when someone writes trash like this – if we don’t show people that this is not the way most of us think in rural Oklahoma, then people will assume we are all ignorant and prejudiced.  We can’t sit idly by and let this sort of thing stand any longer.

Watch for our upcoming coverage of the Eufaula Sailboat Regatta, the Archeological event in Canadian and perhaps several other things going on this weekend around the Eufaula Lakeshore.