Guest post by David All
An outbreak of anti-Obama comments on another thread was strange and unexpected. I will try and offer an explanation for those comments.
Most of the anti-Obama attacks related to a comment lumping Obama together with Hitler and Stalin, saying that all three were spellbinding orators “who thrive on their listener’s anger, using outright lies, personality cults and platitudes.” The suggestion that Obama’s supporters are brainwashed followers of a cult was repeated several times, one writer going so far as to compare Obama and his supporters to Jim Jones and his mass-suicide cult followers! That writer went on to say that Obama was like Hitler and Clinton in that all three had women swooning over them at their rallies. Again, a strange comparison; if you want to compare politicians who attract enthusiastic female followers, how about Kennedy, Clinton and Obama?
When asked for evidence that Obama lies more than other politicians, such as Bush, McCain or the Clintons, the Obama bashers provided no details. And for the anti-Obama writers to say there is a cult of personality about Obama seems rather strange, given that for many years conservatives hung breathlessly on every utterance of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher.
The comparisons to Hitler, Stalin and even Jim Jones indicate a sense of envy at Obama’s appeal as well as panic and despair in the Republican ranks as the general election approaches in November. They have nothing positive to run on. The economy is in a tailspin, gas prices are going through the roof, and Iraq continues to tie down the bulk of American ground troops, while Afghanistan, for lack of troops, is being threatened by a Taliban resurgence. McCain is a good accomplished legislator who went through hell for his country as a POW* in North Vietnam forty years ago, but he does not inspire people like Obama. The Republicans have little positive to run on so there have no choice but to constantly attack Obama in every conceivable and perhaps inconceivable way.
It is the only thing they can do. You can check out the Republican National Committee’s website. In their lead column they have four anti-Obama posts to one pro-McCain post. This is an improvement over the last time I looked a couple of weeks ago, when it was all anti-Obama articles on their home page, with scarcely a mention of McCain! This suggests that everyone should get ready for a lot more comparisons of Obama to Hitler, Stalin, Jim Jones and Jack the Ripper.
*McCain, then a Navy Lieutenant Commander, was singled out for especially brutal treatment by the North Vietnamese after he was shot down and captured in 1967 because his father was a four star, or full, admiral. For the senior McCain, his son’s imprisonment became especially difficult in 1969 when McCain Sr. became Commander in Chief, US Forces, Pacific (CINCPAC) which made him overall commander for the Vietnam War. Admiral McCain continued in this position until his retirement in 1973, shortly after the Paris Peace Accords and the release of the US POWs, including his son.
