McCain and Palin's Racist Friends

The above sign was placed by one Andy Lacasse - a 78 year old Korean war veteran living in Florida.

We can clearly see his racial superiority not only in his confused belief that Obama is a Muslim (he has in fact been a Christian all his life) but in his awsome inability to distinguish between a religion and a type of cloth.

Lacasse wasn't finished there though. To underline his membership of the master race he went on to tell a local news station :
"I got nothing good to say about Obama. If I see anybody touching that sign, I got a club sitting right over there."(1).

Eloquently put, sir. Eloquently put.

During the Korean war other veterans and historians say they obeyed orders from the highest level to shoot unarmed refugees by the thousand while sergeants screamed 'kill 'em all'; men, women, children - all unarmed. Still - they weren't the same race as Andy Lacasse. Not even half-breeds. Just 'gooks' - a term of abuse that developed first in World War Two and the Korean War - and continued during Vietnam. Some other veterans still have nightmares about it (2), (3).

According to US veterans of the Iraq war the equivalent form of abuse which US army recruits are encouraged to use is 'Hajii'; so if an Iraqi civilian is killed it was 'just a Hajii' , not a human like one of us (4), (5). At least three hundred civilians were killed in the US assault on the Iraqi town of Fallujah in April 2004 alone, many killed by American snipers targeting ambulances and civilians(6), (7). American veterans say they're still being killed by all sides - including Coalition forces - today (8). Obama has opposed the Iraq war from the start. McCain still supports it and Palin prays it is 'a mission from God'.

Korean civilians huddled in fear during the Korean war. Many thousands were killed by US forces on the orders of commanders, just in case one spy might get through among all the refugees

Iraqi children in hospital in Samarra after a US/Coalition/Iraqi government offensive in 2004. Of 70 bodies in Samarra General hospital on one day of the offensive 23 were children and 18 women (9).

What's most inspiring is that this veteran of a 20th century war, living in the 21st century in a country where around a third of the population own two or more automatic weapons, has remained true to his racial heritage by relying on a pre-pre-pre-pre-historic weapon. Not a weapon used by those inferior homo sapiens hunter gatherers. No bows. No throwing spears or Atlatls. No - an honest to goodness club as used by homo habilis (handy man) before all those filthy homo sapiens began walking upright and making 'tools' and 'weapons'. Andy Lacasse is racially pure. Not a single human gene to pollute the knuckle dragging. Pure homo habilis. Even cave-men were racially impure compared to him - far too much human in 'em.

What's even sadder though is that John McCain and Sarah Palin have not said they don't want racist votes. They've not made it clear that Obama is not and never has been a Muslim - or that most Muslims are not terrorists. They're quite happy to quietly allow racism and religious bigotry to be core planks of their campaign. In fact many of the lies about Obama, much of the bigotry, is spread by email by Christian fundamentalists in the US - people of similar beliefs to Sarah Palin who has said she prays that the Iraq war is a "mission from God" and whose minister (whose views she has not disowned) says that anyone who has criticised President Bush will "burn in hell".

McCain and Palin are also happy to use sexism against Obama, with the sexist argument that women voters should vote for a woman rather than a man, irrespective of what policies they support and what policies the candidate supports (Palin's and McCain's policies mostly being the opposite of not only Obama's but also Clinton's policies).

Racist votes, sexist votes, the votes of backward dinosaurs - they'll accept them all without ever criticising any of it - then they'll tell you they stand for principles and American values.

If they really stood for American values wouldn't they tell racists like Andy Lacasse and the many like him, but less blatant, that they condemn all racism and bigotry and don't want the votes of anyone who's voting because of a candidate's race, religion or gender?

Is this how the Republican Party really wants to end? On political life support from it's racist friends?

Iraq veteran Joshua Key has a message for McCain and Palin. In his book 'A Deserter's tale' he wrote : "I never thought I would lose my country and never dreamed it would lose me. I was raised as a patriotic American, taught to respect my government and believe in my President.A decade ago I would have laughed out loud if somebody had predicted that I would live as a fugitive in my own country and turn my wife and children into refugees as I fled with them across the border"

If McCain and Palin are elected then real patriots like Joshua Key, who risked their lives for what turned out to be lies, will continue to be forced into exile, while racists prosper and pointless wars kill more Americans and more non-Americans alike.

Sources

(1) = Channel 13 Sep 2008, 'Obama Sign In Yard Stirs Up Neighbors', http://www.cfnews13.com/News/Local/2008/9/10/obama_sign_in_yard_stirs_up_neighbors.html?refresh=1

(2) = BBC History, 'Kill 'em All': The American Military in Korea'
By Jeremy Williams (following on from a 1999 investigative report by the Associated Press) http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/coldwar/korea_usa_01.shtml

(3) = Hastings , Max (1987) 'The Korean War' PanMacMillan , London , 2000, pages 290 , 301 ,306-308

(4) = Guardian 29 Mar 2006, ‘'If you start looking at them as humans, then how are you gonna kill them?'’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1741699,00.html ; Also see The Nation 30 Jul 2007, ‘The Other War: Iraq Vets Bear Witness’ ,
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070730/hedges

(5) = Key, Joshua & Hill, Lawrence (2007) ,'The Deserter's Tale: The Story of an Ordinary Soldier Who Walked Away from the War in Iraq' Atlantic Monthly Press, 2007


(6) = Iraq Body Count 26 Oct 2004, 'No Longer Unknowable: Falluja's April Civilian Toll is 600', http://www.iraqbodycount.org/analysis/reference/press-releases/9/

(7) = BBC News 23 Apr 2004, 'Picture emerges of Falluja siege', http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3653223.stm

(8) = See (4) above and also http://www.duncanmcfarlane.org/who's_right_on_Iraq/bothsides/ and http://www.duncanmcfarlane.org/replytogray/Iraq/ and sources in links for both.

(9) = The Independent 04 Oct 2004, 'Civilians bear brunt as Samarra 'pacified'',
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/civilians-bear-brunt-as-samarra-pacified-550807.html