Paul Gottfried

March 21, 2008

Did anyone else catch the unsettling comment made by Karl Rove on the O”€™Reilly show last night. When O”€™Reilly asked Bush’s former grey eminence whether Obama had benefited from the speech given in Philadelphia, which failed to condemn the racist pastor Jeremiah Wright unequivocally, Rove showed why the American Right is justified to view him with loathing. He proceeded to compare Obama’s failure to criticize Wright decisively to McCain’s “€œlost opportunity”€ in the presidential primaries in 2000. During his campaigning in South Carolina, McCain had apparently avoided the high road when he had sidestepped the “€œConfederate flag issue.”€ This act of moral evasion, we were told, had haunted the Senator, who this year had rectified his mistake, by called for removing the Stars and Bars, as a hate symbol, from public buildings in the Palmetto State. Neither Rove nor McCain looks upon the choice of state flags as a matter for state governments. It is an issue for politicians in presidential races who are concerned about their left flank. When it comes to groveling before the NAACP and the liberal establishment, and when the war is not on the table for discussion, Rove and McCain can do the PC cringe with the best of them. We should be grateful to O”€™Reilly’s regular guest for having reminded us once again of this fact.