From Life Site News:

Anti-abortion demonstrators unfurl a giant sign on the side of North Table Mountain in Golden, Colorado August 26, 2008 referring to the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado.

National Right to Life calls GOP Platform “Strongest Ever” on Life Issues

WASHINGTON, August 28, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - As the Democratic Party officially nominated pro-abortion Senator Barack Obama for president and pro-abortion Senator Joe Biden for vice-president during the third day of their convention in Denver yesterday, the Republican Party Platform Committee, meeting in Minneapolis, adopted the strongest and most explicit support for life ever expressed by a major political party.

“We applaud the Republican Party, and especially the members of the platform committee representing grassroots pro-life Republicans across the country, for making such a strong and unequivocal stand supporting life at all stages,” said National Right to Life Political Director Karen Cross from Minneapolis.  “The work of the platform committee makes clear, in no uncertain terms, that the Republican Party is the pro-life party.”

The platform, as approved yesterday, states in part:

Faithful to the first guarantee of the Declaration of Independence, we assert the inherent dignity and sanctity of all human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed.  We support a human life amendment to the Constitution, and we endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children.  We oppose using public revenues to promote or perform abortion and will not fund organizations which advocate it.  We support the appointment of judges who respect traditional family values and the sanctity and dignity of innocent human life.

We have made progress.  The Supreme Court has upheld prohibitions against the barbaric practice of partial-birth abortion.  States are now permitted to extend health-care coverage to children before birth.  And the Born Alive Infants Protection Act has become law; this law ensures that infants who are born alive during an abortion receive all treatment and care that is provided to all newborn infants and are not neglected and left to die.  We must protect girls from exploitation and statutory rape through a parental notification requirement.  We all have a moral obligation to assist, not to penalize, women struggling with the challenges of an unplanned pregnancy.  At its core, abortion is a fundamental assault on the sanctity of innocent human life.  Women deserve better than abortion.  Every effort should be made to work with women considering abortion to enable and empower them to choose life.  We salute those who provide them alternatives, including pregnancy care centers, and we take pride in the tremendous increase in adoptions that has followed Republican legislative initiatives.

Respect for life requires efforts to include persons with disabilities in education, employment, the justice system, and civic participation.  In keeping with that commitment, we oppose the non-consensual withholding of care or treatment from people with disabilities, as well as the elderly and infirm, just as we oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide, which endanger especially those on the margins of society….

The Republican Party platform stands in sharp contrast to the platform approved this week by delegates at the Democratic Convention which stated, in part, that the Democratic Party “strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.”  As noted by National Right to Life earlier this week, gone are former references of the Democratic Party’s desire to see abortion as “rare.”

“The Democrats have gone out of their way to alienate America’s pro-life majority by embracing the radical pro-abortion agenda of Barack Obama,” said National Right to Life Co-Executive Director Darla St. Martin.  “The Republican Party has once again demonstrated that it is completely in line with the majority of Americans who oppose the vast majority of abortions.”

Some good news about the Republican platform — for a change.

From ABC News:

Some Clinton Donors Are Contributing to McCain

Dozens of Prominent Fundraisers Have Donated over $200,000 in Last Few Months

By MARCUS BARAM

August 28, 2008 — Some of Hillary Clinton’s most fervent supporters are taking their enthusiasm — and their campaign contributions — to John McCain.

More than 85 of Clinton’s fundraisers, including Donald Trump, Univision chief executive Joseph Uva, cable mogul Charles Dolan, philanthropist Norma Hess and one of Florida’s biggest lobbyists appear to be skipping Barack Obama when it comes to writing checks for the general election, according to an ABCNews.com review of campaign finance records.

These Clinton donors have contributed at least $200,000 to McCain’s campaign in the last few months, an amount which doesn’t include larger contributions to the Republican joint fundraising committees.

But the defecting donors, along with a significant segment (20 percent) of Clinton fans who have expressed support for McCain in recent polls, could present a problem for Obama in the general election.

In her convention speech on Tuesday night, Clinton passionately encouraged her supporters to back Obama, but some of her one-time backers weren’t convinced.

“That speech was amazing, but it’s not going to change my mind,” one Texas donor, who gave $2,300 to Clinton earlier this year and contributed $2,300 to McCain last month, told ABCNews.com. “I talk to plenty of people like me who just won’t accept an unqualified president.”

At least one of Clinton’s HillRaisers, elite fundraisers who contributed at least $100,000 to her failed campaign, recently donated to the Republican candidate.

Charles Dolan, head of the giant Cablevision, wrote a $2,300 check to McCain on June 30 after Clinton’s initial plea to help Obama.

Ronald Book, one of the biggest lobbyists in Florida who represents clients as diverse as the University of Miami and Bell South, raised $700,000 for President Clinton in recent years and contributed the maximum to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign earlier this year.

Now, he’s contributing to McCain and is leaning toward endorsing the Republican nominee. Book notes that he wouldn’t give money to Obama even if the candidate took money from lobbyists.

“Obama has said a lot of stuff, but nothing with a concrete vision,” says Book. “I have heard at least some sensible things from Senator McCain. He’s a comeback kind of guy and I’ve heard from many other people who are clearly leaning in his direction.”

Trump, the New York realtor and reality show host, has long been a bipartisan campaign contributor and gave $2,000 to John Kerry’s campaign in 2004.

This time around, he contributed $600 to Clinton. But when it was clear in May that her campaign was over, The Donald gave the legal maximum individual contribution of $2,300 to McCain’s primary fund and another $2,300 to his general election fund. He even tried to give an extra $1,000, but the McCain campaign returned it because it was over the legal limit. Trump’s spokeswoman did not return e-mails for comment.

California researcher Danit Aharon was among those who changed her financial allegiance, gving $2,300 to McCain at the end of June. Aharon could not be located for comment.

Several Democratic defectors contacted by ABCNews.com were reluctant to go on the record with their reasons for defying the party and contributing to McCain…

While the ratio may favor Obama, there are indications that while most of Clinton’s financial backers aren’t giving money to the enemy, they are sitting on their wallets. Obama has yet to receive contributions from some prominent HillRaisers, including Steve Bing and Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein. Only 70 of Clinton’s more than 300 HillRaisers have contributed to Obama, according to a New York Times analysis.

In any bitterly-fought contest like this year’s Democratic primary, there are bound to be disaffected voters on the losing side, says Costas Panagopoulos, professor of political science at Fordham University.

But he predicts that party defections will be much more common this year, especially to the detriment of Democrats and Obama due to McCain’s moderate reputation.

“Had it been a different Republican, Democrats would not have been able to consider defecting so easily,” Panagopoulos says, adding that he doesn’t see much evidence of Republicans supporting Obama. “But given the perception that McCain is a moderate, there is a good chance that some Clinton supporters will defect to him.” …

Again, this is a mixed message.

But of course the money is always welcome.

From the Minneapolis Star-Tribune:

Lisa Sisinni: Why I, a Clinton supporter, will vote for John McCain

Obama is inexperienced, fluffy and arrogant. I can’t back that.

By LISA SISINNI

August 26, 2008

I’ve never voted for a Republican presidential candidate, but this year is different. I’m voting for John McCain.

Throughout the primary season, I supported Hillary Clinton. Between the final two Democratic contenders, Hillary was the only candidate who demonstrated leadership and a true understanding of key issues. She inspired millions of women around the country, Democrats and Republicans alike.

When Barack Obama became the presumptive Democrat nominee, I was faced with a difficult question: Could I support a candidate who gives good speeches but has no substance and little experience? No.

During the primaries, I was turned off by Sen. Obama’s arrogance toward Hillary Clinton. In particular, he seemed to dismiss her experience dealing with foreign policy. Time and again, Obama attacked Clinton’s past stances on international issues, while he hid behind his vague message of change and new politics. Who was Obama to criticize Clinton’s vote on the Iraq war, when he was merely a state legislator when the vote came before Congress?

Now we learn that Obama completely overlooked Clinton and her 18 million voters, failing even to vet her or consider asking her to join the ticket this fall. I believe Obama’s decision to pass over Clinton for vice president without reaching out to her with so much as a phone call makes it that much easier for Hillary supporters like me to turn away from him.

Now that Obama has captured the Democratic nomination, the choice is clear: John McCain has far more experience and understanding of critical issues — the war in Iraq, economic prosperity, health-care reform and energy security, to name a few — than Barack Obama. John McCain has been a member of Congress for 26 years; Obama has yet to finish his first term in the Senate. I may not agree with McCain on every social issue, but he has earned the right to stand where he does after years of making tough decisions as a federal lawmaker.

This is all to the good, of course.

Unless you think about it too much.

From an approving Associated Press:

GOP platform backs off pet issues to help McCain

By MARTIGA LOHN

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Republicans are putting John McCain’s campaign priorities above some of their pet issues, including drilling for oil in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and denying citizenship to the U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants.

Members of the GOP platform committee voted Wednesday to stick with an energy plank that doesn’t mention drilling in the refuge, saying it would only highlight an area where they differ with the Arizona senator. McCain opposes drilling in that protected land, and some committee members said they would rather bring him around on the issue once he’s in the White House than widen their disagreement now.

“He’s not there yet,” said delegate Jeff Grossman of Oregon. “Prudence would dictate that we leave the text as it is until our candidate catches up with us.”

Delegates endorsed expanded drilling generally, both offshore and in Alaska, North Dakota and Montana, and declared that the Alaskan refuge should not be put off limits to the oil industry permanently.

McCain doesn’t have to follow the platform and it’s unclear whether he will give it much weight; presidential candidates often don’t. But the 112-member committee working on the statement of party principles in Minneapolis is trying not to stray too far from McCain’s views, while also satisfying the conservative base.

The panel turned back a move to deny citizenship to U.S.-born children of illegal immigrants. Opponents raised constitutional concerns and said the proposal would complicate life for McCain, who has sponsored legislation giving illegal immigrants a path toward legal status but now prioritizes border security.

“I want to give him a platform he can run on,” said Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour. “I don’t want to stick my finger in his eye.”

On immigration, Barbour said the platform is the toughest ever put forward. It calls for a border fence and English as the official language, and opposes amnesty, driver’s licenses, in-state tuition rates, Social Security and other government benefits for illegal immigrants. GOP delegates also aim to block federal funds to cities that bar police from working with immigration authorities under so-called sanctuary ordinances.

Republicans are also doing a balancing act on climate change.

The platform acknowledges a human role in increased carbon emissions — although a sentence linking those emissions to “a warming effect on the earth” was yanked. The GOP is calling for climate change policies that are “global in nature, based on sound science and technology” and don’t hurt the economy. The document also decries “no-growth radicalism” and says solutions should not “force Americans to sacrifice their way of life or trim their hopes and dreams for their children.”

Committee member Trey Grayson of Kentucky called the document “the greenest platform we’ve ever had.” But it lacks an explicit endorsement of McCain’s call for mandatory cuts in emissions in a federal cap and trade program that goes beyond anything supported by President Bush.

Debate and votes are also expected on health care, education and government reform before the platform is approved Wednesday and sent to the Republican National Convention next week for adoption.

No mention of drilling in ANWAR?

This is just as we feared. Alas, as the article notes, the platform means next to nothing.

Still, having a standard bearer who has to “catch up” with the party rank and file is a bit much.

Another excellent ad from the McCain campaign:

Maybe it’s easy to make such great points when you have the truth on your side.

From an elated Washington Post:

In a First, Draft GOP Platform Credits Human Role in Global Warming

By Juliet Eilperin

Republicans started making the final changes to their party platform today in Minneapolis, hammering out a staunchly-conservative document that calls for constitutional amendments banning abortion and gay marriage while leaving decisions about how to pursue the war in Iraq up to the next president.

But the 48-page document — which is roughly half as long as the party’s 2004 platform — does reflect certain priorities of the presumptive GOP nominee John McCain, by highlighting issues such as the environment.

The current draft doesn’t get into the weeds like the previous one did, according to Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who co-chairs the platform committee. “We wanted it to be shorter, more principled, forward looking,” he told reporters during a conference call this afternoon.

While the 2004 platform did not mention global warming, the draft document Republican delegates took up today in committee includes a one-page section “addressing climate change responsibly.” For the first time, the platform acknowledges that human activity has contributed to global warming: “The same human activity that has brought freedom and opportunity to billions has also increased the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. Increased atmospheric carbon has a warming effect on the earth.”

But the document remains silent on the question of capping carbon emissions — a policy McCain endorses — and tamps down the idea of using broad government regulation to address the problem.

“Republicans caution against the doomsday climate change scenarios peddled by aficionados of centralized command-and-control government,” the platform draft reads. “We can — and should — address global warming without succumbing to the no-growth radicalism that treats climate questions as dogma rather than as situations to be managed responsibly…

Please, Gaia, no.

But I guess we better get used to stories like this.

From the Politico:

Obama to DOJ: Block terrorist ad

By BEN SMITH | 8/25/08

Sen. Barack Obama has launched an all-out effort to block a Republican billionaire’s efforts to tie him to domestic and foreign terrorists in a wave of negative television ads.

Obama’s campaign has written the Department of Justice demanding a criminal investigation of the “American Issues Project,” the vehicle through which Dallas investor Harold Simmons is financing the advertisements. The Obama campaign — and tens of thousands of supporters — also is pressuring television networks and affiliates to reject the ads. The effort has met with some success: CNN and Fox News are not airing the attacks.

Obama has also launched his own response ad, directly addressing Simmons’ attempt to link him to domestic terror.

The project is “a knowing and willful attempt to violate the strictures of federal election law,” Obama general counsel Bob Bauer wrote to Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Keeney last week in a letter provided to Politico. Bauer argued that by advocating Obama’s defeat, the ad should be subject to the contribution limits of federal campaign law, not the anything-goes regime of issue advocacy.

Bauer’s letter called on the Justice Department to open “an investigation of the American Issues Project; its officers and directors; and its anonymous donors, whoever they may be.” …

The Obama campaign plans to punish the stations that air the ad financially, an Obama aide said, organizing his supporters to target the stations that air it and their advertisers…

Obama’s campaign has written a pair of letters to station managers carrying the ads.

The letter calls the ad’s attempt to link Obama to terrorism “an appalling lie, a disgraceful smear of the lowest kind on the senator’s patriotism and commitment to the rule of law.”

Airing the ad “is inconsistent with your station’s obligations under Federal Communications Commission regulations,” the letter continues, saying Simmons’ group lacks formal incorporation.

One large group of network affiliates, the Sinclair Broadcast Group — which aired an documentary attacking John Kerry in 2004 — has been running the ads, Obama aides said. The campaign has launched a special effort to pressure Sinclair.

“Obama supporters have now sent more than 93,000 e-mails to the Sinclair stations that have decided to run the ad,” said Obama’s spokesman Tommy Vietor. “Other stations that follow Sinclair’s lead should expect a similar response from people who don’t want the political discourse cheapened with these false, negative attacks.” …

The ad focuses on Obama’s relationship with Bill Ayers, a Hyde Park acquaintance at whose home Obama attended a gathering early in his political career. Ayers is a complicated figure: professor and adviser to the mayor of Chicago despite not having repented his past as a domestic terrorist with the Weather Underground…

“The fact that [Obama] is launching his own convention by defending his long association with a man who says he didn’t bomb enough U.S. targets tells us more about Barack Obama than any of tonight’s speeches will,” said McCain spokesman Brian Rogers…

Somehow one would think the Department of Justice would have better things to do vis a vis Mr. Ayres than to try to prevent the truth about him from coming out.

And Kudos to the McCain camp for not trashing this group — like they did the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth.

From an admiring New York Daily News:

Hillary Clinton slams John McCain ads that ‘divide’ Democrats

BY MICHAEL SAUL

Monday, August 25th 2008

DENVER - Hillary Clinton slammed John McCain on Monday for using her in attack ads against Barack Obama and declared that the Republicans’ divide-and-conquer tactics won’t fly.

“I understand that the McCain campaign is running ads trying to divide us, and let me state what I think about their tactics and these ads: I’m Hillary Clinton and I do not approve that message,” said Clinton, prompting cheers at a breakfast for the New York delegation.

“We are, after all, Democrats, so it may take a while,” said Clinton. “We’re not the fall-in-line party. We’re diverse, many voices. But make no mistake - we are united.”

Clinton spoke amid grumbling from inside the Obama camp that she is not fully aboard and that there was too much whining from her side over the vice presidential selection process.

Even now, aides to the former rivals are still dickering over the choreography of her last hurrahs at the convention. She is the headline speaker Tuesday night.

Questions about her intentions arose again when Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, who was one of her strong supporters, told USA Today “she wants to run again” - an opportunity that would open sooner if Obama lost to McCain.

“I’ve never said that,” Clinton said Monday. She did not spell out whether or not she holds hopes of a second presidential bid.

As supporters chanted her name and held aloft signs that read “Hillary Made History,” Clinton urged her backers to commit themselves fully to Obama’s presidential campaign.

“I ask each and every one of you to work as hard for Barack and Joe Biden as you worked for me,” said Clinton, who wore a canary yellow pantsuit.

Clinton confirmed she will formally release each of the delegates pledged to her when she meets with them Wednesday.

She said she will tell her delegates that she will cast her own vote for Obama, and “however they decide to vote, we will all be united behind Sen. Obama” when he becomes the nominee.

The Obama campaign and convention officials have not released details about Wednesday’s roll call vote.

But a source confirmed that there are discussions underway to suspend the vote early - after both Clinton and Obama accrue some votes - and then nominate Obama by acclamation…

Aren’t these McCain ads reaching across the aisle? Aren’t they an attempt to unify us? Isn’t that the dream of our media?

Guess it is only a good thing when the Anointed One does it.

Still, when you upset her heinousness this much you must be doing something right.

But don’t the obviously contrived machinations of the Democrat Convention smack of the doings of the Congress of People’s Deputies in the Soviet Union or the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic Of China?

“We are, after all, Democrats, so it may take a while,” said Clinton. “We’re not the fall-in-line party. We’re diverse, many voices. But make no mistake - we are united.”

Anything you say, comrade.

(Thanks to BillK for the heads up.)

It seems like a good idea to provide a place for us to have a drunken running commentary on the first night of the Democrat Convention.

Suggestions for drinking games are encouraged.

We’re going to need all the fortification we can get.

From the despicable Democratic Underground:

(Click image to enlarge)

McCain has an adverse reaction to sound of jangling keys… and his temper erupts disproportionate

Edited on Tue Aug-19-08 03:14 PM by cryingshame

to the source of provocation.

There are behaviors associated with the candidate that would be consistent with a diagnosis of PTSD. Author Robert Timberg mentions McCain’s intense explosions of anger — a hallmark sign of lingering mental trauma from war — in his book “John McCain: An American Odyssey.” Timberg describes the episodes as “an eruption of temper out of all proportion to the provocation.” Timberg, who McCain has said “knows more about me than I do,” wrote that McCain’s sudden fury is a result of Vietnam coming “back to haunt him.” McCain has himself described having an adverse reaction to the sound of jangling keys, which reminds him of his Vietnam jailers. McCain also told doctors that during solitary confinement he had strayed pretty “far out” and had referred to himself as “mentally deteriorating.”

Note that this post was subsequently edited, so it was probably even worse in the original.

What can you say about miscreants like this?

From CBC News:

McCain camp calls Madonna concert segment ‘outrageous, unacceptable’

Monday, August 25, 2008

Campaign officials for U.S. Senator and Republican presidential candidate John McCain have shot back at Madonna for a segment of her just-launched new concert tour.

Madonna kicked off her Sticky and Sweet world tour at Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, Wales, on Saturday. During her performance of Get Stupid, an image of McCain is shown alongside those of Adolf Hitler and Robert Mugabe, as well as photos of global warming and destruction.

Later in the concert, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s face is shown in a sequence that also includes images of Mahatma Gandhi, John Lennon and Al Gore.

“The comparisons are outrageous, unacceptable and crudely divisive all at the same time,” said Tucker Bounds, a McCain campaign spokesman.

“It clearly shows that when it comes to supporting Barack Obama, his fellow worldwide celebrities refuse to consider any smear or attack off limits.” …

What does anyone expect from one of General Wesley Clarke’s top advisors?

(And from the selfsame artiste who made a video wherein she threw a hand grenade in President Bush’s lap.)

After all, she is encouraging people to “Get Stupid.”

But it was probably a mistake for the McCain people to respond to this broken down trollop at all.

From the McCain campaign, via YouTube:

Once again, we suppose this is necessary on some level.

But the sad thing is how close McCain is to Hillary’s positions.

From the May 16, 2005 edition of NBC News’ Meet The Press:

MEET THE PRESS

Transcript for May 16 [2004]

Guests: Secretary Colin Powell, Department of State; Senator Joseph Biden, D-DE, Ranking Member, Foreign Relations Committee; Senator John McCain, R-AZ, Armed Services Committee

Moderator/Panelist: Tim Russert - NBC News

Russert: Senator Biden, what do you think of John McCain as a Democratic candidate for vice president?

Biden: I think John McCain would be a great candidate for vice president. I mean it. I know John doesn’t like me saying it, but the truth of the matter is, it is. We need to heal the red and the blue here, man, the red states and the blue states. And John McCain is a loyal Republican. God, he drives me crazy how loyal he is as a Republican as much of a friend as he is. We disagree on a lot of things, but I’ll tell you, the fact of the matter is that we’ve got to bring together the red and the blue here. This is a divided nation. And I think that — I would still urge John Kerry to pick up the phone and call John McCain. He’ll say no probably. But I think John Kerry has an obligation to do that for the way he wants to heal. And I know John will listen. He’ll say no, but I’m going to tell you, I’m counting on him being a more loyal American than he is a loyal Republican.

And, John, I’m not so sure you’re so happy about the Senate. I’d like to see you president instead of the guy we have now. So–but you’re a great senator. But I think you’d also be doing a great service. Do I think it’s going to happen? No. But I think it is a reflection of the desire of this country, and the desire of people in both parties, to want to see this God-awful, vicious rift that exists in the nation healed, and John and John could go a long way to healing that rift.

And all this time we thought it was the Anointed One who was going to be the ‘Great Unifier.’

Still, it is far more troubling than reassuring to hear this out of the mouth of Mr. Biden.

But there it is.

Sorry, but we can’t help ourselves. This is another great jab at the Anointed One from the McCain camp:

Passed Over

Announcer: “She won millions of votes. But isn’t on his ticket. Why?

For speaking the truth. On his plans:”

Hillary Clinton: “You never hear the specifics.”

Announcer: “On the Rezko scandal:

Hillary Clinton: “We still don’t have a lot of answers about Sen. Obama.”

Announcer: “On his attacks:”

Hillary Clinton: “Sen. Obama’s campaign has become increasingly negative.”

Announcer: “The truth hurt. And Obama didn’t like it.”

Except that it reminds us of the sad truth that Hillary supporters should find a lot in common with Mr. McCain.

Alas.

From the new Klanners at Slate:

If Obama Loses

Racism is the only reason McCain might beat him.

By Jacob Weisberg
Posted Saturday, Aug. 23, 2008

What with the Bush legacy of reckless war and economic mismanagement, 2008 is a year that favors the generic Democratic candidate over the generic Republican one. Yet Barack Obama, with every natural and structural advantage in the presidential race, is running only neck-and-neck against John McCain, a sub-par Republican nominee with a list of liabilities longer than a Joe Biden monologue. Obama has built a crack political operation, raised record sums, and inspired millions with his eloquence and vision. McCain has struggled with a fractious campaign team, lacks clarity and discipline, and remains a stranger to charisma. Yet at the moment, the two of them appear to be tied. What gives?

If it makes you feel better, you can rationalize Obama’s missing 10-point lead on the basis of Clintonite sulkiness, his slowness in responding to attacks, or the concern that Obama may be too handsome, brilliant, and cool to be elected. But let’s be honest: If you break the numbers down, the reason Obama isn’t ahead right now is that he trails badly among one group, older white voters. He does so for a simple reason: the color of his skin.

Much evidence points to racial prejudice as a factor that could be large enough to cost Obama the election. That warning is written all over last month’s CBS/New York Times poll, which is worth examining in detail if you want a quick grasp of white America’s curious sense of racial grievance. In the poll, 26 percent of whites say they have been victims of discrimination. Twenty-seven percent say too much has been made of the problems facing black people. Twenty-four percent say the country isn’t ready to elect a black president. Five percent of white voters acknowledge that they, personally, would not vote for a black candidate.

Five percent surely understates the reality. In the Pennsylvania primary, one in six white voters told exit pollsters race was a factor in his or her decision. Seventy-five percent of those people voted for Clinton. You can do the math: 12 percent of the Pennsylvania primary electorate acknowledged that it didn’t vote for Barack Obama in part because he is African-American. And that’s what Democrats in a Northeastern(ish) state admit openly. The responses in Ohio and even New Jersey were dispiritingly similar.

Such prejudice usually comes coded in distortions about Obama and his background. To the willfully ignorant, he is a secret Muslim married to a black-power radical. Or—thank you, Geraldine Ferraro—he only got where he is because of the special treatment accorded those lucky enough to be born with African blood. Some Jews assume Obama is insufficiently supportive of Israel in the way they assume other black politicians to be. To some white voters (14 percent in the CBS/New York Times poll), Obama is someone who, as president, would favor blacks over whites. Or he is an “elitist” who cannot understand ordinary (read: white) people because he isn’t one of them. Or he is charged with playing the race card, or of accusing his opponents of racism, when he has strenuously avoided doing anything of the sort. We’re just not comfortable with, you know, a Hawaiian.

Then there’s the overt stuff. In May, Pat Buchanan, who writes books about the European-Americans losing control of their country, ranted on MSNBC in defense of white West Virginians voting on the basis of racial solidarity. The No. 1 best-seller in America, Obama Nation by Jerome R. Corsi, Ph.D., leeringly notes that Obama’s white mother always preferred that her “mate” be “a man of color.” John McCain has yet to get around to denouncing this vile book.

Many have discoursed on what an Obama victory could mean for America. We would finally be able to see our legacy of slavery, segregation, and racism in the rearview mirror. Our kids would grow up thinking of prejudice as a nonfactor in their lives. The rest of the world would embrace a less fearful and more open post-post-9/11 America. But does it not follow that an Obama defeat would signify the opposite? If Obama loses, our children will grow up thinking of equal opportunity as a myth. His defeat would say that when handed a perfect opportunity to put the worst part of our history behind us, we chose not to. In this event, the world’s judgment will be severe and inescapable: The United States had its day but, in the end, couldn’t put its own self-interest ahead of its crazy irrationality over race.

Choosing John McCain, in particular, would herald the construction of a bridge to the 20^th century—and not necessarily the last part of it, either. McCain represents a Cold War style of nationalism that doesn’t get the shift from geopolitics to geoeconomics, the centrality of soft power in a multipolar world, or the transformative nature of digital technology. This is a matter of attitude as much as age. A lot of 71-year-olds are still learning and evolving. But in 2008, being flummoxed by that newfangled doodad, the personal computer, seems like a deal-breaker. At this hinge moment in human history, McCain’s approach to our gravest problems is hawkish denial. I like and respect the man, but the maverick has become an ostrich: He wants to deal with the global energy crisis by drilling and our debt crisis by cutting taxes, and he responds to security challenges from Georgia to Iran with Bush-like belligerence and pique.

You may or may not agree with Obama’s policy prescriptions, but they are, by and large, serious attempts to deal with the biggest issues we face: a failing health care system, oil dependency, income stagnation, and climate change. To the rest of the world, a rejection of the promise he represents wouldn’t just be an odd choice by the United States. It would be taken for what it would be: sign and symptom of a nation’s historical decline.

Jacob Weisberg is editor-in-chief of the Slate Group and author of The Bush Tragedy.

This is kind of early for such threats, isn’t it?

Three milks, please. Lilly white.