The hate-mongering politics of Sarah Palin, John McCain and
their supporters are not going to be enough to "change the subject"
from the economic crisis and the fact that most voters see Barack Obama
as being better equipped to deal with it. But pointed references to
Obama as someone who "pals around" with terrorists and somehow isn't
a "real" American with "small town values" are resonating with an increasingly
hateful and vocal minority of the electorate who don't want to see an African-
American as our next president.

While the televised talking heads have for the most part minimized this issue
by pointing to a few instances in which McCain has called Obama a "good man"
in response to questions at his rallies, Frank Rich makes clear in his Sunday
column of this week that McCain needs to do far more to rein in the hatred that his campaign has helped to fuel.

It's time for more of us -- in and outside of the media --
to denounce the McCain/Palin tactics.

This is not to suggest that a great deal of time or verbiage need
be spilled on this front -- McCain would like nothing better than
to change the public focus from the economy to the issue of Barack
Obama's character; but we can't as a nation pretend that this is
not happening -- hate begets hate, and it can all too easily spiral
out of control.

Rich gives a good sense of where things stand now -- much better
than I've seen in the regular coverage of the campaign in print
and on television:

"At McCain-Palin rallies, the raucous and insistent cries of "Treason!" and "Terrorist!" and "Kill him!" and "Off with his head!" as well as the uninhibited slinging of racial epithets, are actually something new in a campaign that has seen almost every conceivable twist. They are alarms. Doing nothing is not an option."

Rich also underscores the fact that these attacks on Obama go far beyond
politics-as-usual:

"What makes them different, and what has pumped up the Weimar-like rage at McCain-Palin rallies, is the violent escalation in rhetoric, especially (though not exclusively) by Palin. Obama "launched his political career in the living room of a domestic terrorist." He is "palling around with terrorists" (note the plural noun). Obama is "not a man who sees America the way you and I see America." Wielding a wildly out-of-context Obama quote, Palin slurs him as an enemy of American troops.

By the time McCain asks the crowd "Who is the real Barack Obama?" it's no surprise that someone cries out "Terrorist!" The rhetorical conflation of Obama with terrorism is complete. It is stoked further by the repeated invocation of Obama's middle name by surrogates introducing McCain and Palin at these rallies. This sleight of hand at once synchronizes with the poisonous Obama-is-a-Muslim e-mail blasts and shifts the brand of terrorism from Ayers's Vietnam-era variety to the radical Islamic threats of today."

If McCain is truly the decent man he claims to be, he needs to tell his running mate to stop the inflammatory rhetoric -- now -- and to pull any ads insinuating that Obama is a terrorist sympathizer who hates our troops. A few ad hoc statements about Obama being a good guy don't make up for the hate rhetoric that his campaign continues to both employ and encourage.