Ever since President Obama made his debut on the national stage, we've seen some dirty, racially-charged attacks from the right. But what we might be seeing now could be the lowest of the low ... In the wake of the Clint Eastwood's RNC empty chair "performance," one Austin, Texas homeowner hung an empty chair from a tree branch in front of his house and later attached an American flag to it. (Talk about a creepy, "offensive," "insulting" use of the flag!) The man reportedly told a blogger who said she had concerns about it, "I don't really give a damn whether it disturbs you or not. You can take [your concerns] and go straight to hell and take Obama with you. I don't give a [expletive]. If you don't like it, don't come down my street." Then, in Centreville, Virginia, an empty chair with a sign reading "Nobama" was strung from a tree near a park.
Meanwhile, news outlets report critics are upset that these incidents are meant to symbolize "lynching of President Obama." Um, you think?!?
How is this even a question? A matter of debate? Both displays are so blatantly racist, hate-filled, completely sick. What year is it again? Oh yeah, 2012, not that it should matter, because it's not like lynching -- or even using it as "metaphor" -- was ever something that should have been condoned by any American! This isn't civilized political protest -- it's grotesque and, as Rosemary Edwards, chairwoman of the Travis County Republican Party in Austin, put it, "deplorable."
Thankfully, the Secret Service is taking the incidents seriously and reportedly conducting a followup. But, at the same time, one local Republican speaking out against these isn't good enough. Because these vile displays were clearly triggered by Eastwood's strange performance at the RNC -- in which he said, "When somebody doesn't do the job, you've got to let them go" and made a throat-slashing gesture -- we need to hear from him and the Romney campaign. Granted, neither of these sick "empty chair" displays actually show any support for the GOP or Romney, but it still only seems right that they publicly denounce these acts.
It's no different and perhaps even worse than in 2008, when some McCain-Palin supporters adopted a mob mentality and began shouting out hateful, threatening remarks about Obama. Thankfully, Sen. McCain made the decision to shut down some of that ignorance at one rally by telling a racist supporter that Obama "is a decent person and a person you don’t have to be scared of as president of the United States."
Sadly, we can see that in some pockets of the country, not much has changed in four years. Hence why it is even more imperative that the Republican party and the Romney campaign take a strong stance and make it known that these deeply disturbing, incredibly "un-American" (because, you know, if you want to slap that FOX News-y label on something, this is it!) displays are nothing short of shameful and will NOT be tolerated.
How do you think Clint Eastwood, the Romney campaign, and the GOP should react to these "lynching" displays?
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Comments 89
Wow, I think some of you have really lost your ever loving minds! Its awful, it is inherently racist, and just because someone else did something that may or may not be similar to someone else does NOT make this okay!! If your so passionate against hippocrates, perhaps try not being one yourself? Where on earth has the civility gone??
There is something really wrong with all of us when everytime someone on either side of the aisle does something abborhent all we, as constituents, can think to do in response is point fingers "Well he did it too! " "But she did it last year!" Blah blah blah. My goodness.
Totally spelled hypocrite wrong- my bad.
And for the fifth time, this people who hung these chairs are jackasses.
The point is not that 'such and such happened to such and such Republican, so this is par for the course". The point is that anyone with any knowledge of history and basic sense of decency should just say, "this is wrong" without the need to qualify it with the "yeah, buts". Burning Palin in effigy-wrong, making fun of her child-wrong, calling her an ugly name-wrong, mocking Ann Romney's miscarriage-wrong...see what I mean? Your inability to separate yourself from the party line and see wrong for wrong is what I find so immature and galling.
Bills, this was not neccesarrily directed specifically at you, but my point still stands. If you want "liberals" to unconditionally denounce awful things done by "lefties", should you not also UNCONDITIONALLY denounce awful things done by conservatives? And saying "Well its wrong but so and so went first" is not unconditional. Its wrong, period, no matter who does it.
Everytime a piece is written about something horrible that some left wing democrat has done, I don't see you standing on your soap box sreaming about all the times that a conservative did something awful-its a two way street.
Bills-the problem with your position is that you cannot just say, "hey, that's wrong!" You have to qualify it in with "yeah, but no one got mad about xyz". That's not what this article is about. It's an article about something that happened that was disgraceful. It isn't an article about all the bad things that have been done or said about politicians. The point I'm trying to make is that should try for one minute to separate yourself from the defensive posture of "but they did it too!" and see how this particular incident rises to the level of significance to rate a response from the opposing side. The historical significance of symbolizing the hanging of a black man should generate some response from the GOP candidate to denounce such racist and hateful behavior. Calling for that is not equivalent to saying that inappropriate remarks made about other politicians is okay. The incivility of this entire election is disheartening to say the least.