As Election Day approaches, the right-wing media are becoming increasingly vitriolic and irrational.
As Election Day approaches, the right-wing media are becoming increasingly vitriolic and irrational.
Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Jerome Corsi, and others have attacked Barack Obama over his visit to his ailing grandmother.
On Monday, Savage responded to Colin Powell's endorsement of Obama by insisting, “The only people who don't seem to vote based on race are whites of European origin.” Later in the week, Savage said welfare recipients shouldn't be allowed to vote. Fellow radio host Jim Quinn went a step further over the edge, declaring that there was “good reason” for allowing only landowners to vote.
A Washington Times columnist called Barack Obama a “Marxist” who believes that “murdering innocent babies ... is an inalienable right.” ABC's The Note declared that little piece of overheated rhetoric a “must-read.”
The creative conspiracy theorists over at WorldNetDaily claim that Obama “campaigned for” “radical Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga” during a 2006 trip -- a claim supposedly substantiated by obviously fake emails Jerome Corsi claims to have obtained. In the extraordinarily unlikely event that the emails are real, they still do not substantiate WND's claims -- in fact, they don't contain so much as a single statement of support for Odinga.
Syndicated columnist Thomas Sowell compared Obama to Hitler, Mao and Jim Jones. What's the similarity? Well, they all spoke inspiringly of “change.”
Believe it or not, that isn't the craziest Hitler comparison to ooze forth from the right-wing fever swamps in the past month. Bill O'Reilly recently declared that Nancy Pelosi practices her speeches too much, noting that Hitler also practiced speeches before delivering them (O'Reilly claimed he wasn't comparing Pelosi to Hitler. Right.)
For radio host Bill Cunningham, comparing Obama to Hitler doesn't go far enough. He prefers to suggest that Obama is the antichrist. (Cunningham has frequently peppered his comments about Obama with gratuitous references to the candidate's middle name, Hussein -- once embellishing by referring to “Barack Mohammed Hussein Obama.”)
KSFO radio host Lee Rodgers falsely claimed that Obama has admitted that he would “stand with the Muslims” against “the Western world” -- a twisted fantasy reminiscent of Savage's claim to “doubt” that Obama “would take our side” in the event of a terrorist attack. Speaking of which: Two weeks ago, Savage announced that "[N]ot all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists happen to be Muslim." Just in case the bigotry and stupidity of that statement isn't obvious: Tim McVeigh wasn't a Muslim.
There is, in short, a lot of hate and venom spewing forth from right-wing media, particularly radio and blogs. The last time a Democrat was elected president, the right used that hate to mobilize opposition to him and his agenda. There's no reason to think the Rush Limbaughs of the world will react differently to an Obama presidency. The only question is whether the “mainstream” media will take their cues from the far-right hate merchants again -- and whether progressives will be more aggressive in fighting back.
Jamison Foser is Executive Vice President at Media Matters for America.