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Deride and Conquer

Off Their Rockers

Some hardcore Republicans are losing their minds, and showing their true colors:

Palin's routine attacks on the media have begun to spill into ugliness. In Clearwater, arriving reporters were greeted with shouts and taunts by the crowd of about 3,000. Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric's questions for her "less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media." At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, "Sit down, boy."

Wow, nice set of values you all have got there. And:

Palin, speaking to a sea of "Palin Power" and "Sarahcuda" T-shirts, tried to link Obama to the 1960s Weather Underground. "One of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers," she said. ("Boooo!" said the crowd.) "And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, 'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,' " she continued. ("Boooo!" the crowd repeated.)

"Kill him!" proposed one man in the audience.

The level of hate at these rallies, and the absence of any sense of shame, is unbelievable. Yet the McCain campaign is making the fundamental mistake of thinking that this country is filled with small, bitter people.

Such comments aren't, of course, reflective of all Republicans. But when you stir up ugliness, don't be surprised when people start thinking of you as ugly as well.