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If McCain Can’t Stand up to a 61 Year Old Librarian, How Can He Face Down Bin Laden? |
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For a candidate with a carefully cultivated tough guy image, John McCain seems to need a lot of coddling. Yesterday, at a town hall meeting that was supposedly “open to the public”, McCain’s secret service detail had a 61 year old librarian removed because she had a sign reading “McCain = Bush.” I am completely in favor of Secret Service protection for presidential candidates, but how was this dimunutive senior citizen deemed a threat? Obviously, she was singled out because of her speech–she was removed, and cited with trespassing, simply because of the nonviolent, nonthreatening words she wrote on her sign.
We’ve just gone through 7 years with a president who is not exposed to the slightest criticism when he appears in public. As Think Progress notes, the Bush administration had a policy “to exclude potentially disruptive guests” from Bush’s appearances. On its face, that policy is not obviously objectionable, but the problematic word is “potential”. A member of the public need not actually do anything disruptive–if he or she is “potentially” disruptive, whatever that means, he or she can be removed. In practice, that can mean removing anyone who simply has a different viewpoint than the president’s.
The Republican party does not have a proud record in this area. The RNC required people to sign an oath of loyalty before attending campaign events in 2004, pledging their support for Bush. The party reportedly turned away uncommitted voters who simply wanted to hear Dick Cheney speak. After September 11, then-press secretary Ari Fleischer warned Americans to “watch what they say, watch what they do.”
Is this what we’ve come to–loyalty oaths, elected officials who cannot tolerate even the blandest criticisms, administration officials who warn Americans against speaking freely? There is a basic, fundamental question here: how far are our presidential candidates willing to go for free speech? In McCain’s case, we have an answer: permitting a 61 year old librarian to wave a sign is too far.Â
I think, as usual, you are missing the point. The threat wasn’t that the lady was holding a sign nor was it that she was 61 years old. It was the mere fact that she was a liberryian, the most insidious card carrying liberals there are. Books for free? That’s practically communism at its basest form. Kick her out!
quite true…I believe Laura Bush was a librarian wasn’t she…they are an insidious bunch
I think this is a fair question…was this article even worth writing?
Seriously?
well, I enjoyed writing it, and it has generated some great comments…
seriously, I think it matters how presidential candidates feel about dissent and free speech. The Bush presidency has silenced and marginalized dissent, which has not been a good thing, to say the least. Apart from the grotesqueness of an American president standing against free speech at home, Bush’s refusal to brook dissent leads to policy-making that relies on yes-men and women. It concerns me that McCain seems to be following Bush’s lead when it comes to dissent