Appalling

I have thus far avoided most of the Republican Convention due to Lo’s addiction to garbage TV (the viewing schedule the past few days has been the truly awful 90210 redux, America’s Next Top Model and tonight’s TiVo fare, Project Runway – God help me people), but I did happen to catch the completely disgusting 9/11 panderfest video that was played tonight. I cannot remember a more blatant and revolting appeal to humanity’s lesser impulses. Look, I understand that the GOP is going to play the fear card for all it is worth because essentially, that’s all they have. But to incorporate footage of the plane crashing into the World Trade Center; people, that is not merely beyond the pale, it is fucking disgusting, awful and sick.

Think about this for a moment. The Republican brain trust just compelled us to watch the murder of hundreds of Americans at a purely political event for purely political gain. People were being burned alive and the GOP saw fit to use that very moment to fire up their base. For that bit of vulgarity, they deserve our wholehearted scorn rather than our votes. And, irony of ironies, the Party that claims to protect us and yet failed dramatically to do so on that day had the motherfucking balls to exploit that tragedy for their ends (again). Simply despicable. 9/11 was one of those truly dark days; it should be treated with reverence and its victims with respect. That custom had been more or less observed until tonight. Instead, the GOP used it in an act of grotesque exploitation and I hope the backlash is swift, severe, and enduring. Those fuckers have earned nothing less.

Damn near the whole world reacted with shock and revulsion when those planes careened into the WTC. And in the aftermath of the disaster, the rest of the civilized world stood in solidarity with us, to fight against terror and to honor the innocents that lost their lives when the planes hit and the buildings came crashing down. The memory of that horror belongs to the families that lost loved ones in its wake. It most certainly does not belong to the amoral opportunists that would mine their grief to get elected. Catastrophe and death should not be a backdrop for a political campaign.

It is time to reject the gutter tactics of the Karl Rove Era and return decency to the White House. We can do it by electing Barack Obama. Yes we can.