If there is no breaking news like that Senator Barack Obama when he was 8 helped Bill Ayers build bombs or something else, then he will be the 44th president of the United States.   Hence, the McCain campaign is relentlessly pushing news stories aimed at de-legitimatizing a potential Obama presidency, and undermining democracy itself.

The McCain campaign’s strategy is guilt by association.   Instead of trying to connect Obama to Kevin Bacon, McCain and Palin are trying to connect him to terrorists.   Why else would Palin charge that Obama is “palling around with terrorists who would target their own country”?   Why else would McCain demand that “We need to know the full extent of that relationship”?

It’s obvious: the Republicans can’t plausibly win on their free market ideology since trillions of dollars of 401k’s were lost when the financial crisis hit.   They can’t accuse Obama of being soft on national security when his proposal for a timetable to withdraw is echoed by Iraq’s Prime minister Nouri Al-Maliki.   They can try to trot out this mythical everyday “Joe the plumber,” but this particular fame seeking plumber hasn’t even paid back his taxes.

So, the strategy is vintage Karl Rove: accuse your opponent of hating America and undermining its beliefs.   Use the 60’s to prevent the country from voting for change.

I hope the American people are smart enough to ignore this because McCain and Palin’s attacks threaten not just Obama’s presidency but also American democracy.   Democracy is premised on the fact that the outcome of a vote is legitimate (Bush vs. Gore aside).

However, if Obama’s campaign is really hiring minority community organizers to register fake names for voting, then they must be trying to steal the election.   There’s evidence that ACORN’s contractors have engaged in voter registration fraud, but not in voter fraud.   Just because you register Mickey Mouse as a voter doesn’t mean Mickey Mouse will show up on Election Day and vote.   There’s even footage of John McCain speaking at an ACORN rally in 2006.   Again, the lie that ACORN is trying to steal the election has been disproven again and again.   However, this incontrovertible evidence hasn’t stopped the Republicans from repeating the same demonstratable lie.

By repeating the same lie, Republicans want to undermine an Obama Presidency’s legitimacy, because then the Right always has a set of patently false talking points to refer to.   Just as liberals allege George W. Bush stole the 2000 election, conservatives can allege Obama stole this one.

This kind of campaigning that knowingly fabricates ludicrous truths destroys the fabric of a vibrant democracy.   Ever since the Clinton years, American politics has become more polarized and campaigns discuss less ideas.   Hence, in the last 8 years, nobody, Democrat or Republican, has done anything to fix social security, Medicare, give health coverage to the 44 million uninsured Americans, or wean us off from owing Middle Eastern tyrants money for oil.

Ironically, the American Conservative’s desire to hold onto power has lead it to embrace a certain postmodern view of truth. Every assertion, no matter how wrong, can be repeated enough so that people will think it’s “probably” true.   Agreeing to common standards of logic, evidence and reason is reserved for east coast, cosmopolitan, liberal elitists, not the Joe six-pack within all of us.   So, let’s not agree to debate about the issues and just spout bald-faced lies about who knows whom and who was raised where.

Hence, Senator Barack Obama must be a socialist, terrorist, anti-democratic activist, racist and Muslim.   Oh, and he favors sex-ed for kindergärtners. Despite all these “facts,” he’s got my vote.