McCain’s Pastor Problem
Posted on May 8, 2008
Filed Under Uncategorized
 David Corn has a piece in today’s Mother Jones about Rod Parsely, a man John McCain has referred to as his “spiritual guide” and whose beliefs about the evils of Islam are at least as toxic as anything spewed out of Jeremiah Wright’s bigoted mouth. McCain, who has yet to renounce and reject this bigot’s support and who recently shared a stage to welcome the endorsement must at the least be held to the same standard as Barack Obama. Obama at least kept Wright at a distance before breaking all ties with the man; McCain, in contrast, has not only shown little conern over his guide’s controversial beliefs, but has publicly embraced the man.
Andrew Sullivan has an interesting point in setting up a distinction between Obama’s Pastor problem and McCain’s: the Republican party is far more influenced by its religious fanatics than the Democrats by theirs. Perhaps it is just the dynamic within the two parties that allows for hate mongers of the far right to be guiltlessly embraced by the mainstream - McCain, et. al - while such an association is like krytonite across the aisle.  If the Republican’s insist on playing the Jerimiah Wright card in the general then the Democrats have a weapon of at least equal potency; more when you factor that this zealot’s words speak to heart of American foreign policy.
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