Battleground PA

So there I was watching the Phillies the other day when an ad came on the TV from the Republican National Committee. It was innocent, slamming Obama on $1 trillion dollars of new spending. The way I see it it is a pretty good and fair argument against Obama, issues that the campaign should be about. The very next commercial was another anti-Obama ad. This one really blew me away.

"When convenient, he worked with terrorist Bill Ayers. When discovered, he lied. Obama. Blind ambition, bad judgment," goes the commercial.

"The Chicago way, shady politics. That's Barack Obama's training," the announcer says.

I couldn’t believe it, this coming after the embarrassing YouTube videos of people waiting in line at McCain rallies spewing this nonsense. So I was waiting for the typical, “Paid for by the Republican National Committee.” But no, this one was approved by McCain himself. I get it, desperation brought on by a screaming conservative backing, but come on, this is way over the line. I’m feeling pretty good about my Obama endorsement.

Unfortunately, though, Obama is being forced to run a different kind of ad in PA. A commercial depicting his background as unique - all good stuff – getting to know the candidate type stuff. But over and over again there are pictures of him and his white mother. I hope I’m wrong in thinking this is being done to persuade voters who may not be inclined to vote for a black guy but that would be naive. In a way it pissed me off that this was necessary.

To come full circle to the Phillies, they were getting blown out last night. In between Dodger rallies I was catching a little of Chris Rock’s Head of State on TBS. In case you don’t know it’s about a black guy running for President. While I’m obviously not comparing the character in the movie to Obama there were a ton of references about the nation not being ready to elect a black guy and the corresponding racial overtones that is was almost prophetic. In fact it was eerie to compare parts of the movie to real life today. With that being written, albiet funny in parts, don’t use up your Netflix slot for this one; try to catch it on TBS.