What's in a Name? Hillary Rodham Clinton, John Sidney McCain III, and Barack Hussein Obama Jr.

With a name like John Sidney McCain III, you’d think if anyone were receiving scrutiny for signs of possible subversiveness or latent Francophilia it might be John McCain.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Hillary Clinton’s decision at one point to use her maiden name, Rodham, in conjunction with her married name was cited by the usual crowd of idiots as anti-family, an indication that Clinton wanted to do away with families altogether, and raise kids collectively in some kind of perverse and secular commune ruled by monkeys. Even her book, “It Takes a Village,” is a sign of Clinton’s communist tendencies for these folks.

And Obama? Well, his middle name, which he shared with the US’ most hated enemy (after his transformation from the US’ best friend) just as surely indicates to these troglodytes that Obama was reared in a madrasa, has scabs on knees from kneeling towards Mecca, dreams of killing infidels, and is just waiting to devour the nation’s youngsters in their cribs.

This would all be very funny or at least just plain silly if it weren’t part of a larger, more insidious attempt to spread fear and hate among the electorate. As amazing as it is to think that using one’s maiden name could be associated with the decline of the West or one’s middle name with terrorism and beheadings, there are enough bladderheads who not only uncritically ingest such garbage but are somehow able to coax their brainless bodies into the voting booth.

One such schlub was interviewed last Sunday on the television program, 60 Minutes, by Steve Kroft who had gathered about him several Ohioans either laid off or reduced to lesser-paying jobs, ostensibly because of the predations of NAFTA. When asked by Kroft who he was voting for, the man said he was considering voting for Obama but was unsure because he had heard he might be a Muslim and that he didn’t place his hand over his heart during the pledge of allegiance.

Jesus. You don’t get much more moronic than this—Obama is not a Muslim and the incident to which the man vaguely referred was actually the playing of the National Anthem where neither propriety nor patriotism requires hand over heart—but nonetheless there are voters who believe such horseshit and who make decisions based on it.

In any event, whether focusing on Clinton’s maiden name or Obama’s Islamic-sounding middle name, the intention is to do harm to the candidate and persuade others not to vote based on religion, ethnicity or gender. It is no different from racism or any kind of attempt to incite hate for that matter. Clinton has been subject to hateful emails, web trash talking, and right-wing radio vitriol for some time. Obama is a more recent recipient of such filth and especially the Internet now is filled with racist and misleading garbage about his religion, education, and allegiance to the United States. In one especially repugnant email, a photo of Obama’s head is superimposed on a lawn jockey, suggesting that this is where Obama really belongs.

And the candidates themselves, what do they do when faced with such attacks? We all remember that Hillary, signaling that she was in fact the dutiful wife, spoke very conspicuously about baking cookies when Americans wrung their hands at her independence. And just the other day, Obama, trying to put the story that he is a Muslim to rest, said not only that he is a Christian and has gone to the same Christian church for twenty years but that he prays to Jesus every night? How pathetic that Clinton and Obama are reduced to playing this mean-spirited and stupid game and, even more, that voters apparently demand this.

Unfortunately, Hillary Clinton, of all people, is not above playing this game and when given an opportunity recently by the very same Steve Kroft to say definitively that the story circulating about Obama being a Muslim was untrue or to denounce the other misrepresentations that are following Obama and of which she is clearly aware, she punted, stating that she has “no reason not to believe him” when he said he is a Christian, and “as far as she knows” Obama is a Christian.

Clinton’s frequent duplicity and pettiness and the effects of these on her candidacy are another story, however. And anyway nothing she has said or hasn’t said can compare to what we are likely to hear in the general election if Obama is the Democratic nominee and pill-popping Rush Limbaugh, and boobs like Anne Coulter or Bill O’Reilly incite their followers to frenzy.

Maybe then we should turn our attention instead to John Sidney McCain III and the traditions and privileges his name evokes: a long line of John Sidney McCains who have marched lock step into the armed services (McCain’s grandfather (JSM) and father (JSM jr) were admirals in the Navy, and his son (JSM IV) is also in the Navy). Not only do the McCains not question the validity of wars like Vietnam and Iraq, they believe not enough was done to win the war (Vietnam) or that we will stay in Iraq for “a hundred years,” if necessary.

At least in this instance such a focus would have nothing to do with racism, misogyny, or hate. Instead it would perhaps draw attention to a real problem that besets folks like John Sidney McCain III, George Walker Bush, and Richard Milhous Nixon—the arrogance, sense of entitlement, and assumption that no one will question their motives, patriotism or even their middle names.