My fellow Americans, I give you... Mrs. Gayle Quinnell of Shakopee, Minnesota. It's sweet that they let her take the short bus to the rally.

Gayle Quinnell: I went to the library in Shakopee and I got lots of ... three pages of information about Obama
Adam Aigner of NBC News: And what kind of information did you get?
Quinnell :I got to tell you , you call me. It's a long story. I'm afraid of what's going to happen to this country.
Aigner: What would you think would happen? Do you think it would become Muslim country and what would that mean?
Quinnell :It would be bad
Aigner: So even though Senator McCain told you that he didn't feel that was true and you ought to be more respectful, you still fear that?
Quinnell I still do. Yeah. I'm not alone. I go to Burnsville, the main Republican headquarters and I do a lot of work over there. A lot of sending out mail and talking to people. And all the people agree with what I'm saying to you about Obama.
Aigner :Then do you feel there are a lot of volunteers for McCain who feel that way?
Quinnell Yes. A lot of them. In fact I got a letter from another woman that goes over there to Burnsville and she sent me more things about Obama.
Aigner:What was on the letter?
Quinnell Oh all kinds of bad things about him and how, I mean I have to tell you to call me. It's all bad.
Reporter: Are a lot of people getting this letter and are a lot of people believeing it and is that turning a lot of votes or support for McCain?
Quinnell Yeah I sent out 400 letters. I went to Kinkos and I got them all printed out. And I sent about 400 letters. I went in the telephone book and sent them out to people. So they can decide if they would want Obama.
Aigner :Can you give me your name again?
Quinnell Gayle Quinnell and I honestly think that these people hear about this Obama, they wouldn't want him.
Aigner: Because they would know what you know in the letter?
Quinnell Yeah, he read that letter. In fact when I was standing in line , there were about eight girls, young girls standing in line. And they said "what have you got". I had one of the letters and they said "Give it to me. I want to read it. I want to read it" And they read it. And they just went (shakes head) . They hadn't read it before and they didn't (unintelligible) all that information. To me it's bad news.
Aigner : So maybe if I call you you'll give me one of the letters maybe?
Quinnell I sure can!
Aigner: You don't have another one on you now?
Quinnell No I don't. But I can give you what I got and I can give you what she sent me in the mail.
Aigner: I'd be interested to read it.
Quinnell OK
Aigner:: and can you spell your name for me?
Quinnell Q-U-I-N-N-E-L-L
Aigner: E-L-L? And Gayle is just
Quinnell G-A-Y-L-E
Aigner: And where you from?
Quinnell I'm from Shakopee.
Aigner: Shakopee?
Quinnell Shakopee, Minnesota
Aigner: And and I'm sorry how old are you ma'am?
Quinnell I'm 75
Aigner : 75?
Quinnell (Nods yes) And I got a lot of grandkids and a lot of kids, I've got five kids. I got seven grandkids and they all think the same way.
(PHONE NUMBER EDITED OUT OF CONVERSATION)
Noah Kunin( The UpTake): Do you volunteer at the Republican Party Headquarters or the McCain Campaign office over in Burnsville?
Quinnell McCain. McCain Headquarters in Burnsville.
Noah: The McCain headquarters.
Quinnell It's out over by , over by that post station there.
Noah: Yeah, I know which one you're talking about. And just to be sure to make sure we got your quote OK, you called Obama and Arab terrorist
Quinnell pardon?
Noah: You called him an Arab terrorist? Is that correct? Why do you think he is an Arab?
Quinnell Because his dad is. If you... I'll send you the paper.
Female reporter: His dad is Muslim His dad was Muslim. Barack Obama has never been a Muslim.
Quinnell No but he's....
Dana Bash of CNN :he's a Christian.
Quinnell He's not an Arab either, he's a
Bush: His father was Muslim, and he's a Christian.
Quinnell Yeah , but he's still got Muslim in him. So that's still part of him. I got all the stuff from the library and I could send you all kinds of stuff on him. In fact....
Bush: What did you think about McCain said. He said he's a decent person.
Quinnell Well he did have didn't have (unintelligible) I think McCain wanted to (unintelligible) I don't think he wanted to say anything against him. You know he didn't want to cut him down. That was my way of thinking. I don't think he wanted to cut him down. So he just kind of brushed me off.
Reporter: Plus he criticizes Barack Obama plenty himself, so why wouldn't he do it now?
Quinnell Well I probably brought up something that he didn't want to talk about.
Reporter: Do you think John McCain thinks that he's Arab? Do you think he knows this stuff that you're saying you know is fact?
Quinnell I don't know. I don't know. Maybe he doesn't want to bring it up then. I don't know why. Is there some way I can get to you more information.
Bush: Can you wait for me for like five more minutes?
Quinnell Yeah.
Bush:: I want to an interview on camera. Our camera team is occupied right now. What's your name?
Quinnell Gayle Quinnell (Spells name again)
Bush: In case I lose you, you don't have a cell phone do you?
Quinnell No I wish I had it on me but I don't.
Bush: See the pretty lady over there with red hair? That's our camera. As soon as she's done, we'll be over there Ok
Reporter: What was your reaction when Senator McCain backed away
Quinnell What was my reaction? Well when he didn't want to talk about it

Some folks are saying things like, "Oh, I feel sorry for this older woman who's being lied to about a man that looks different and has a very different name". Bullshit. I work with people all the time who are a damned sight older than this woman. People don't automatically lose their minds or their responsibilities when they turn 70. Gayle Quinnell is a willfully ignorant racist who had her mind made up about the scary black guy with the weird name, and went to the "li-berry" to find a bunch of bullshit lies to try to justify her prejudice. She mailed a bunch of these three-page screeds to everyone in her address book, but she couldn't even remember a single thing that was on those pages... or at least she pretended not to recall anything they contained for fear of having to own it on television. She's a bigot, plain and simple, and should be deeply ashamed of herself.

McCain, on the other hand, just earned back a quarter teaspoon of the cup and a half of respect I once had for him. Of course, if his campaign (including that corrupt fuck-wad in a pencil skirt who shares the ticket with him) hadn't started this whole not-so-thinly-veiled race-baiting in the first place, perhaps squalid incidents like these wouldn't be such a commonplace occurrence lately. Racism, even in the "liberal" upper midwest, is impossible to control once you've let the cat out of the bag.

Of course, it would have been nice of McCain to remind America that one can be arab, or even muslim, and still be a "decent family man" and a "citizen". But that would have been too much to ask of a Republican.

The truth, unmasked

I was horrified by the blatant racism evident in the presidential campaign over the past week or so. Yeah, there was the isolated "sweetie" comment from Obama (for which the candidate personally called the reporter to whom he said it, and apologized profusely... BEFORE the story broke in the media and BEFORE Clinton and Ferraro started whining about it). But the piddly amount of misogyny in this campaign pales into insignificance when compared with the mountain of racism and xenophobia heaped upon Obama. It's not that the media is trumping up the race issue, or that there's a regional bias against southerners... all you have to do is let the people of West Virginia and Kentucky speak for themselves.

I was hoping, in a stunning display of naivete, that we were better than this. That we had gotten past this kind of tired racial hatred. I was hoping that the battle our nation was fighting was not against this sort of mindless race-related mental retardation, but rather a more insidious and latent racism of which even the racially biased might not be aware. I was proven wrong.

I love the idea of this country, but the absence of any kind of societal premium placed on education in the United States has resulted in a pervasive impoverishment of the mind. The thought that great swaths of America are populated by these "blue-collar hard working Americans" as Clinton likes to call them (also known as idiotic redneck racist assholes) makes me more than a little ashamed. The answer can't be as simple as advocating for stronger education. I'm sure some of these people graduated from college. The issue also isn't necessarily one of class... those who grew up in Appalachia with limited means aren't necessarily going to grow into racists. I don't know what the answer is, but until West Virginia, Kentucky, and other cognitively-impoverished states tackle this issue, more and more of their children will leave the state for greener and more welcoming pastures.

If this primary election has taught me one thing, it is this: one can never underestimate the American capacity for insane bias or useless stupidity.

The Hague welcomes Mr. Bush, party of one.

These data need no further explanation.

We should have impeached this fool years ago.

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