I'm never again going to doubt the wisdom of this campaign. At every step, when I feared that they were going off the rails, doing something that would imperil their chances at winning, it always turns out to be right. From the primaries to the general, when they make a move, they make it worse.
Of course, I'm talking about the McCain/Palin campaign and their propensity for throwing people out of their rallies for no particular reason.
Perhaps most prominent was their refusal to let the president of Penn State University into an on-campus rally, although to be fair, the 7,000-person rally was also fully screened so that only die-hard supporters would be allowed in. This makes perfect sense, as the surest way to swing the undecided and slightly Obama-leaning supporters that you need to your side is to make sure that they're refused access to you.
A McCain-Palin campaign official snubbed the president of Penn State University who inquired about attending a campus speech Tuesday by Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, university officials told ABCNews.com.
"He's a big Democrat. Why would he want to meet Palin?" campaign aide Russ Bermel allegedly asked a school employee who was hoping to make arrangements for president Graham B. Spanier to meet Palin, according to Spanier's office.
Wasn't part of the rationale of adding Palin to the ticket to attract die-hard Democrats who were former Clinton supporters, particularly in states like Pennsylvania? Oh, I forgot, no rationale in their campaign can last longer than three days, because then it starts to get old and stupid.
This is small potatoes compared to the real genius exhibited at their rallies - throwing out any and all young people because they look shady. This includes their own supporters, because...why wouldn't it?
Lara Elborno, a student at the University of Iowa, said she was approached by a police officer and a McCain staffer and was told she had to leave or she would be arrested for trespassing.
“It was a very confusing, very frustrating situation,” Elborno said. “I said that I had a right to be there, I wasn’t doing anything disruptive — I was sitting, waiting for the rally to start.”
[...]
Elborno said even McCain supporters were among those being asked to leave.
“I saw a couple that had been escorted out and they were confused as well, and the girl was crying, so I said ‘Why are you crying? and she said ‘I already voted for McCain, I’m a Republican, and they said we had to leave because we didn’t look right,’” Elborno said. “They were handpicking these people and they had nothing to go off of, besides the way the people looked.”
I really can't see any problem whatsoever with threatening the arrest of people at your events because they don't fit the correct profile of your supporters. People love that shit.
