Saturday, August 9, 2008

Obama the Anti-Christ?

Seriously. Slacktivist has a fascinating post on what looks to be an attempt to persuade the Left Behind-types that Barack Obama just might be the Beast of Revelation.

It's a very clumsy kind of dogwhistle, though. When torture-apologist Michael Gerson inserted evangelicalisms into President Bush's speeches he did so seamlessly. The intended evangelical audience understood the dogwhistle message, but it was embedded within a coherent message addressed to the larger audience. McCain's ad works as a dogwhistle, but there's no larger message for the larger audience. The Left Behind readers will understand his coded message, but the larger audience will just see him standing there, growing red-faced from blowing into a whistle that appears not to work.

1 comment:

James Hanley said...

Well, you gotta mobilize the base. And since the base doesn't trust McCain, that may be an especially important task this year.