[Dr. Judith Apter Klinghoffer is the author of Vietnam, Jews and the Middle East: Unintended Consequences, the co-author of International Citizens' Tribunals: Mobilizing Public Opinion to Advance Human Rights and a History News Network blogger.]

With McCain you get the real thing while with Obama you may get an audacity of rhetoric based on nothing but political expediency and imagined racial grievances. Recent polls reveal that the American people are beginning to get it and that scares not only McCain's Democrat opponents but also European leftists, especially following his successful stops in Britain and France.

These European McCain foes recognize the inherent weakness of the main ammunition their American counter parts have been using, his age. Late night comedians' tasteless jokes aside, in an era where 60 is the new 40 and 70 the new 50, too many Americans can look at the vitality of their own 72 year old parents, aunts and uncles or grandparents, as well as McCain's own performance on the campaign trail, and recognize the absurdity of the feebleness charge.

It is this context that we should read the Financial Times column written by Cambridge historian and New American Foundation senior fellow, Anatol Lieven entitled: Why we should fear a McCain presidency? His intriguing answer which appears in bold print in the paper edition is: "Some of the worst 20th century catastrophes were caused by brave men with passionate sense of national mission."

Really? I was curious. Who could he mean? I could not think of an example. Apparently, neither could he. The closest he came to naming names is comparing McCain to Andrew Jackson, a highly regarded 19th century Democrat president and not a particularly scary one. He does tell us that so extreme is the McCain presidency going to be that it will make leftists look back with nostalgia at George W. Bush....

World War II hero and two term president Dwight Eisenhower was another military man with a lightning temper. In her book First Mothers, Bonnie Angelo describes his mother's failure to teach him temper control. "From childhood those lightning flashes were as much a part of Ike as the contagious smile," she writes.

Biographer Carlo D'este describes instances when "he totally lost his self-control -- whether beating an apple tree with his fists as a child, banging his head against a wall when playing poor tennis, or punching his fist through the wall of a cafe." White House seamstress Lillian Rogers Parks tells how his wife Mamie lived in constant fear of his outbursts. Angelo reports that presidential aides became most familiar with a vein in his forehead which would noticeably stand out during press conference he found annoying as signaling, "Caution: high voltage temper."

White house advisor Merlo Pusey wrote: "Sometimes his anger is aroused and it may set off a geyser of hot words. The President's emotions are close to the surface and his irritations are registered on his face almost as readily as his general good humor."

That said, Eisenhower did help win World War II but did not start World War III. He, merely, ended the Korean War and presided over 8 years of relative peace and prosperity. Not a bad record for a brave honorable, if temperamental, warrior. If temperamental McCain does as well we should all be very happy....

R.R. Hamilton - 4/16/2008

I could write a book on the warped Afrocentric mindset that projects racial malevolence onto nearly every action or word of whites and others who are not black. Rev. Wright isn't the exception -- he's the norm!(1)

Just a few minutes ago, this item came to my attention: A woman was criminally cited for telling the children of her black neighbor to "quit playing in the tree like monkeys". Yes, it now appears to be a CRIME for non-blacks (the poor woman is Hispanic, a civil rights advocate, and an Obama delegate -- or WAS: Obama asked her to resign!) to use the word "monkeys" within earshot of blacks. http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/obama/883120,CST-NWS-trustee08.article

About a week ago, I saw a black college professor(!!) being interviewed about the Rev. Wright controversy. The host got the professor to admit that the U.S. government did not create the AIDS virus to kill blacks, but the professor was nevertheless able to claim (unchallenged, unfortunately) that the U.S. government "injected syphilis into Tuskeegee blacks in the 1930s". I knew this was a blatant falsehood and that it is one of the "politically correct grievances" believed by nearly all blacks.

The Tuskeegee Syphilis Hoax, like say, the Lacrosse Rape Hoax, is based on the ridiculous notion that white people have hurt and will hurt black people anytime they can. The Tuskegee blacks weren't infected by white doctors: They infected themselves through their own sex practices.

I did a little (10 minutes) research on this case before responding here. These are the facts of the Tuskegee matter: In 1932 tests of 600 Tuskegee black men found 399 infected with syphilis -- a syphilis-rich environment! It was decided that these men would act as a "control group" while other infected men were given real treatments. The initial plan called for the experiment to last only six to nine months, but as with so many government programs, it took on a life of its own -- to the profit of area black hospitals and doctors.

Things to keep in mind: First, many of the doctors and nurses responsible for the experiment were themselves blacks. The Tuskegee Institute and other black-owned hospitals participated. It probably would've been called "racist" if the government had ENDED this pork-barrel program for black medical professionals. Second, until 1947 there WAS NO CURE for syphilis, so there was no real harm for the first 15 years of the study. Third, the purpose of the study was to determine if syphilis affected black men and white men differently -- which suggests to me that there was ANOTHER "control group" of just white men, who were also untreated, but that fact doesn't seem to have interested anyone else.

I regret I have to end now. I would not leave this with such a nig ... uh... sparing presentation, but my daughter says I need to go to the store and buy toilet paper. I think I'll buy white.

Kenneth Laurence Davis - 4/15/2008

If Obama has been speaking of how he is discriminated against because of his color, I've not heard of it.

If the author was indeed referring to Obama personally, I'm in the wrong. I dismissed that possibility out of hand as I read because I didn't find it plausible. No details were given by the author. What has he said?

Please tell me which racial grievances, in your opinion, fall into the category of being politically correct? A couple of examples would suffice.

R.R. Hamilton - 4/15/2008

Actually we do hear "Obama complaining about how he's treated in a racial context" quite a bit lately. Moreover, the author of this article that we are discussing was herself refering to Obama in the context of "imagined racial grievances". Finally, is it too audacious to say that most of the politically-correct-racial-grievances are indeed based more on imagination than fact?

Kenneth Laurence Davis - 4/13/2008

We don't hear Obama complaining about how he's treated in a racial context, do we. So 'the case of Obama' is not the issue, is it.

Nice snide-swipe, however.

R.R. Hamilton - 4/12/2008

In the case of Obama, they're "imagined" ... unless he's still hurt by being called "not black enough" in his first election campaign.

Kenneth Laurence Davis - 4/11/2008

Talk about audacity of rhetoric...