Former GOP presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, known for his witty one-liners on the campaign trail, today showed that there is such a thing as being too quick on one’s feet. Speaking to the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association, Huckabee made an off-color remark regarding Barack Obama having a gun aimed at him after a loud noise was heard off-stage. “That was Barack Obama,” he said. “He was getting ready to speak. Somebody aimed a gun at him and he…he dove for the floor.” Huckabee is not the first to use assasination innuendo when speaking about Barack Obama. Media outlets no less than The New York Times have hinted at the topic, as has The Early Show in an interview with Ted Kennedy.
In January of this year, the phrase “assassinate Obama” reportedly showed up on the top 100 Google search terms, leading to reports of increased security and expanded Secret Service detail with the candidate. The rumors, suppositions, and innuendo continue to swirl about, unregulated by mainstream media who are largely too squeamish to say it out loud. Underlying these rumors is a basic apprehension that Americans in general, and Democrats particularly, have held since the last time they put their faith in an “inspirational” candidate. With repeated comparisons to the Kennedy’s, as well as his all-but-certain position as the first black presidential nominee, these thoughts, macabre as they are, stem from a string of unresolved traumas of the sixties. Democrats, young and old alike, have memories (or at least have gleaned cultural memories) of the chaos of the 1960s – when a sitting president was assassinated, his brother, a popular Democratic contender, shot to death, and an inspirational civil rights leader murdered. And whether it be some kind of pre-emptive defense mechanism, dark obsession, or mere conspiracy, Obama represents for many the ultimate test of the viability of change politics in the modern American system.
