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In various caricatures of McCain and Obama, they are often depicted as the erratic Captain Kirk, and the logical Dr. Spock. Its uncanny how the similarities stack up, from their prose, their personalities and their actions. Did Gene Roddenberry have a brief episode of clairvoyance and see this election coming? How could it have been foretold in such eerily accurate ways?

When Captain Kirk noted in quiet reflection his feelings towards the Klingons, he said, “I’ve never trusted Klingons, and I never will.” This quote was used to convict him of murdering the Klingon Chancellor and he was exiled to a frozen wasteland. Nearly a decade ago, John McCain was quoted as saying something quite nearly as despicable towards the Vietnamese people. ”I hate the gooks,” McCain said in response to a question from reporters aboard his campaign bus. “I will hate them as long as I live.” Supposedly, he is allowed to do this because he was a POW.

He qualified his comment by saying, he only meant his captors. As one reporter noted, what if he had been captured by Nigerians? Would he call them “niggers” and then explain that his derogatory slander applied only to those Nigerians that captured him? How would that have gone over with the rest of the country?

His ignorance is further revealed in his choice of slur. The term “gook” is a bastardization of a racial slur against Koreans who in their native tongue refer to themselves as “Han-guk saram.” The bigotry in the USA continues to defy all intellect and reason without reprimand. All of this passes by without notice because of the passivity that minorities have afforded to their taskmasters coupled with the moral values that a nation of supposed Christians promotes. 

My family came across the waters on a boat, hounded by Thai pirates, chased out of country by our own people. Japanese war machines ravaged China and did unspeakable horrors to millions of muted victims of my own race. Yet we continue to rise above and become better humans for it. We don’t spread hatred, we don’t pass generalizations on a race and incite further violence. We evolve.

“What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black.” Robert Kennedy: Delivering News of King’s Death (NPR)