So, what's this whole diary about?  Well it's obvious my grandmother was a racist.  She didn't mean to be.  She certainly didn't think of herself as one.  After all, she voted Republican, didn't she?  My whole young life, however, I heard about "that one."

To give it some context, it was always used to refer to an outsider.  Usually, invariably, she referred to African-Americans as "that one", or "those people" if it was necessary to group them together.  There was not a lot of call for it in our neighborhood as I was growing up, but occasionally a "that one" would creep into her vocabulary in reference to Hispanics.  Most pointedly, however, she would use it to refer to my 100% Italian father when she was really irritated with him.  After all, she was all German and her late husband all Scots-Irish, so anyone swarthy, dark or, God-forbid Catholic, was certainly "that one" and inherently "other".

When Senator McCain used the phrase in the debate this evening, it conjured up in me an inherent reflex.  I'm sure it was the opposite of what he intended -- in me -- but probably exactly what he wanted in the 55 to 70 age-group; it was a dog whistle indicator that "that one" is someone different.  Let's not mince words...  to my parents' generation he was saying, "This is someone 'other', a black guy, an outsider, someone you can't trust.  In fact, he's the guy, personified, whom you have always blamed for any ill which has befallen you."

Yeah, he said all that in two words.  

I think I'm in a somewhat unique situation here.  I'm the product of two long generations.  I'm a Gen-X'er.  I just turned forty a couple days ago.  But my brother and sister are solidly Boomers in their mid-fifties.  (Yeah, I was an accident, but that's another diary.)  My folks are in their mid-seventies, and thanks to my persistence they're solidly in Obama's camp.  But others in that generation just got the subliminal signal that Obama is one of "those people"...  an "other" if you will.  It's not enough to knock my parents off their (recently) progressive footing, but it's gonna hurt with any seniors or near-seniors who don't have an Obama advocate on hand.  They've heard this kind of talk from their authority figures throughout their upbringing, and it's gonna hit home with some of them.