'Crucify' Obama?

Frank Schaeffer's column at the Huffington Post is headlined:

This Good Friday Let Us Not Crucify Barack Obama

Excuse me? Nobody is talking about crucifying anybody. It's just politics, Frank. The three remaining presidential candidates -- Obama, Hillary and McCain -- are all U.S. senators, and should they lose, they'll still be U.S. senators. So to suggest that criticizing them is akin to crucifixion is ... well, maybe it's not blasphemy, but it's pretty ridiculous.

Speaking of ridiculous, here's the first paragraph of Schaeffer's column:

Senator Obama has a problem: the hardening of the American heart, the closing of the American mind, the shriveling of our souls, the shrinking capacity of our imaginations, our jaded senses, the seen-it-all attitude that makes us into sneering voyeurs too mean spirited to save ourselves.

Notice Schaeffer's dishonest use of first-person plural pronouns -- "our" and "us" and "ourselves" -- dishonest because, of course, he doesn't really mean to include himself in this indictment. Schaeffer is not saying that he has a hardened heart, a shriveled soul, a shrunken imagination, etc. No, he aims these pejoratives at you.

Among the hard hearts and shriveled souls that Schaeffer attacks by name is Ronald Kessler of Newsmax, who has been reporting on Jeremiah Wright and Trinity Church for months. Kessler and Schaeffer were both guests on a radio talk show to discuss Obama's big "race in America" speech, and Kessler was apparently unimpressed. Schaeffer writes:

He said it left him unmoved. He was in a sneering mood bristling with ever-so-reasonable middle class certitude of his conservative righteousness. To Kessler the speech was just politics, nothing more. The idea of it's truth was of no consequence. To him it was all about tactics.

Is it really so hard-hearted to say that a speech by a candidate for office is "just politics, nothing more"? Was Obama's speech so chock-full of undeniable truth that no reasonable person could interpret it in terms of political tactics?

Schaeffer continues:

Obama offers civility in the midst of a drunken national bar fight. Obama speaks in complete sentences, well-turned paragraphs, offers thoughts with intellectual depth, nuance, humility and compassion. Obama is a reasoned essay cast before sound-bite swine who seem ready to tear anything that falls into their sty to shreds. . . .
Obama is offering America a fresh start. There is more decent intelligent authenticity in his little finger than the Clintons will ever know. There is more kind wisdom in Obama than in all our sneering bloodsucking moronic media combined. But we have imbibed detritus for so long that when clean food is offered we can't taste it.

We are unworthy! We are unworthy!

Frank Schaeffer drank the Kool-Aid, and there is no hope for him. No wonder he resorted to the Good Friday crucifixion theme -- he's an Obama apostle, a True Believer.

And Frank: Knock off this "we/us/our" crap. It's insulting.

UPDATE: Is the bogus "we" some kind of trend? Megan Daum pulls the same trick in the L.A. Times.

UPDATE II: Ace links (I could have sworn he'd link the "Kristen's fake boobs" post instead, but he decided to play against type) and also links Hot Air with more Easter messages from Democrats: James Carville says Bill Richardson is Judas Iscariot for endorsing Obama.

Don't blame me -- in this battle of Democratic analogies, I suppose I'm Pontius Pilate.

UPDATE III: Also linked by Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler, who calls attention to this quote from Ace:

Are you quite sure Obama is Jesus?
I’m not a big believer in End-of-Days claptrap, but I’m beginning to think a better case could be made for someone else mentioned near the very end of the Bible.

Heh. Actually, I thought Hillary was The Beast.

UPDATE IV: Speaking of Hillary, her Pennsylvania campaign spent Good Friday running a crucifixion registration drive.