A troubling bit of video was in rotation at CNN and CNNHN last weekend, John McCain and a supporter named Gayle Quinnell at a rally. The exchange goes like this:

Quinnell: I can't trust Obama. I— I have heard about him and he's not, he's not, he's a, um.... He's an Arab. He is not....
McCain: No, no. No, ma'am. No, ma'am.
Quinnell: No?
McCain: No. No, ma'am. No, ma'am. He's a, he's a, he's a decent family man, citizen, that I just happen to have disagreements with on, on fundamental issues, and that's what this campaign is all about. He's not. Thank you.

Now, there's a lot that troubles me about this, but I'll strip it down a layer at a time to get to what really bothers me.

First, Quinnell says Barack Obama is an Arab, which is... patently wrong. Of course, what she means is that Barack Obama is a Muslim. I'll get to that, too. But my first layer of objection is her inability to distinguish between Arabs and Muslims. Given that the U.S. is engaged in a two wars in the Middle East, and has complicated relationships with a number of countries in the region, I think it would behoove us to familiarize ourselves with the most basic sociological groups in that very, very rich, complex region. Especially if those of us who are volunteering in political campaigns, like Ms. Quinnell.

If you don't know the difference, please take a moment to survey those Wikipedia articles I linked above. Please... seriously. But the bottom line is that they're not the same. There's a lot of overlap in the two groups, but they're not the same. An Arab is someone who identifies with an ethnic group. There are Arabs who practice many religions. A Muslim is someone who observes some form of the super-religion of Islam. There are Muslims throughout the world, in the Middle East, in Europe, in India, in Indonesia, in China, in the United States, and of all ethnic groups.

Okay, so Ms. Quinnell is ignorant about the difference between an Arab and a Muslim. That a 75-year-old American woman would be confused about cultures she doesn't encounter regularly is not terribly shocking. I'm sorry that's probably representative of my country as a whole, but it's not what really bothers me.

Now, Quinnell is clearly face-down in the koolaid that some rightist propagandists are pushing about Barack Obama being a Muslim. And a whole lot of other people are, too. This is really strange to me. I'm not sure how the guy can be evil because he's a Muslim -- I'll get to that, too -- and also be evil because his fiery preacher at Trinity United Church of Christ is a really angry guy.

But, hey, that's politics for you. If you oppose somebody or something, you tend to have a couple of genuine reasons, and then you stack up borderline reasons around them like cordwood. Obama's family connections to Islam (his father was raised Muslim, but stopped practicing before he moved to the U.S., and young Barack Obama learned about Islam in school, like we all should have; that's about the extent of his connection to Islam) are inflated to one of the most frequently cited reasons for opposition to Obama in public polling. But, come on. We all do that. It's human nature.

What really chills me is McCain's reaction to Quinnell's statement. She says she doesn't trust him because he's an Arab... that's kinda foul and pretty racist, but not very detailed. McCain is the one who makes it worse. Seriously, read it. McCain says he's not an Arab, he's a family man and a citizen. So, an Arab can't be a family man or a citizen? But, again, they're not really talking about Arabs. Quinnell meant "Muslim." I know it, and I'm pretty sure John McCain knew it, too. So a Muslim can't be a family man or a citizen?

Yeah. That's it. That's what's bothering me. So let me look hard at that.

I'm not a very objective observer — I've picked my side in this election, and it ain't John McCain — but I can step back and look at what John McCain is doing here. He's not saying that Barack Obama can't be an Arab or Muslim because he's a good family man and a good U.S. citizen. He really isn't. He's running a political campaign. He has a message he's pushing, and anything outside of that message has to get swept aside. I don't blame him for that. The game demands that he work within the format of sound bites that look good on TV, and a lengthy explanation of the distinction between Arabs and Muslims, and about how many of them are good people who work hard to support and better their families, about how many of them are doing that right here in our United States, and how none of that has much to do with Barack Obama, who is neither an Arab nor a Muslim, isn't going to play well for his audience.

Just now, it's not John McCain's job to educate anyone, it's his job to get elected. I don't blame him for that. My guy does the same thing, and I know it. John McCain was trying to be an honorable player, quickly stepping away from the crazy and moving on to what's going to play better for TV.

But, by golly, there's an awful lot of prejudice and hate in this country. If John McCain isn't standing up and saying, hey, there are over a million Muslims in the U.S., and they're just folks like the rest of us who work, or don't, who have families and mortgages and problems and dreams, and some of them are criminals and most of them are not, and some of them are sinful and many are virtuous, just like all Americans... who is standing up to say that? If he's not standing up to say there are 1.5 million Arab Americans, and they're as American as the European Americans and the Asian Americans and the African Americans and the Latin American Americans, and maybe everybody else is a little less American than the Native Americans... then who is?

I was taught this as a basic fact of America: it's you that matters, not your nationality, ethnicity, religion. Who did you help today? Who did you hurt today? Nothing else matters, damnit. That's the koolaid I drink. I know it's a delusion, but it's the one I want to have come true.

"Family man" is not the opposite of "Arab." I don't really believe John McCain meant that it was, but he did kinda leave it hanging there. And somebody needs to shoot it down. We all need to shoot it down.