Obama is running an ad on immigration that tries to link John McCain to Rush Limbaugh and the nativist wing of the Republican party. Here's a link.While one might argue that McCain has invited this comparison by turning against his own immigration proposals in an effort to woo the hard right, I think this is a pretty unfair ad, given McCain's generally laudable history on this issue. Moreover, the tone of the ad, which plays on the insecurity and resentment that Latinos feel as a result of nativist race baiting, is beneath the level of discourse to which we ought to aspire in our political culture. Apparently, it also takes the Limbaugh quotes out of context. Not that I feel any desire to defend Limbaugh, but, given the number of offensive things Limbaugh says, why on earth would the Obama campaign feel the need to stretch the truth here? Calling Republicans out on that sort of thing is not at all problematic. That is, I don't consider it race-baiting or "playing the race card" to remind Latinos about Republicans who use racialized langauge to turn immigration into a wedge issue, but trying to link McCain to this rhetoric is wrong, and doing so with out-of-context quotes is even worse. We should be encouraging Republicans to reject this kind of rhetoric, as McCain has done.I think there's a difference between being aggressive and hard-hitting (I'm all for that) and stooping to sorts of smearing that brings discredit to the political process. These are precisely the sorts of tactics that Obama has criticized the McCain campaign for employing. This ad should never have seen the light of day.