We (Asheville) are hosting Ms. Palin in the arena this evening in a big, last-minute and hastily planned rally.

People have come from all over the southeast. Primarily, the crowd is local, but there seems to be a large contingent from South Carolina, just about an hour's drive from here. The crowd was estimated to be about 8,000, but I can tell by how long the line is (and comparing it to concerts that have had large turnouts), that there's easily 15,000 out there. The line has gone around the block completely and backed up around back to the front door again...

You should see this crowd. These people all look normal enough, until you really start studying them. Most are happy, but about every third one is angry and quite willing to scrap with the occasional protester that wonders by (The good news, about one of every 10 is an Obama supporter.) I've spoken to a few, they're very sure they're going to win. That Palin is going to be the next VP, and shortly, the Pres. Comments on our local paper's site show that people are taken with the notion that Palin is just like their neighbors wife.

I didn't delve into "why" they were so sure that things are going to swing their way. Maybe they believe that they've prayed about it fervently enough. Maybe the fact that so many are from the reddest of red states where red state media only serves up red meat to chew on has skewed their world view. One can only imagine. Maybe in their last meeting in the great conspiracy cornfield were they all meet to breed they discussed the proper techniques for stealing votes. Who knows?

The right wing continues to link the fight for black equality with socialism and communism. At the website of conservatism’s flagship publication, National Review, conservatives like Andy McCarthy argue whether Obama is "more Maoist than Stalinist," and National Review writer Lisa Schiffren explicitly argued this summer that Obama must have communist links based on his interracial background. Schiffren mused, "for a white woman to marry a black man in 1958, or 60, there was almost inevitably a connection to explicit Communist politics."

This conclusion is one she shares with Robert Shelton, Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1950s, who declared that "amalgamation is ultimately the goal of the Communist element." (To be fair, these conclusions make a bit of sense: could there be a more perfect vessel for a secret communist takeover of the United States than a biracial one-term senator from Chicago with an Arabic-sounding name? At a Starbucks somewhere, Chairman Mao is leeching WiFi for a quick instant message to William Ayers: "It’s happening exactly how we planned it.")

McCain, a child of privilege who spent the late 1960s in a Vietnamese prison camp, may simply be unaware of the feelings and historical context he has evoked through his campaign’s rhetoric. When Sarah Palin accuses Obama of "palling around with terrorists" and suggests that Obama hates his own country enough to wish it violence, the McCain campaign fuels age-old paranoia built around the conflation of black rights and the radical left. As for McCain himself, his attempts to tamp down the vitriol of his crowds suggest that he is somewhat confused by their response. He wants voters to dislike Obama, but he seems unaware of just what he has unleashed. However, by implicitly invoking the idea that Obama represents a socialist takeover of the United States, McCain is inviting what can only be a rational response from those who would die for their country: violence. What else is a patriot to do when freedom is threatened? Especially when their fears have been validated by no less authoritative a source than the Republican nominee for president of the United States?

LIMBAUGH: I just think it's about the economy right now. You mentioned cap gains -- that may be a little sophisticated. But this Obama tape that's out there is not. It's not too sophisticated. It is easily understood. When you've got a guy out there saying that he doesn't believe in the U.S. Constitution, yet he's got to take an oath to defend it and protect it. I mean, did Hillary put this out? Where's this been? How come this has not come out until now? Now there's a lot of undecideds and that's where this tape and that's where the economic mantle on Obama can have some impact here in the final week.