If you think things have gotten nasty in the Kansas attorney general race, take a look around. Attack ads airing in the rest of the country make Phill Kline and Paul Morrison seem like old fishing buddies.
The Washington Post reports that this year, political ads are going way beyond negative, completely abandoning issues in favor of casting opponents as moral degenerates. The story includes some pretty outrageous examples.
The Post notes that the majority of such ads are coming from the GOP, which this year finds itself with a record that is not particularly inspiring.
“You’re going to see more of this sensational, off-the-wall stuff,” one expert said. “If you get people disgusted, they might withdraw from politics, and that’s the real goal these days.”
Posted by Dave Knadler
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Speaking of dirt I’ll be releasing some information on a Republican candidate on Tuesday. Yes, another Republican has come afoul of the law. The criminal candidate’s opponent has asked that I don’t release the information until that date.
Meadowlark will be jealous because this is real news.
http://www.maggotpunks.com/mp.html
First things first. A vote for Libertarian Frank Gilmour will distance Libertarians further from their ideology of government than a democratic vote and for theses reasons.
The Republicans are on a course which establishes the United States as a dictatorship, the opposite end of the political spectrum for Libertarian ideals.
That makes a vote for Libertarian Frank Gilmour a “throw-away vote,” other than voicing an opinion.
Myself, as a conservative Republican, am better served by voting democratic, thus flushing the Neocons Republican away from the all important control of congress and to help stymie the Rove/Cheney/Bush/Rumsfeld/Rice cabal of “one world megalomaniacs.”
In some ways Democrats may come closer to Libertarian Ideals than Republicans, though certainly not in all ways.
In Libertarian Ideology Government plays a very small roll which should align itself with Republicans more so than with Democrats, but due to the current situation in congress, that does not hold true. As it stands now, we all need to wrest control away from the Republicans in congress or lose our democracy.
It is imperative that that congress no longer be the spending, killing playground, which they’ve managed to corrupt.
The Republicans are now being driven by the radical end of their current foreign dictated foreign policy, if you can catch my drift, leaving domestic issues just about all in disarray.
It’s likely for Libertarians to make greater headway with the present modern day democratic congress, than with the current rubber-stamp Republican congress subservient to Karl Rove Cabal’s underhanded and self-destructive ambitions.
By offering your votes to the democrats in return for Libertarian favors will enhance your overall strategy.
Inside Karl Rove,s dictatorship, we all lose America and getting it back in one piece will be the king of all nightmares { I’ll make what’s happening in Iraq look like a playground }.
Vote democratic to advance Libertarian principles and ensure that there will be a free government to modify.
A cutoff your right hand if it offends thee approach eh? Unfortunately, there will be a timed typing test later on.
I agree with Ed. We need a balanced Congress and that has been the major problem with the Bush Administration. There has been no one with power to cut Bush and Chency off at the knees when they drunk with total power.
Libertarians are not going to win and everyone knows that. I would rather have a Democrat that I don’t personally like than another Republican to give Bush and Company even more power.
Republicans should also vote Democratic and for these reasons.
Privacy issue are generally important to Republicans and the Rove/Cheney/Bush/Rumsfeld/Rice cabal of “one world megalomaniacs” offers no small businesses any security or privacy in their business dealings and patent laws along with copyright privileges are likely not to be honored.
Dictatorships do not recognize property rights and Free Enterprise, along with creativity assume a “why bother” attitude, as in “nothing to gain.”
The Neocons have destroyed the Republican Party principles and the Fascist Government Neocons strive for are actually describing what they so distort about when lying about Islam. Those diatribes are much more akin to the Rove, Cheney/Bush/Rumsfeld/Rice cabal’s attitude toward the world, which is “fill your pockets,” no matter who that might kill { Them or us }.
We can’t vote Republican anymore, because all they do is lie, and for all practical purposes there is no “Republican Party” in principle to vote for, as the one named on the ballot is a illusion.
Vote Democratic or stay at home and don’t vote.
We Republicans can regain our Party, but not with the Bush administration still in power.
We will be in position to pressure democrats after helping to elect them.
We’re in big trouble, America needs us, so If you can’t vote democratic, don’t vote.
The Beagle has endorsed TT for a return to Congress. They ignore his real record as a participant in this administrations continuing lies and rape of American and Kansas working people and the encouragement of the continuation of our dependence on foreign oil and the $9 Trillion dollar deficit this paper and administration continues to ignore. It is creating a legacy that betrays future generations.
They say he has knows how the political process in D.C works, if that is true he is a party to this administrations and the Republican Congress unparalleled corruption, crony capitalism and scandal; it is simply the way they do business. Tiahrts close ties to indicted Texan Tom Delay is the biggest example of how he believes the political process should work.
They don’t mention he has voted 4 times against any Congressional investigation into the waste fraud and abuse of several of the biggest contractors Halliburton / KBR, CaCI and others. Yet Todd in his arrogance proposed legislation to create a Congressional oversight of Government departments. He defends the allies of VP Cheney at the expense of tapayers and the safety of our troops.
Earlier this year he voted to approve an Emergency appropriations bill that REMOVED 2 BILLION dollars form the Military personnel budget.
His leadership on the House economic caucus and House jobs action team has consisted of writing a nine point “Letter to the Editor” expressing the views of this bought and paid for administration and encouraging the deportation of more jobs to foreign countries.
He came into office on the coat tails of the contract with America in 1994 that the Republican party quickly turned into the Contract with special interests and large corporations. He was in favor of term limits and now his term should be up.
The Eagle turns a blind eye to and endorses corruption, scandal and the lies of this administration and the Republican party.
Let’s face facts. There are two reasons the country is in the mess it is currently. First is the repukes who are trying to grab as much power as possible. While in the minority they hold considerable sway over the rest. The second, the more predominate group, are those who have no spine. They do whatever the alpha repukes say without question. The result of these two groups is what is best described as a cluster f#@!
The government has gone unchecked for six years and we now have almost 3000 dead in Iraq, a record deficit, all time high prices at the gas pumps, and a government that prefers corporate welfare to serving the people it was origionally established to serve. The highlights of the last six years are arguable at best. Unemployment is low, but you can’t compare unemployment now with unemployment under Clinton because the method of calculating it was changed to make the numbers look better. Progress in Iraq would probably be proceeding faster if the current administration didn’t feel the need to make sure the new Iraqi government was very pro-America and get rid of the previous two that had been set up. Repukes refuse to learn from their mistakes, and there are many. Saddam was a pro-American government at one time.
But I have left out another group, a group I really have no anger toward. The TRUE conservatives. Those who understand the basis of conservatism and want what is best for the US. Liberals and conservatives quite often disagree on the way to best serve America, but they both love the US and want to see it prosper. These values are absent from the current administration and republikans in control of the Congress. They must go!!
Gentle people,
I fear for your sanity. May of you already are on shaky ground as far as your ability to conduct a rational and civil political discussion. I fear that after the election, when the good people of this country allow the republicans to retain a majority in the house and senate, you will completely lose it.
I just hope that I will be able to temper my elation and remain gracious in light of the republican victory.
Don’t worry children, the adults will take care of things!
Hank
Hank – this thread ain’t nothing compared to the meltdown over on the Kline thread.
Hey, you and Nathan missed a great chance to ‘zing’ me on the lose weight/gas mileage thread. Something more for fun!
Hank? Rational and civil?
Oh you were REAL rational and civil when you attacked Michael J Fox and called him a liar and said that the symptoms of his Parkinsons disease were a “little Parkinsons dance”
“Gracious” is another term you’ve no business pretending at.
“Adults?” You really consider yourself one? I consider an adult as a person capable of supporting themself. YOU routinely brag that I and the taxpayers are paying your way. And you do have other means of sustenance don’t you……
Win or lose I say there can be no civility with such as you. You and your party need a good swift kick in the ass to remind you that America is more than just your personal country club.
The eagle editorial stays the course on Tiahrt.
Tiarht is a member of do nothing congress. Maybe his biggest accomplishment in two years, is flying back to Washington on a Sunday night at the request of Tom Delay to hold an emergency session, emergency legislation for Terry Schiavo.
But who in the fourth congressional district gets emergency legislation.
There are so many real people that are desperate for real answers about real problems.
Shame on the editorial board for siding with big business.
Tiahrts record is a disgrace.
Hey Ed,
Don’t say ‘We Republicans’ if you are going to vote Democratic Party.
You don’t like Bush and…
Bush is not running…
So, you’re gonna show those ‘Republicans’ by voting Democratic in Kansas elections.
Yeah, that’ll fix ‘em.
Tiahrt must be a Liberal. After all, the EAgle is a Liberal newspaper. At least in the world according to Paul …
Anyone see the Debate between Barnett and Sebelius?
I thought Barnett did well, but Sebelius’s performance was lackluster and she appeared a might timid on the issues.
Ben,
Forgot to mention I saw you on TV the other day. Oh, and I would never bring up the gravity-challenged issue, as I’m above the 1/8th category myself.
er make that 1/8th ton category.
…hiring for personal proofreader…
I watched the debate, I thought that Barnett did well too. I was a little disappointed in Sebelius. I had the opportunity to talk with her before whe was governor. Very bright and outgoing. Although I didn’t agree weth her on a few issues I felt she was sincee and had the best interest in Kansas in mind.
I didn’t see that in the debate. I didn’t see that in Barnett either. Oh well.
I voted by mail yesterday, I don’t have to pay attention for two more years!
Hank
;^)
Both gravity and follicle challenged …
I notice that Sebelius has the courage to debate her challenger; Tankerless Todd does not.
Hank,Onward-through the fog.
JM?
I call on you again to change that nic. We have a J M here who does not deserve to be confused with you.
I digress. JM? I don’t think you’ve much buisiness telling Ed how to vote! Didn’t you post just yesterday that “My family has voted Republican since the party was formed”? Your words yes?
Well JM that speaks of either entrenched self interest or hereditary mental illness…..or both.
Are you a wealthy person JM? Has your family always been so? If so, you would seem to confirm the commonly known truth that the Republican party is the party of the rich.
If you and your family are not wealthy, I’d have to look again at the mental fitness angle……
The Eagle’s only reasons for endorsing torture Tiahrt is that he’s in office and he enjoys pork barrel spending. In other words the Eagle would endorse Hitler and Stalin for their past experience and their huge amounts of government spending.
Congratulations, Tiahrt knows how to use a chair and a pen. In the realm of Republican leadership those must be big accomplishments since it’s enough to earn an endorsement.
Posted by: J R | October 29, 2006 at 11:34 AM
“I digress. JM? I don’t think you’ve much buisiness telling Ed how to vote!”
If you re-read my post, I don’t think I told Ed how to vote. Re-read Ed’s post, he was trying to convince a whole party how to vote.
“I call on you again to change that nic. We have a J M here who does not deserve to be confused with you.”How about no? Those are my initials. Besides if you get too confused, you can verify who is who by looking at the email address.
“Are you a wealthy person JM? Has your family always been so? If so, you would seem to confirm the commonly known truth that the Republican party is the party of the rich.”
Really? All Republicans are rich? How many other stereotypes do you hold in your bag of goodies?
And hows about you answer questions before asking your own buttercup? No all Republicans are not rich. There are plenty of good STUPID people who vote Republican.
So which are you “JM”? rich or stupid?
I’m not sure exactly when McGinn filed for the election, but the winner of the election was determined long before.
Todd Tiahrt had a campaign fund at the first of the year that discouraged any viable opponent. He had enough money to ensure that there would not be a serious challenger.
You cannot win a congressional seat unless you have money and the support of the national party (read more money). The DNC and the DNCC want to elect as many democrats to congress that they can. They can’t afford to waste money on second rate candidates to run against strong encumbants. They need to concentrate their funds in races that they stand a chance to win.
McGinn seems to be a good man. He seems to have tried to give back to the community in various non-political ways. If he actually had an original thought and the backing of his party he might have a chance to get elected.
In a political campaign you don’t do things that help your opponent get more votes. Tiahrt has nothing to gain by debating McGinn. The people that support Tiahrt now would learn nothing new. The people that don’t support Tiahrt would learn nothing new. The people that don’t care one way or another will learn that there is an opponent running against Tiahrt and that he has a name.
Should Tiahrt be willing to debate? Sure. Would I watch a debate? Sure. Maybe, just maybe I might learn that there is more to McGinn than the sophmoric position statements on his website would indicate. But I doubt it.
Hank
Posted by: J R | October 29, 2006 at 11:50 AM
“And hows about you answer questions before asking your own buttercup? No all Republicans are not rich. There are plenty of good STUPID people who vote Republican.
So which are you “JM”? rich or stupid?”
Oh, you forgot to include ‘good’ as one of the choices in your final question. Besides if I was ’stupid’ why would you want me in the Democratic Party?
In case anyone missed it, my political satire cartoon.
Oh and J R, I can explain it to you, if you don’t get it. :)
http://mccluer.name/scary.jpg
Dear Ben,
I’m not sure how I missed a chance to ‘zing’ you. I too am a little gravity and folically challenged. I didn’t read that thread until now. I read less than half the BLOG threads. A man has to pace hisself!
When I retired from the Navy I weighed 165 and had a nice head of brown hair.
I mrried a beautiful little Italian girl and I’m now at 200 and have a miimum amount of grey hair.
At one time I weighed in at 245. I went on the Zone diet and lost down to 175. Since then I slowly gained back up to 200. I feel that I’m at least 25lbs over weight, but I’ve been able to maintain that weight for the last six or seven years and I can still get on my horse without the aid of an upside down five gallon bucket.
So… until I get back down to my fighting weight again… you are safe from zingers from my quarter.
Hank
The fact that the Republican Party is playing in fictitious dirt isn’t surprising. According to Wikipedia, Karl Rove has been psychologically traumatized, deeply. His father ran away from his duties and abandoned his family. His mother committed suicide. Rove is from a very SICK family. At the age of 9, he was beat up by a GIRL.So, let’s reasonably conclude that he has a massive inferiority complex. Somebody you want to shape our lives?
In 1970, according to Wikipedia, he fraudulently represented himself to get access to Democrat Alan J. Dixon’s office and stole 1000 blank letterheads, that he used to post official-apparent Dixon letters promising “free beer, free food, girls and a good time for nothing,” and distributed them at rock concerts and homeless shelters, with the effect of disrupting Dixon’s rally.
Rove told the Dallas Morning News in 1999, “It was a youthful prank at the age of 19 and I regret it.”. Dan Balz. “Karl Rove – The Strategist”, The Washington Post, July 23, 1999.
So, he’s a criminal. He committed fraud to commit theft, and then perpetrated fraud using stolen letterhead. (But, no the Republicans wouldn’t commit election fraud by hacking voting machines. Rove learned, “I didn’t get caught committing theft and fraud, so I’m never going to do it again.”
Dick Cheney used a series of maneuvers to avoid getting drafted to go to Vietnam. He first used student deferments, then relied on a married-without-children gambit. When the rules were changed to make such men draftable, he got his wife pregnant to declare he was a married man with a child, when his wife was three months pregnant. She delivered 9 months and 2 days after the new policy was enacted.
Donald Rumsfeld learned to fly planes for the Navy after Korea and before Vietnam. He was completely eligible to sign up for naval aviator service in Vietnam. He declined the opportunity.
George Bush avoided the draft by entering the Air National Guard, which wasn’t called up.
We haven’t caught OBL. Where is the Taliban leadership ensconsed? In Pakastan. Have we launched cruise missiles at Pakistan, or invaded, to eliminate the Taliban leadership? No, we haven’t. Have we mounted an efffort to end Taliban control of large parts of Afghanistan? No, we haven’t. See http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/29/magazine/29taliban.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
If the administration is run by brilliant people, then they’ve intentionally created a failure scheme and have lied to the American people. If not, then they’re totally incompetent. In Operation Desert Storm Bush 41 said he didn’t take out Saddam and capture Baghdad because the international coalition, including 118,000 Saudies, 40,000 Egyptians, 17,000 Syrians, would not support it.In Operation Desert Shield, we didn’t have Muslim cooperation. Bush 41 might have said privately to Bush 43, “You were always a f**k up. I got you into Yale, but you were a loser. I played baseball, you warmed the pine. I got into law school, you didn’t. I set up a wildcatter oil company, you tried by muffed it. You still are a loser. But at least help my oilogarch friends.”
Hank – you have given me a great idea. It’s not MY fault I’m overweight – it’s my WIFE’S fault! And it’s my grandkids’ fault I’m bald!
;^)
Ah Ben,
I don’t think it was my wife’s fault! She is an excellent cook, but she’s never force fed me!
When I retired I was maintaining diver’s quals, smoked Pall Malls, chewed Copenhagen and drank my Jack Daniels neat.
When I retired, I met my wife, quit smoking, quit chewing, quit drinking brown liquer and got a desk job.
I do watch what I eat a little more than I did, get excercise training and trialing my dogs and riding horses. Still, there’s that 25/30lbs that I would gladly trade for a full head of hair.
Hank
heartlander,
Wow, someone is bitter.
Oh well Hank – it’s worth a try!
;^)
How much power will tiahrt have when the democrats retain control of congress.
Actually, I’m kind of hoping Democrats take over the House of Representatives. Other than increasing taxes, my guess is they won’t be any more or less effective than the Republicans.
We will see though after the election and new names appear in D.C.
Throw-away vote? That is garbage. You have only one vote. You can’t vote in a voting block with someone else – there is no guarantee what anyone will do when he is all by himself in the voting booth. I have chosen to vote my conscience rather than vote in fear. Libertarianism is my conscience.
After 6 yrs. in control, it’s the only thing Repubs. have going for them, such a shame.
How about this for adverse politics: My parents got a call from a “person” identifying themselves as being with the Harris Poll. They asked them why they didn’t vote for Todd Tiahrt. Mystified, my Mother asked how did they know if they did or did not vote for Tiahrt or not and what business was it of the Harris Poll to ask such a leading question (as if it was them really anyway). The supposed “pollster’s” response was, “Well you are going to pay for that mistake!” Who are these people? What makes them even believe that this kind of threat even works. It’s stupid to believe that this could swing a vote thier direction. In fact, if it was me, I would go the other way and vote for the opposition. And YES… you conspiritor theorists, it could be someone from the “other” side. But again I ask, WHY? It just works against thier side too! But we all know WHO it MUST be! Tiahrt is what he is… A born again right wing antiaborshinista who knows that a Constitutional Amendment will never happen. The Bill of Rights makes it the States right to put it in thier Constitutions and it would be stuck down anyway by the courts. Study the document and you’d know that’s the way it is, folks. It’s just the Repuplican way to use hot-button issues to swing voters thier way to stay in power. I would like to see if anyone else got a similar call or if Tiahrt’s or anyones camp would respond to this if it was bought out that thier “believers” are such flagrant boilerplaters. The Republicans must be desperate to use these kind of tactics.Besides, Todd’s peeps need to get a real life, respect the rights of women to make thier own decsisions as far as thier bodies go and Todd needs to ab@rt himself from his losing cause. And remember why Roe V. Wade happened… We don’t want the tragic alternatives, folks.
If you do not vote for the people you want to see in power, don’t be surprised when it never happens.
Vote Libertarian if you agree with the principals and ideals that party represents.
If you want to send the Republicans a message, try talking to them. Become active within the party. Get in with the good old boys. The same is true of the Democrats. Get to know them. Then you can be afraid with the rest of us who can no longer tell the major parties apart.
Vote Libertarian
By all means, VOTE LIBERTARIAN!
All you Republicans that hate the way your party has sold you out to big oil and the pool-side portfolio watchers instead of small government and fewer restrictions, vote libertarian.
You’ll do for the Republicans what Ross Perot did for H. W. Bush.
But the eagles endorsement of tiahrt and the reason they gave seems silly. Because in about 30 days there will be a democratic takeover, and all of those powerful positions held by KS politicians like tiahrt and brownback, and roberts are history. They will be replaced with liberals. And giving the rising star status of our state, turning blue, and all, chances are Garth McGinn would have been rewarded.
Using their reasoning, if power for ks business is what was really important to them, they should have endorsed Garth Mcginn.
At least he would have been a member of the ruling party.
Again, even if relected, in about 30 days, Todd Tiahrts power in Washington will be greatly diminished.
wow.
Shill central!
And if you really want to take it a step further…
Think about all of the misbehaving our powerful Ks Politicains have been involved.
Tiahrt has never been forced to answer what he knows about foley, or abramhoff, or delay, or frist, or cheney..
The list is so long, and he is so close with these men…just think of the times they have come to Wichita to shill for him, raising volumes of money. These very same men are all in jail or heading to jail.
Do we really want the embarrassment of Todd Tiahrts record becoming public when the Democrats takeover. Because you know it will all come out.
The Eagle could have not endorsed Todd for a million reasons. He is pathetic. His record is pathetic. He has been AWOL on everything that matters to hard working, tax paying people of the fourth district. He has been AWOL to our own military kids. AWOL to global warming, AWOL, for education, and STEM Cell Research…
Todd Tiahrt has a record. But it isn’t one that we want to hear about.
If Todd Tiarht is reelected, with the new wave of democrats, and the beauiful blue takeover of the house.
I doubt very much that even Todd Tiahrt will want to stick around for the reality of his ties with all of the creepy delay, cheney abramhoff types. It will come out.
So for them to endorse him and try and use his powerful ethics committee connections will only come back to haunt everyone in Kansas.
Spare us all the embarassment.
Vote for Garth McGinn
He’s a much better candidate anyway.
Our political sysytem is DEAD, that’s why every election devolves into squabbling over minutiae and filth. Sadly though, the sheeple seem to love, much as sickos love “golden showers”, damned fetishists!
Viva La Revolucion Blanco!!
Cin,
Sorry, couldn’t help myself, but did you know in 1995 President Bill Clinton signed into law the Dickey Amendment which makes it illegal for Federal money to be used for research where stem cells are derived from the destruction of the embryo.
Just thought I’d let you know. :)
For those who are interested Jan Beemer, family values GOP contender for the 86th District was recently arrested for speeding and driving with a suspended license.
http://www.maggotpunks.com/mp.html
She is one helluva kook.
Doug: Sorry I missed your note before I replied to Political Mama and commented (see comment #4) about that Maggot piece here:
http://www.saljournal.com/blogs/?p=1489
We may both finally agree that we don’t like the laws about non-profits in politics.
“She is one helluva kook.”
This is same woman who ran against Judy Loganbill last time, and lost by only 99 votes. She is indeed a kook: she attacked Judy’s patriotism and her religion at all at once.
I hope the voters of the 86th district give her a sound thumping this time.
Heartlander,
You omitted the one really interesting detail of the Karl Rove story. His stepfather, a man who Karl was close to, Louis Rove, was gay.
Kinda makes you wonder how he manages to pander to the far right branch of the party with the anti-gay marriage wedge issue.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-moore/the-closets-of-karl-and-k_b_28669.html
(Patti is Ron and Nancy’s daughter)
By Patti DavisNewsweek
Oct. 25, 2006 – When I was a kid, I was once being teased relentlessly by a bully at school, and I faked being sick to stay home and avoid him. My parents knew I was faking (the thermometer under hot water trick didn’t work) but they also knew something was wrong. My father came into my room to talk to me, and I willingly confessed. He patiently explained to me that the best way to deal with a bully was to totally ignore him—treat him as if he is invisible. Because all bullies really want is attention.I got it right back then. I returned to school, ignored the persistent bully, and he backed off. I seem less able to do that now when a bully by the name of Rush Limbaugh has accused Michael J. Fox of faking the symptoms of Parkinson’s (OK, he actually said “acting”) for political purposes. Fox, who could easily be held blameless if he reacted with rage and vitriol, has exhibited grace and dignity, ignoring the blathering accusations of the radio host and expressing appreciation that, just two weeks before the midterm elections, we are discussing stem-cell research. We could all learn from the way the actor has responded to cruelty; certainly I can.
Fox, stricken with Parkinson’s disease while still in his 30s, has not shied away from public view or expressed any self-pity or anger at the hand fate has dealt him. In fact, he has called himself “lucky”—for the unwavering love of his family, a career he can be proud of and the opportunity to use his fame to bring attention to the miracles that stem-cell treatment holds for people afflicted with many diseases, including Parkinson’s. He has demonstrated courage, generosity and compassion.
Limbaugh, on the other hand, flagrantly broke the law by procuring large amounts of drugs and then escaped the punishment that someone who is not white, wealthy and famous would have gotten. He spends his time insulting people and gets paid handsomely to do so; now we have seen that even those with serious diseases don’t get a reprieve from his cruel bluster. And his apology doesn’t cancel out the nastiness of his original comment.
While I am obviously not ignoring Limbaugh, I am determined to focus more of my attention on Fox, because he is an example of how all of us should live our lives. There will always be cruelty in the world, there will always be bullies. How we respond is what matters. There are loftier goals than mudslinging. The people we will remember years from now are those who kept walking calmly and kindly through the worst mudslinging, who kept their attention on the changes they wished to make in the world and who treated others with compassion even when they were being abused.
Fox could slink away and hide his disease from us—few would blame him. Instead, he is using the misfortune that came his way to try and open doors to a miraculous future—a future in which diseases like Parkinson’s, diabetes, ALS and Alzheimer’s could perhaps be cured. He will be known for that work, as well as for his dignity in the face of insults.
Hopefully, stem-cell treatment will be available in time to cure Michael J. Fox. There are no stem cells, though, that can cure heartlessness. Cruelty is a demon that feeds on itself. Limbaugh’s fate is ultimately the harsher one.
Hank Price,
Wouldn’t be monday without some smug fascism dished up by the WeBlog’s resident self-proclaimed ‘daddy.’
(Ian, take your drink. I know it’s early, but you promised.)
“Adults in charge.” Man, Hank Price, yer killin’ CF. Guess y’all have had that GOP election-stealing machine on the charger in the garage, just waiting for next Tuesday.
It’s gonna be GREAT watching the GOP’s trial lawyers contesting every close election and trying to steal the results in the courts–just like the last two. Rove’s been setting this up for a while in the media.
*********************************
Billmon has a great ‘big picture’ piece from 10/27, on negative campaigning and the rapidly degrading traditional media environment. I’ll excerpt part of it here.
The Enemies of Truth
Billmon
“The corporate media have finally noticed that a very large, very rabid skunk is busy spraying its caustic stink all over the 2006 election campaign. Some journalists, like the Washington Post’s Michael Grunwald, are even acknowledging — oh-so-gently — that the varmint has a name:
While negative campaigning is a tradition in American politics, this year’s version in many races has an eccentric shade, filled with allegations of moral bankruptcy and sexual perversion . . The result has been a carnival of ugly, especially on the GOP side, where operatives are trying to counter what polls show is a hostile political environment by casting opponents as fatally flawed characters.It’s an improvement, at least, over the spin being put on the story at ABC News, where Mark Halperin is taking his promise to keep conservatives happy this November literally, and blaming the Democrats for ads they haven’t run yet.
But no one in the corporate media, to my knowledge, has even come close to putting an accurate lead on the story — which would look something like this:
Faced with the likely loss of one if not both houses of Congress, the Republican Party has embarked on a massive, last-ditch effort to smear Democratic challengers in competitive districts across the country.The resulting campaign has completely demolished whatever minor restraints remained on the use of lies and distortions in political attack ads, and has pushed the already debased American political process to a new low.
A “straight” journalist couldn’t possibly write a lead like that and expect to get it past his/her editor — even though the Republicans themselves revealed their intentions quite clearly some weeks ago:
The National Republican Congressional Committee, which this year dispatched a half-dozen operatives to comb through tax, court and other records looking for damaging information on Democratic candidates, plans to spend more than 90 percent of its $50 million-plus advertising budget on what officials described as negative ads.Opposition research is power,” said Rep. Thomas M. Reynolds (N.Y.), the NRCC chairman. “Opposition research is the key to defining untested opponents.”
The only fresh “news” is that the resulting ads are even fouler and more despicable than any the Rovian machine has unleashed in the past — to the point where some of them would probably have made Joseph Goebbels himself blush.
This alone tells you something about the almost complete breakdown of political accountability in this country. The Rovians now assume they can say anything, any freaking thing at all, and it will still come out the other end of the journalistic sausage factory as a “balanced” assessment that “both parties are doing it.”
And so, after listing five specific cases of maximum, over-the-top GOP sleaze — including Ken Blackwell’s gaybaiting in Ohio, claims in Indiana that Democrats “want to abort black babies,” and the now-infamous masturbating geezers and Vietnamese prostitutes ad in Wisconsin and North Carolina — the Post story adds this caveat:
Some Democrats are playing rough, too. House candidate Chris Carney is running ads slamming the “family values” of Rep. Don Sherwood (R-Pa.), whose former mistress accused him of choking her. And House candidate Kirsten Gillibrand has an ad online ridiculing Rep. John E. Sweeney (R-N.Y.) for attending a late-night fraternity party.And that’s it: the sum total of the evidence produced for the case that Democrats are also “playing rough.” Chastising Don Sherwood for beating his mistress, an affair (the sex, not the abuse) that he has already publicly admitted, and tweaking John Sweeney for his party habits. This is “balanced” only in the same sense that an elephant balances a mouse — because, after all, both are mammals.
The way the media is currently handling the GOP’s Swiftboat extravaganza is a textbook example of how the conventions of journalistic “objectivity” have become the enemies of truth, not its allies. It shows why so many on the left are so angry even with “responsible,” non-Foxified news organizations: because they insist on describing a moral equivalence that factually doesn’t exist — and which many, if not most, reporters know does not exist.
The Democrats certainly aren’t the Children of Light here, and there’s no question liberals are perfectly capable of ignoring the motes in their own eyes — and those of their political patrons. The general reaction in Left Blogistan to the reporting on Harry Reid’s land dealings in Nevada was a good example. Lefty bloggers generally fell all over themselves excusing Reid’s financial ties to an extremely dirty circle of local Las Vegas pols (to find out how dirty, Google “Operation G-string” or “Rick Rizzolo”) and arguing that the Minority Leader’s failure to disclose his partnership with a known mob attorney was a mere technicality. Reid’s dealings may not have been illegal, or even unethical, but I have absolutely no doubt that if he had been a Republican pol caught with the same pair of pants around his ankles, the cries at Daily Kos for a special prosecutor would have been deafening.
But at some point refusing to recognize the disproportionality — a disciplined, lavishly funded and utterly ruthless authoritarian machine on one side; the usual run of backslapping bribe takers on the other — becomes a form of lying, and we’re long past that point.
When even Chris Matthews can smell the odor wafting from “Ken Mehlman’s cesspool,” you know how strong the stench is, but most journalists, most of the time, continue to flee from the truth: that the GOP machine will use every totalitarian propaganda trick in the book, if need be, to keep all three branches of the federal government in its grip. Or, at a minimum, that the men at the top — Rove, Mehlman and, of course, Junior — show no signs of having any limits on their willingness to use such techniques.
The sinking sensation this produces in my stomach is comparable to the feeling I had after the Abu Ghraib story broke, when it quickly became clear that torture and sexual abuse had been used as routine tools of interrogation not just in Iraq but at Guantanamo and in Afghanistan, but the corporate media insisted on treating the Cheney Administration’s lies as equal to, if not greater than, the events unfolding in front of their eyes.
I could, of course, cite other examples — the WMD fraud, the secret wiretapping, the insane debate over whether the sectarian slaughter in Iraq qualifies as a “civil war,” and so on. But the common denominator, in each case, was the corporate media’s stubborn, and I would say deliberate, insistence on “balancing” obvious lies and partisan spin against the facts. Truth versus truthiness.
Needless to say, if the TV bimbos and the ink-stained wretches were willing to give the Geneva Convention that kind of treatment, it’s no surprise they’re willing to do the same in a political campaign — which, after all, tend to be vapid, vicious, inane and dishonest even at the best of times. But every failure to draw some kind of line, to make a distinction between “both parties are doing it” and “one of the two parties is completely out of control,” encourages the out-of-control party to behave even more outrageously. In the end, it will also force the Democrats to respond in kind (that is, if they want to survive) thus making ABC’s prediction that the left, too, will unleash it’s garbage a self-fulfilling prophesy.
Or maybe not, since the Dems also depend heavily on the votes of moderate, educated voters, male and female, who may not respond as readily to the kind of limbic politics the GOP now specializes in. But if that’s so, then we’re probably well on our way to the corporate one-party state, in which case the question may eventually arise: Why do we even need elections, or a bunch of arrogant, culturally liberal reporters to cover them?
Forgive me for belaboring the obvious here. I’m obviously not the first guy to make the point that ignoring the truth is not the same thing as telling the truth (genuflects before pictures of Paul Krugman and Stephen Colbert) but where I might go beyond most liberal critics is in arguing that the “objectivity” convention itself is primarily a commercial arrangement, not a political one. And, like all arrangements in a dynamic capitalist economy, it has a finite life cyle, one which may be nearing its end.
The mass media — the TV networks, the news weeklies, the large, national circulation newspapers like the New York Times — have been under enormous economic pressures for over a decade now, and those pressures are only getting worse. The mass market itself is being torn apart, into smaller and smaller niches. For most old media, the networks in particular, it’s become a zero sum game. Just trying to hold the audiences they have is a losing battle. This loss of market power is one of the forces driving the trend towards consolidation (oligopoly). It’s a defensive reaction in an industy that is getting more competitive, not less.”
Continued at http://www.billmon.org
Direct link to Billmon’s post:http://billmon.org/archives/002894.html
Oh my gawd! Who the hell made that Ian link? That’s just too funny!