It's starting to get ugly. You've seen and read about it all week. The candidates are at each other's throats. The mud is starting to fly. It's becoming the kind of campaign that we all have come to know and love throughout the history of politics in our country.
Who can forget Davey Crockett accusing Martin Van Buren of wearing a woman's corset in the 1828 political election campaign of Andrew Jackson against John Quincy Adams? And, in that same election, a Republican pamphlet was circulated around stating that Democrat Andrew Jackson was "a gambler, a cockfighter, a slave trader and the husband of a really fat wife?"
'Member that? The Jackson campaign strategists countered by calling Adams "The Pimp" because "he had once coerced a young woman into an affair with a Russian nobleman when he had been the American Ambassador to Russia?" Then, Adams supporters issued a pamphlet saying that "General Jackson's mother was a prostitute." It's gone on for centuries, from Warren G. Harding to "Tricky" Dick Nixon and from Andrew Johnson to Lyndon Johnson. No one is innocent.
In 1884's election campaign, Grover Cleveland Alexander was accused of fathering a child out of wedlock. In 1952, Sen. Joe McCarthy accused the entire administration of President Harry Truman of harboring communists. It's gone on since the first election of 1789 to the last election in 2004, with Bush being accused of draft dodging and Sen. John Kerry's creditability as a Vietnam veteran being challenged by "Swift Boat Veterans?"
The Internet has made it worse. People with blogs can make outrageous claims without the fear of censorship. Nothing is sacred now.
So, how can we believe anybody anymore? We're faced with electing a new leader and we have to have the ability to filter out all the untruths again. I think all we really want is to live in a country with health care for all, an opportunity to make enough money to cover our bills and a place where we and our children are safe from crime and war. Everything else will be a plus in this period of "Electile Disfunction."
Nice talking to you.
