Thursday, September 09, 2004

Here We Go Again: Politics is dirty. We just live with it. It's kind of like e-mail spam. We hate it. But the reason we keep getting it is because some idiots out there keep buying it. The same goes for dirty campaign ads. We say that we don't like it, but obviously somebody buys into the garbage, otherwise nobody would run it.

That being said, I'm doubly annoyed that the Kerry campaign would push the same Bush bashing smears twice. We've already had a thorough look into Bush's National Guard duty back when the issue was raised in the spring and summer. While there seem to be some gaps, he received an honorable discharge. Any other accusations are just rumors.

Kerry got his taste of similar smears when the Swift Boat Vets questioned the senator's Vietnam service and medals last month. Kerry obviously earned the awards under normal military standards, and any accusations otherwise are just conjecture. It was a low hit by the Bush campaign. And just because Bush went through the same garbage doesn't give his supporters the right to air such trash. And Kerry rightfully asked that the Swift Boat ads be condemned. Bush, as we know, condemned both liberal and conservative independent groups that run trashy ads.

I'll be waiting for Kerry to condemn the repeated accusations that Bush was AWOL for his National Guard duty. I'll also be waiting for the news media run in depth investigations into whether Kerry really earned his medals like they're doing to Bush. And I'll wait for The New York Times to run several front-page articles revealing that the individuals repeating these smears are (gasp) politically active in the opposing political party of the guy they are attacking.

The Kerry campaign has now lost all of my sympathy they generated from the Swift Boat smears. However, given the success of Bush's smears against Kerry's Vietnam service, I expect both candidates to keep hammering away at each other's distant past.