WaPo Continues Campaigning for Democrats

The Year Of Playing Dirtier
Negative Ads Get Positively Surreal

By Michael Grunwald
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 27, 2006; Page A01

Rep. Ron Kind pays for sex!

Well, that's what the Republican challenger for his Wisconsin congressional seat, Paul R. Nelson, claims in new ads, the ones with "XXX" stamped across Kind's face.

It turns out that Kind -- along with more than 200 of his fellow hedonists in the House -- opposed an unsuccessful effort to stop the National Institutes of Health from pursuing peer-reviewed sex studies. According to Nelson's ads, the Democrat also wants to "let illegal aliens burn the American flag" and "allow convicted child molesters to enter this country."

To Nelson, that doesn't even qualify as negative campaigning.

"Negative campaigning is vicious personal attacks," he said in an interview. "This isn't personal at all."

By 2006 standards, maybe it isn't.

On the brink of what could be a power-shifting election, it is kitchen-sink time: Desperate candidates are throwing everything. 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.

Well, it's obvious what Party Grunwald supports, lines like:

"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."

A statement patently inaccurate and biased, proves his dedication to the Democrat Party. Particularly in joining in the claim, made by Democrats, that the infamous "Playboy Party Advertisement" against Harold Ford is racist. The advertisement is only racist to those looking for a reason to call it so.

There is no doubt that the ads that Mr. Grunwald cites are way beyond the pale. To infer that some candidate pays for phone sex simply because one of his aides mis-dialed the telephone is really low and disgusting. The candidates who are making these absurd and slanderous claims deserve to be called down on their lies, but the fact is that this disgusting pattern extends equally across the spectrum of Left and Right.

As for the Harold Ford advertisement; it is clear that the charges of "racism" are contrived and weak. The advertisement is an amusing means of pointing out the Senators Liberal record. If he is embarrassed by his cavorting with Playboy Bunnies (most of whom are, in truth, white) then perhaps he should have more carefully considered his attendence to the party. We all are responsible for our own actions, after all.

The real problem here is the sad state of our electorate. In a society in which college students can't even name one member of the President's cabinet; in which the people don't even know any information about our government, whose in it, and what they are doing, the power of advertising is way greater than it should be. I can honestly say that I have never been influenced by any political advertisement. I have hardly ever been influenced by any advertisement other than those which introduce a new product or service which seems to be worthy of investigation.

Perhaps the press and our schools should spend more energy teaching our citizens about our government and its history rather than propagandizing and promoting their own political agenda.

Full Story: Post, Selling An Agenda

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