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Maybe Americans have always been nuts ..; ... and the world is just finding out
Topic Started: Aug 23 2004, 10:41 AM (366 Views)
Wichita
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The Adminstrator wRench
Quote:
 
With Liberty and Slander for All 
By: Bill O'Reilly for BillOReilly.com
Thursday, Aug 19, 2004 

With just about ten weeks until the Presidential vote, smear merchants on both sides continue to run wild. The internet is one big Defamation.com; John Kerry is a traitor, George W. Bush is a deserter. And there's big money behind the purveyors of this vile brew.
But this is nothing new for America. What's changed is the machinery that delivers the slander. All throughout our history character assassins have surfaced every four years to attack anyone daring enough to run for the highest office in the land. The freedom of screech extends all the way back to 1796.

In that election, campaign supporters of John Adams really went after his opponent Thomas Jefferson, calling him, among other things, an atheist, anarchist, demagogue, coward, trickster and a mountebank.

A mountebank is a guy who sells phony medicine, in case you're like me and didn't know.

Jefferson's crowd immediately struck back by labeling Adams: egotistical, erratic, eccentric and jealous-natured.

Historian Paul Boller describes all this in his lively book "Campaigns" (Oxford Press). Boller chronicles each Presidential contest, and it's clear that we have learned little over the years. The mud stays eerily similar throughout the ages.

In 1828, for example, backers of John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson were totally out of control. Jackson won the vote despite being accused of adultery, gambling, cock fighting, bigamy, slave trading, drunkenness, theft, lying, and murder. I guess the voters figured anyone with that much energy deserved the top job.

But Jackson's people didn't silently stand by. No way. They hammered Adams hard, accusing him of having premarital relations with his wife and traveling on a Sunday. It doesn't get lower than that.

The slime machine behind James Polk went to work in 1844, announcing that his opponent, Henry Clay, had systemically violated every one of The Ten Commandments.

Clay's mudslingers immediately replied calling Polk "unimaginative." Polk won the election carrying much of the non-creative vote.

U.S. Grant was, perhaps, the most vilified Presidential candidate in history. Running against Horace Greeley in 1872, Grant was called a crook, an ignoramus, a drunk, a swindler, and an "utterly depraved horse jockey."

It's entirely possible that last attack caused much sympathy for Grant who carried 31 of 37 states. A depraved horse jockey indeed!

In 1912, Theodore Roosevelt was actually shot in the chest while campaigning in Milwaukee. He got up, finished his speech, and then went to the hospital. Woodrow Wilson won the election, but let's give the Rough Rider some credit here.

During the campaign of 1928, hysteria reigned because Al Smith was a Roman Catholic. Some supporters of his opponent Herbert Hoover got this message out: If elected, Smith would annul all Protestant marriages and extend the newly completed Holland Tunnel in New York City all the way to Rome! Talk about a big dig.

Compared to the above, calling Bill Clinton a "pot smoking, draft dodger," or labeling John Kerry a "flip-flopper" doesn't even rate. President Bush's intelligence is being challenged but nowhere have I seen him accused of fathering an out-of-wedlock child as was Grover Cleveland (who actually did). So while we have been assaulted by Swift Boats and taunted by the likes of Michael Moore, the slime peddlers are not nearly as creative as they used to be.

I just pray Bush and Kerry don't travel on Sunday.

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Minuet
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Fleet Admiral Assistant wRench, Chief Supper Officer
:loling: :loling: :loling:

I didn't know about the long and distinguished history of mudslinging in the US presidential elections.

But I've always known Americans were nuts ;)
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Hoss
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Don't make me use my bare hands on you.
I'm gonna have to pack up and move to any other country on earth where politics is clean and friendly and stuff like this never happens.
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Admiralbill_gomec
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Like where? Monaco?
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Minuet
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38957
Aug 23 2004, 12:55 PM
I'm gonna have to pack up and move to any other country on earth where politics is clean and friendly and stuff like this never happens.

Not that politics is "clean" anywhere else, but Americans have made mudslinging an art form.
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somerled
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Admiral MacDonald RN
nah!

Perhaps the average yank is pretty sensible when in small groups (most the present company included).

Perhaps it's just their foreign policy and economic system that's nutz. :evil1:
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38957
Aug 23 2004, 05:55 PM
I'm gonna have to pack up and move to any other country on earth where politics is clean and friendly and stuff like this never happens.

Good uck then, i don't know anywhere on the planet.
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Hoss
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Don't make me use my bare hands on you.
Minuet
Aug 23 2004, 11:58 AM
38957
Aug 23 2004, 12:55 PM
I'm gonna have to pack up and move to any other country on earth where politics is clean and friendly and stuff like this never happens.

Not that politics is "clean" anywhere else, but Americans have made mudslinging an art form.

First of all it is just mud-slinging and it revealing of our political freedom.

Second, I wonder what we would find if we delved into the political debates and rhetoric of another country like England, Canada, France, Australia or Germany. Would we find baseless accusations, misleading statements, misdirection, scandal, etc. or would it just be a bunch of boring, yet informative debates on the important issues of the time?

And if you want to talk about tabloids and politics, nobody has anything on the British Royals. All the crap on Prince and Princess whomever and who they had fooled around with made Clinton look like a choir boy. Okay, maybe not a choir boy, but the point is that the public and the politicians in other countries like to go down into the sewer as well.

I have seen stories where there have been fist fights in the assemblies in other countries. I don't remember seeing that in congress.
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Minuet
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Fleet Admiral Assistant wRench, Chief Supper Officer
38957 please reread my comment. I said "Not that politics is "clean" anywhere else".

I just think that what I have seen so far is much dirtier then what I have seen in Canadian politics. The mudslinging goes on to a certain extent here - but as I said, the Americans have made it an art form.

As for it showing your "political freedom", sorry I am not impressed. To me freedom is knowing the real truth. Mudslinging is just exagerations and outright lies. It adds nothing to freedom.
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Wichita
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The Adminstrator wRench
Minuet
Aug 23 2004, 05:34 PM
As for it showing your "political freedom", sorry I am not impressed. To me freedom is knowing the real truth. Mudslinging is just exagerations and outright lies. It adds nothing to freedom.

Personal Response

I think you are both right.

"Freedom of Speech" can lead to excess. Hopefully there are checks and balances that will expose that "excess", but not always.

I don't doubt there was a level of partisianship in the Watergate investigations - both by the media and by Congress - but not to the extent that there is today. At least then, there appeared to be an actual investigation. One clue to the next to the next. These days facts seem in short supply, but opinions are plentiful.

End of Personal Response
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Minuet
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Talking about mudslinging - I would love to know if this article is telling the truth.

Pledging allegiance to Bush-Cheney

Quote:
 
Pledging allegiance to Bush-Cheney


SIDNEY BLUMENTHAL
SPECIAL TO THE STAR

Before attending a rally to hear Vice-President Dick Cheney, citizens in New Mexico were required to sign a political loyalty oath endorsing the re-election of George W. Bush.

Around the country, Bush is campaigning at events billed as "Ask President Bush." Only supporters are allowed entrance and talking points are distributed to questioners.

In Traverse City, Mich., a 55-year-old social studies teacher who wore a small Kerry sticker on her blouse had her ticket torn up at the door. "How can anyone in the United States deny someone entry?" she asked. "Isn't this a democracy?"

At every rally, Bush repeats the same speech, touting a "vibrant economy" and his leadership in a war where "you cannot show weakness."

He introduces local entrepreneurs who praise his tax cuts. And then he calls on questioners. More than one-fifth of them profess their evangelical faith or denounce gay marriage.

In Niceville, Fla., one said: "This is the very first time that I have felt that God was in the White House."

"Thank you," replied Bush.

Bush's overriding strategy is to bolster his credential as a decisive military figure and to impugn his opponent's manhood.

In his latest TV commercial, he says: "We cannot hesitate, we cannot yield, we must do everything in our power to bring an enemy to justice before they hurt us again."

But according to the Washington Post, he has uttered the elusive Osama bin Laden's name only 10 times in the last two years and "on six of those occasions it was because he was asked a direct question .... Not once during that period has he talked about bin Laden at any length, or said anything substantive."

At his rallies, he mentions Sept. 11 only to raise the threat of Saddam Hussein.

Cheney (who had five draft deferments during Vietnam, saying he had "other priorities") sneered at John Kerry for using the word "sensitive" with respect to counterterrorism.

Not one war was "won by being sensitive," mocked Cheney.

Kerry, in fact, had called for fighting "a more effective, more thoughtful, more strategic, more proactive, more sensitive war on terror that reaches out to other nations and brings them to our side and lives up to American values in history."

Cheney's distortion is calculated to attempt to portray Kerry as somehow effeminate.

Since the birth of the American party system, presidential candidates have gone directly to the sovereign people — who are the only source of legitimacy and power — to make their case.

After the Democratic Convention, Kerry travelled from New England to the Pacific Northwest doing just that. Not one of the hundreds of thousands who attended his open-air rallies had to pledge allegiance to him, and he encountered organized Bush hecklers as part of the price.

At Bush's rallies, he is the packaged president as pseudo-populist. But these controlled environments reflect his deeper view of the presidency as sovereign, pre-empting democracy.

Foundering in the polls, without a strategy for Iraq, unwilling to say the name of bin Laden, he is always secure in knowing that the cheering multitudes have been carefully selected.

Strutting and swaggering on the stage as though he has conquered the crowd, he plays to true believers. But a social studies teacher from small-town Michigan who would not bend her knee had her ticket to see her president ripped up.

"Ask President Bush" has crystallized the essential underlying question, framed succinctly by the greatest American poet of democracy, Walt Whitman, who wrote: "The President is there in the White House for you, it is not you who are here for him."

salon.com


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Author Sidney Blumenthal served as a senior adviser in the Bill Clinton White House.




I ask because so much has been said on this board about Kerry being aloof and the "Free Speech" zones. If true, this is as bad as anything the Democrats have done to keep Republicans out of thier speeches. Next complaint I hear I will be thinking "Pot, Kettle, Black"
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Hoss
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Don't make me use my bare hands on you.
By political freedom I meant that anyone can criticize the political figures without repercussions or retaliation. If you're not impressed, I am sorry. Try doing this in North Korea.

Yes, this means that we get jack-asses like Michael Moore as a side-effect, but it beats having people cowering in fear of the government.

And I can't honestly believe that Americans have elevated political squabbling to an art form higher in degree than anybody else. I have studied global politics enough to write a book on the subject, but really, this sounds a great deal like America bashing. I expect this from somerled, ....
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Wichita
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The Adminstrator wRench
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Minuet, of course, all these instances* are true. Wasn't there a reporter handy to tell the story to? :whistle: :angel: :whistle: :angel:

Are ALL the citizens of New Mexico required to sign an oath to see the President? No, of course not. Were some at a specific event? Quite possibly ... some events in the campaign are private with different entry requirements.

Are ALL the Bush campaign stops like this ... the ones I saw on the news in Ohio certainly were not ... how else could the hecklers supportive of Kerry gotten in? :shrug:

Mudslinging comes in many forms ... ;)

*See the 1972 Nixon Campaign handbook :lol:

End of Personal Response

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Minuet
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38957
Aug 23 2004, 02:11 PM
By political freedom I meant that anyone can criticize the political figures without repercussions or retaliation. If you're not impressed, I am sorry. Try doing this in North Korea.

Yes, this means that we get jack-asses like Michael Moore as a side-effect, but it beats having people cowering in fear of the government.

And I can't honestly believe that Americans have elevated political squabbling to an art form higher in degree than anybody else. I have studied global politics enough to write a book on the subject, but really, this sounds a great deal like America bashing. I expect this from somerled, ....

You honestly can't say I sound like Somerled :frown:

I am not bashing America - I am just not a fan of your political campaign style. My right to "Free Speech" should allow me to say this without being denigrated as an America basher.

Yes, there may be other countries that mudsling just as bad but not most. I guess my comparison point is Canada. And yes, some mudslinging goes on here as well. But it's not the same. I don't know how to fully explain it. I was in Houston during the State and local campaigns 2 years ago. I have seen the difference first hand. Maybe if you have never seen a more civilized campaign then you have no comparison point. However, Canada is proof that you can have a free election with free speech and still remain civilized.
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Minuet
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Wichita
Aug 23 2004, 02:19 PM
Personal Response

Minuet, of course, all these instances* are true. Wasn't there a reporter handy to tell the story to? :whistle: :angel: :whistle: :angel:

Are ALL the citizens of New Mexico required to sign an oath to see the President? No, of course not. Were some at a specific event? Quite possibly ... some events in the campaign are private with different entry requirements.

Are ALL the Bush campaign stops like this ... the ones I saw on the news in Ohio certainly were not ... how else could the hecklers supportive of Kerry gotten in? :shrug:

Mudslinging comes in many forms ... ;)

*See the 1972 Nixon Campaign handbook :lol:

End of Personal Response

I don't disagree with your main point.

However - those who would jump on the Democrats so quickly are not giving them the benefit of the doubt that they too have some "specific" events that they want to keep private. As the article points out, there have been many open air events with thousands of participants. I am sure that at those events people were not checked for thier affiliation.

Just to be clear. My problem is not with the private events. It is with those on both sides who would use them to paint an unfair picture of the other side.
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