Iconoclastic

reposted from www.democrats.com:
Submitted by Bob Fertik on September 10, 2008

It may be two months until Election Day, but the Presidential campaign ended today. Why? Because the McCain campaign decided shameless serial lying was perfectly ok. So from now on, we will hear nothing but shameless serial lies from the McCain campaign.

There is no point in paying attention to the news. Just decide your most important reason for election Barack Obama and defeating John McCain, and devote your efforts to persuading everyone you know to vote with you.

As usual, Hunter says it best:

is this really what we had devolved to? That, quote, "these little facts" are secondary, in elections, and there's not a dam thing we can do about it? Candidates for teh presidency can silmpy lie through their teeth, and it is a good thing, because the ability to affect the narrative via a repeated lie is much more useful than any possible blowback for telling that lie?

Then what do we have elections for? If I can simply stand up and say "so-and-so's tax policy will cost you all one million dollars each," when it wont' or "so-and-so is a supporter of infanticide," when he isn't, or "so-andso wants to show your children dirty pictures," when it's not true, or "I was against this bad thing" when we've got freakin' film of you supporting it -- what's the point? It is impossible to have a democracy without informed voters, and it is impossible to have informed voters when you are going out of your way to lie to them.

I said it yesterday, and I'll say it again. Crooks. That's the only word for it. There's no noble or higer purpose here, there's nothing admirable about it, not even in the most brutal, Machiavellian sense. They're liars. They're crooks. It is taken as a Republican given that anything that can gain power is justifiable, regardless of how loathsome it is or how depraved the fabrication.

If we welcom open, direct lies into our political discourse, it's not political discourse anymore -- just the oratorical equivalent of an organized crime ring. McCain knows he can lie through his teeth and almost nobody will truly call him out on it -- at least, not compared to all the people who will hear the lie. That's been the strategy for every election involving the old Nixonites, from then until now, and there's no chance it's going to go away until there is a price to be paid for being a nationally televised liar. So when's that going to be?