EDITORIALS
Some campaigns get nasty
Debates shift from policy to personal, and the voters ultimately get cheated
Politics, as an American humorist once said, “ain’t beanbag.” That’s always been true, but even in Western New York, where politics is played rough, this is shaping up as an especially disgusting year.
From the race for president to the region’s marquee campaign for Congress to a fight for a State Assembly seat, this election season is already fetid. Innuendo, false issues and outright lies have polluted the discussion of critical issues as the anything-to-win mentality tightens its grip on candidates who forget they are supposed to be offering voters a demonstration of maturity.
Barack Obama is a Muslim: That’s a lie, and irrelevant. Sarah Palin has five children: That’s true, but also irrelevant. Assemblyman Sam Hoyt had sex outside his marriage. Also true, but of questionable policy relevance, albeit a reflection of character.
This is the vulgarization of American politics and, sad to say, it works. As much as any other influence, it has driven Americans away from their own institutions of government and created the thirst for change that Obama has capitalized upon, and McCain is trying to capitalize upon.
This is not to say that negative campaigning doesn’t have its place. It does. It is entirely within bounds, for example, to challenge a candidate’s experience. Character also is a key evaluation for voters to make.
Republicans and Democrats are both beating up their opponents over the experience levels of Obama and Palin, McCain’s running mate, and appropriately so. They are issues that voters ought to consider. So are voting records, veracity and public conduct.
But with Jon Powers’ explanation about why his Iraqi children’s charity stumbled, does anyone really care anymore? Shouldn’t the congressional race to succeed Rep. Thomas Reynolds be about the economy, Iraq and legislative ambitions?
It’s been a long way down from the days when President Ronald Reagan and House Speaker Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill could argue during the day and share a drink at night. Today, with the influence of the Internet and the blogosphere, candidates run for office knowing that it is open season on them, their families and their records.
Any issue, regardless of its truthfulness (remember the Swift Boat) can sink a campaign. Hence, the wretched suggestions that one of Palin’s daughters, and not the candidate herself, gave birth to Trig, Palin’s young son with Down syndrome. Hence, too, Palin’s willful misstatements about Obama’s proposals to roll back President Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.
Even non-candidates are shaming themselves. B. Thomas Golisano’s new organization, Responsible New York, is linked in some secretive way to another group called Mothers and Fathers Demanding Answers. That organization is mailing flyers criticizing Hoyt’s marital infidelity.
That might be fair enough, but Responsible New York appears to be trying to hide its connection to the mailings. Why? If that’s what Responsible New York thinks, why not just say it instead of refusing to comment on its connection to the mailings?
Away from the white heat of campaigning, there are some hopeful signs of comity among adversaries. Some senators, including Hillary Clinton, Ted Kennedy and McCain, make a point of working with members of the other party (though right wingers like Rush Limbaugh have excoriated McCain for that virtue.) Other candidates — including Hoyt opponent Barbra Kavanaugh, who has consistently pointed out she has no link to the independent organizations involved, and Alice Kryzan, staying above the Jon Powers-Jack Davis fray, deserve some credit for restraint.
But when it comes to election season, this genie is out of the jar and it’s not likely to go back in. The question is whether, of necessity, each presidential election year has to be worse than the one before. It doesn’t look good. And when the campaign becomes more about the campaign than about the issues, voters get cheated.
