Bloomberg has an article about Republican dirty politics in South Carolina which has been heating up in preparation for the primary:Among Republicans, the shenanigans this year include automated telephone pseudo-surveys trashing former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson's stance on abortion, mailings claiming Arizona Senator McCain turned his back on fellow prisoners of war in Vietnam and a phony Christmas card from former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney extolling polygamy.
Whats more interesting is that they not only recognize the problem... South Carolina Republicans are proud of it:
``Politics in South Carolina has been, from the very beginning, since colonial times, kind of a blood sport,'' said Trey Walker, who served as the state's Republican Party executive director from 1993 to 1999 and is now a consultant for McCain. ``South Carolina is a small state and everyone knows each other, and it becomes very personal.''
Some practitioners of the dark political arts defend these tactics. In 2004, Warren Tompkins, a veteran South Carolina political strategist who worked the Bush campaign in 2000, was asked why operatives spread false rumors about McCain in that race. ``It worked, didn't it?'' said Tompkins, who now works for Romney.
I've heard Virginia Politics referred to as "dirty"- but if this kind of stuff happened here in the Old Dominion- my hope is that even Republicans would be swift to condemn it.
Matusleo
Ut Prosim