Is anybody surprised that the all-out political assaults are affecting public opinion polls? Cold-hearted strategies can be highly effective. Full frontal assaults can do a lot of damage.
When truth is optional, there is no end to the damage that can be done in the run-up to an election.
Weeks too late, The New York Times’ (NYT) Public Editor, Byron Calame, has retracted his support for the Gray Lady’s exposure of the SWIFT program –– the secret money tracking program the Administration was using to find terrorists. Calame now says that the program was legal and that nobody’s private data was threatened in any way. What made him act in such an irresponsible way in the first place? The Administration’s “vicious criticism” of The New York Times after the original, erroneous article was published is what made him do it.
Albert Fernandez, Director of Public Diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the U.S. State Department, apologized this week for anti-American statements that he made in a recent interview, in Arabic no less, with Al-Jazeera –– the terrorist propaganda network of choice. Of course, there is no way that Al-Jazeera will broadcast his apology in a way that will erase all the damage he caused when he accused the U.S. of “arrogance and stupidity” in Iraq. There is no way, either, to keep Al-Jazeera from continuing to broadcast Fernandez’ praise for Yusuf al Qaradawi, a jihadist that the State Department official described as “a religious leader worthy of the deepest respect.” How can the American public ignore the fact that a high-ranking State Department spokesman gave support to the enemy while American soldiers are at war with the terrorists who get their information from that propaganda network?
So, who will prevail? Will the victors be the data crunching wonks with their get-out-the-vote strategies or the “hate America” national security wimps who are destroying all opposition in their lust for political dominance? Political ethics are at stake, but so are the principles of freedom and democracy. Can a nation long survive if every election becomes a matter of who is left standing after the Machiavellian political hacks slash and burn their way through the culture and media, if every election is reduced to wonks vs. wimps?