Is there a point beyond which smear campaigns become ineffective?

[Stinky The Clown]

06 is going to be butt ugly. Bloody, mean, hateful, and untrue accusations will be flung like a monkey in a cage slings feces.

The RW will almost certainly school their candidates in how to do it. The more red meat candidates on our side will be wise to do the same.

Every polled American decries the tactic. Every voting American falls for it.

But is there some point beyond which the well-demonstrated effectiveness of such a campaign will fall off to a point of counterproductiveness?

Will, say, Bush's poll numbers give lie to the rantings and lies of any republican candidate?

Would a smear of a candidate's children tip the scales?

LBJ's famous 'game plan' of accusing the other guy of being a pig fucker and making him deny it usually pays off.

But even in amoral America there has to be ***some*** line that no one dares to cross.

Or is there?

What do you think?

[waiting for hope]

1. It didn't work for the governor's race

in New Jersey as I recall and haven't you noticed lately that the RW talking heads haven't been saying the Dems have no message anymore? I think they are scared, really scares about '06 and frankly, we have too much true and good stuff to sling we needn't embellish anything...that is what has them worried...

[AtomicKitten]

2. if you think perhaps they don't dare pull another Swift Boat adventure,

think again. It's all they have. It's all they know.

[Stinky The Clown]

4. Indeed

And that's why I'm wondering about the 'line'.

The swiftboating was very effective. All lies. But effective.

I wonder, though, if that would work now if, for example, 06 were the midterms. With Ceaser Disgustus flirting with the 20s, would that campaign work the same or simply show him to be desperate and thus work against him. I honestly don't know.

[MrModerate]

3. I think if you accuse your opponent of . . .

Eating children in midnight rituals, cheating on his taxes and his wife, and not having really earned all those medals on his chest;

And your opponent accuses you of supporting an illegal war, favoring the rich, tearing up the constitution, wrecking the environment, and being incompetent to govern . . .

Your opponent will come up the winner.

We don't need to smear to smash these slimy fuckers. The truth is bad enough. Just keep at it, and also focus on what we'd do differently, and keep reminding the undecided and the maybe-voters how much worse things will get if they keep on in the same direction.

[BillZBubb]

5. To answer your question: YES.

But it is rare. It has to be a situation where the voters are totally fixed on a certain issue or issues. They will then judge the candidates on those and ignore most of the mud, particularly if it is not relevant to the key issues.

The Repugs game plan has to be to find a wedge issue powerful enough to take voters minds off the high gas prices. They then will mercilessly paint the Democrats as "soft" on that issue. If they can't find such an issue, they are in deep doo doo.

[skipos]

6. Some people feel Kilgore (R) lost to Kaine (D) in VA because

of the mud he threw.

[diamondsndust]

7. There's no need for mudslinging from Democrats

What they need to focus on is fact slinging. The outright and utter incompetence of this misadministration is overshadowed only by it's blatant disregard to the American Public, aka We The People.

I have been feeling a ray of hope lately though, as it seems that more and more people are starting to wake up or wise up. I still grieve for our Great Nation, for we have been reduced to a disgrace among other Nations, but I do have faith that we will be able to redeem ourselves in the very near future.

[AtomicKitten]

9. Fact slinging? OUCH. They can't take the pain.

Welcome to DU.

[saltpoint]

8. One of the variables is the voters' sense of things and how informed

they are to begin with.

When Rudy Boschwitz decided to mount a comeback for Paul Wellstone's senate seat, he ran ads claiming that Paul Wellstone was "embarrassingly liberal" for Minnesota.

Voters rejected that notion and returned Wellstone to the Senate.

Unfortunately in many other districts, smearing can be effective. The most grievous transgression for Republicans -- that we know of -- was Rove's smear of McCain in South Carolina, regarding the candidate's paternity of a "black child." John and Cindy McCain had adopted a baby girl from Bangladesh and Rove spun it as he wished to debase McCain after the big upset win over Bush in New Hampshire.

[adwon]

10. There's a line

Imagine if someone tried to use pictures of flag-draped coffins from Iraq in an ad. I don't believe that would fly very far, no matter what the ad said.

[SaveElmer]

11. Backfired in Virginia...

Republicans saying Kaine would not impose the Death Penalty against Hitler in ads they aired...

Was viewed as a smear on Kaine's religious convictions!