Paul Krugman:Blizzard of Lies (makes Bush-Cheney 2000 look like something out of a civics class)

[cal04]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/12/opinion/12krugman.html

Did you hear about how Barack Obama wants to have sex education in kindergarten, and called Sarah Palin a pig? Did you hear about how Ms. Palin told Congress, “Thanks, but no thanks” when it wanted to buy Alaska a Bridge to Nowhere?

These stories have two things in common: they’re all claims recently made by the McCain campaign — and they’re all out-and-out lies.

Dishonesty is nothing new in politics. I spent much of 2000 — my first year at The Times — trying to alert readers to the blatant dishonesty of the Bush campaign’s claims about taxes, spending and Social Security.

But I can’t think of any precedent, at least in America, for the blizzard of lies since the Republican convention. The Bush campaign’s lies in 2000 were artful — you needed some grasp of arithmetic to realize that you were being conned. This year, however, the McCain campaign keeps making assertions that anyone with an Internet connection can disprove in a minute, and repeating these assertions over and over again.

(snip)
And now the team that hopes to form the next administration is running a campaign that makes Bush-Cheney 2000 look like something out of a civics class. What does that say about how that team would run the country?

What it says, I’d argue, is that the Obama campaign is wrong to suggest that a McCain-Palin administration would just be a continuation of Bush-Cheney. If the way John McCain and Sarah Palin are campaigning is any indication, it would be much, much worse.

[Bob Dobbs]

1. mc5plane bigger liar than busholini.

mooseolini more destructively evil than dick.

Amazing, but there it is.

[HowHasItComeToThis]

2. REPUBLICAN PARTY DEMEANS THE OFFICE OF PREZ AND VP

THEY HATE FEDERALISM AND MOCK THE ELECTORATE AND ELECTION

[Jackpine Radical]

3. So far, only the print media seem to be calling them on this.

Unless the lies get exposed over and over and over on TV until their existence penetrates even the oaken crania of the densest Americans, they will get away with it. They have just taken the "create your own reality" thing to a new level of blatancy. It's like they're testing the media to see how much they can get away with, knowing that there is no penalty for their slimy actions.

[kurth_]

4. Excellent paragraph:

Why do the McCain people think they can get away with this stuff? Well, they’re probably counting on the common practice in the news media of being “balanced” at all costs. You know how it goes: If a politician says that black is white, the news report doesn’t say that he’s wrong, it reports that “some Democrats say” that he’s wrong. Or a grotesque lie from one side is paired with a trivial misstatement from the other, conveying the impression that both sides are equally dirty.

They’re probably also counting on the prevalence of horse-race reporting, so that instead of the story being “McCain campaign lies,” it becomes “Obama on defensive in face of attacks.”

Still, how upset should we be about the McCain campaign’s lies? I mean, politics ain’t beanbag, and all that.

One answer is that the muck being hurled by the McCain campaign is preventing a debate on real issues — on whether the country really wants, for example, to continue the economic policies of the last eight years.

But there’s another answer, which may be even more important: how a politician campaigns tells you a lot about how he or she would govern.

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Damn I had this same talk with my brother in law

never ask if things can get worst...

They are making the bushes look like really upstanding and honest people

[ddeclue]

6. Unfortunately Wolf Blitzer and CNN are NOT calling bullshit on McSame and Mooselini...

They he said she said every point of discussion rather than doing anything resembling a reality check.

It's just pathetic.

How do you get people to notice the lies if the media refuses to do it's job?

All I can suggest is that Obama and Biden need to start dropping the "L" bomb on their asses and calling them damned liars since they ARE damned liars.

Doug D.

[Usrename]

7. Yep. Worse than the last 8 years.

Bush/Cheney didn't start this kind of in-your-face lying until much later. These two are coming out the gate spewing whoppers.

[Hubert Flottz]

8. "it would be much, much worse."

I have been thinking and saying the same thing.

[Zenlitened]

9. K-and-FREEEKIN-R!

This is THE story of the campaign right now: The out-and-out LIES coming from the Republicans are unprecedented -- in their sheer volume, in the rapidity of delivery, and in the obviousness of their fraud.

Krugman nails it here, including when he notes -- as Sen. Obama himself has -- that all these Republican lies are a planned diversion from the truly serious issues facing our country.

Republicans think they can get away with their lies. Can they? Time will tell. But, as more and more people stand up and call a lie a lie -- without mincing words -- it's not looking good for the same old poisonous GOPolitics of the past.

:dem:

[Zenlitened]

10. Kick. - n/t

:dem:

[McCamy Taylor]

11. "...much, much worse"

[Supersedeas]

12. and yet the cable Free Ride just keeps going and going and going