McCain as Morally Unfit

Over the weekend, TPM reader BK noted the following:

It seems to me that the lying and exaggerating that has been done by the mccain campaign either from his lips or with his approval has a moral dimension that is not being discussed. No one is questioning McCains physical courage. But lying is an immoral act, one that you cannot get "forced into" by acts of others.

If there is a sustainable link between McCain, Palin, Bush and Cheney, it is their willingness to lie to get what they want. Bush and Cheney lied us into a war they wished to wage and they have been deceptive about many of their other policies. And the way an Administration runs takes its direction from the top. Is there really any doubt that if McCain and Palin are willing to lie about themselves and their opponents in an effort to get elected that they will continue to lie to the American public about there plans and policies.

Campaigns offer a direct view into how a candidate will run a large complex organization. McCains true colors,,,,,his true moral convictions....are being demonstrated for all of us to see. We have seen this ends based strategy before and we know it never turns out well for us.

Indeed, Josh Marshall later noted that whether or not the press allows McCain to get away with his lies will be the singular story of the presidential campaign.

As I noted below, the big press story of the campaign is shaping up to be how reporters are and will react to McCain's deliberate strategy of full-court-press lying. The corrupt, though normal, approach is for reporters to try to dig up whatever Obama exaggerations they can find to try to balance the coverage. If that doesn't work, then they will try to hang the charges on Democrats -- i.e., "what Democrats are calling 'lies'" etc. And of course using the dictionary term -- "lies" -- for repeated and intentional misstatements of fact is almost always forbidden.

But the lying is so extreme in this case that a few reporters are beginning to actually report the story accurately.

So keep an eye out for examples in both categories -- egregious refusals to identify McCain's lies properly and instances where reporters actually decide not to mince words and accurately report the story before them. If you find them, send them in and we'll start keeping a list.

And TPM's Marshall noted this earlier, which is also directly on-point:

Of all the shortcomings of the establishment press today, none is more central to the corruption of the profession than the decision to prioritize balance over accuracy. That corruption is visibly on display in the current coverage of the McCain campaign's policy of deliberate lies. And you won't find a better example than Cathleen Decker's piece in yesterday's LA Times.

Read into the article and you'll see numerous instances of McCain's repeated use of false claims and lies and one instance Decker is able to dig up of an Obama campaign claim that arguably leaves out some information.

But the conclusion and packaging of the article is that both candidates deceive equally and that they do so because it works. (There was another example, though not quite as egregious, by Jonathan Weismann last week in the Post.)

We hear a lot about the steep and perhaps terminal decline of the business model underlying daily print newspapers. But this corruption in the basic conception of the craft -- which is actually related to the economic decline -- gets discussed much less.

This is what gives liars a clear strategic advantage over non-liars. And it's an open question whether McCain's level of dishonesty turns out to be so great that it overwhelms reporters' unwillingness to report accurately on it.

Interestingly, McCain would face harsh consequences for his actions were he still serving in the Navy. It seems that the Navy takes a very dim view of its officers having no honor. And the military, it seems, is taking note of McCain's conduct.

Hell, even Karl Rove -- yes, Karl Rove! -- thinks that McCain is going too sleazy. And Fox News may even push back from time to time.

The Obama campaign is starting to push back on this issue, not just with rally rhetoric, but with ads. This will hopefully not only bring the message directly to the people, but keep it front and center in the mind of the press as well. We shall see if they do their job.

15 September 2008