Letters to the Editor

The Headless McCain Smear The national media played up McCain's victimization in the 2000 South Carolina primary, but strained themselves to avoid identifying the perpetrators. Glenn Greenwald [2008-01-21]

• Bitter Scribe

  One of the reasons the perpetrators of the so-called "smear campaign" aren't being identified is that no one has actually proved Rove and Bush were behind it. They probably were, but unlike in blogs, "probably" isn't good enough for a responsible news outlet to make an explicit accusation.

  John McCain, interviewed by one of America's few real journalists, Amy Goodman:

  http://www.democracynow.org/2004/9/3/amy_goodman_questions_john_mccain_on

  AMY GOODMAN: Do you think this is similar to the attacks on you in 2000, the Bush attacks in 2000?

  JOHN MCCAIN: No, I put the attacks behind me. The attacks that were made on me are long ago and far away, and I don’t ever think about them or dwell on them.

  AMY GOODMAN: They were very personal, very harsh, and they questioned your war record.

  JOHN MCCAIN: And I had to get over it. And I got over it, and I don’t look back in anger. I look back as running for president as the greatest experience of my life.

  AMY GOODMAN: It's one thing to get over it. It’s another to stand with and campaign with the man who did it to you, George Bush.

  JOHN MCCAIN: I put it behind me. I put it behind me. Absolutely, we have a very good, friendly relationship.

  AMY GOODMAN: Has he ever explained himself to you, why he attacked your wife, Cindy, and your kid?

  JOHN MCCAIN: I can only -- my discussions with the president are private. Okay? Thanks, good.

  Ann Banks, The Nation

  http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080128/banks

  Eight years ago this month, John McCain took the New Hampshire primary and was favored to win in South Carolina. Had he succeeded, he would likely have thwarted the presidential aspirations of George W. Bush and become the Republican nominee. But Bush strategist Karl Rove came to the rescue with a vicious smear tactic.

  Rove invented a uniquely injurious fiction for his operatives to circulate via a phony poll. Voters were asked, "Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain...if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?" This was no random slur. McCain was at the time campaigning with his dark-skinned daughter, Bridget, adopted from Bangladesh.

  The New York Times:

  http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/19/us/politics/19mccain.html?_r=1&sq=john%20mccain%20black%20baby&scp=1&pagewanted=all

  The McCain team had trouble nailing down the origin of the dirt.

  “One time in Hilton Head, we chased these punks down the block who were handing them out,” said State Representative James H. Merrill, the Republican state majority leader, “and when we got to them and asked them where they got them, they said some guy in a red pickup truck said, ‘Hey do you wanna make $100?’”

  Clearly, there's no evidence it had anything to do with Bush.

  -- GlennGreenwald
  [Read GlennGreenwald's other letters]
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