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Increasingly, the media seems to think that character heuristics and superficial personality shorthand are reasonable substitutes for actual reporting of facts, ongoing issues, and behavior in action.
We don't need to know whether Mukasey in fact exhibited and continues to exhibit patent dishonesty and professional malfeasance, because we have a sufficient proxy that says the opposite: his life story and friends' accounts of what an admirable and humble man he is.
For precisely the same reason, this is why we saw John McCain roll out a "reintroduction" of himself and his life story to the nation last week. As long as we know him to be an honest, red-blooded 'Merican, loveably prone to youthful mischief, it doesn't matter that he now demonstrates serious ongoing hypocrisy, intellectual weakness, and advocacy of demonstrably dangerous views.
We just "know" he is a good person. Just like we "knew" George W. Bush was.
