Old News

There must be a half life to scandals … and so, the Clinton's just released, this past Friday night, a dump of many documents from the Clinton Library relating to their numerous sordid scandals … Whitewater, Monica Lewinsky, the pardoning of Mark Rich, Vince Foster, etc. … see: UK Telegraph Story and News10 Story. (The bigger the scandal, the longer must be the half-life ...) Many of these documents were heavily redacted and some were held back altogether. To use a tired old chestnut, this document dump was clearly and cynically meant to inoculate the Clinton's against further use of this information. In any future discussions they can, with a dismissive wave of the hand, offer the pusillanimous slight, “That’s old news!”

I find it very curious that good (or I might say evil) politicians seem to sense the exact timing of the aging process of scandalous stories in which they are involved. Thus, Hillary Clinton can put off any testimony about Benghazi until the American people (and the media) will dismiss any damaging revelations as “old news.” (Somehow Nixon never found the exact timing of this half-life process … although he surely tried.) I, on the other hand, react entirely the opposite way. Seeing politicians play this game of rope-a-dope just incites my outrage even more ... at this politician … and at the American people for allowing themselves to be so easily manipulated.

I guess I am forever cursed with my out-of-step mind.

And even more curious, after a sufficiently long delay (using some mysterious formula), the public may again have an appetite for the details of a particular scandal … the Sally Hemings, Thomas Jefferson affair comes to mind. How do I respond to such ancient revelations? My normal reaction is, “That’s old news!”

Playing Defense

Rush Limbaugh spent almost his entire program today discussing how Mitt Romney should respond to all the salacious attacks that the Obama team is currently smearing him with.  Basically Rush's take was that, if you are on defense, you can't be on offense ... you can never move the ball down the field.  You should not respond to such dirty charges as seen in recent Democrat attack ads (such as Romney effectively killed Joe Soptic's wife because Bain Capital ... after Romney was no longer active there ... shut down GST Steel which caused Soptic to lose his job and health insurance ... which was the reason, five years later, that Soptic's wife died of breast cancer) because it just keeps these charges in the news cycle.

Now, I am not a political consultant ... nor do I play one on cable TV.  However, as I remember it, when Bill Clinton was under assault throughout his time on the national stage ... with a wide variety of charges from bimbo eruptions, to perjury charges, to the Whitewater scandal, to Monicagate, etc. etc. ... he responded using his rapid-response team with rabid attacks on his accusers (remember how Ken Starr was vilified?).  This certainly was effectively offensive defense ... and Clinton is generally attributed with being a consummate politician.  And recall what Rahm Emanuel (Obama's former junk-yard dog) has used as his political modus operandi?  "If they bring a knife, you bring a gun."

Would it sully Romney's pristine image if his team was as belligerent as Clinton's was ... or as Obama's is?  Probably ... however, I still do believe that Romney needs to go on offense with a rigorous defense of his reputation ... much like Clinton and his surrogates (James Carville, Paul Begala, Lanny Davis, George Stephanopolous, etc.) did all those twenty years ago.  Unfortunately, Romney seems to have only one surly cur on his side, John Sanunu.  He needs to surround himself with quite a few more offensive defenders ... ones the likes of Newt Gingrich, Ann Coulter, and Chris Christie.