July 4, 2004

Negative Political Ads Beginning to Self-Destruct

Crowds in Charlotte County are queuing up to titter over Michael Moore’s movie tantrum "Fahrenheit 9-11" bashing President Bush.

Moore specializes in malicious lying and preposterous opinions. These are traits unacceptable in a free society dependent on truth as well as freedom of speech.

Consider his angry reaction to the Twin Towers disaster just days later: "We, the United States of America, are culpable in committing so many acts of terror and bloodshed that we had better get a clue about the culture of violence in which we have been active participants."

With citizens like Moore, who needs Al Queda?

Two years ago he fabricated a gun control "documentary." It purports to show that the first President Bush and conservative actor Charlton Heston were responsible for the schoolyard shootings at Columbine High School in April 1999.

A teacher and eleven students at Littleton, Col., were gunned down by two rampaging students who then committed suicide.

Moore also blames Bush-1 and Heston for the Feb. 2000 murder of Kayla Rolland -- a first-grader at Buell Elementary School, Flint -- by a quarreling schoolmate with a stolen pistol.

"Bowling For Columbine" pieces together sentences lifted from a half-dozen non-related speeches by Bush and Heston -- to "prove" they espoused the shootings and "rushed" to both locations to stage celebratory rallies.

The truth is that Bush-1 and Heston decried the shootings and nine months later Bush-1 appeared briefly in Flint for a campaign speech.

For his vicious lies, Moore was awarded an Oscar for "best documentary" and received a standing ovation.

Moore discovered profitable notoriety by attacking General Motors -- the principal employer at Flint. Thereafter, he claimed favorite-son status.

As a former, proud resident of Flint, I asked a good friend there to give me a Moore rundown.

He writes: "Much to the chagrin of most people in the nearby small town of Davison, Michael Moore is a graduate of the high school there.

"He actually was on the Board of Education when he was only 18 or 19. That must have been an interesting time for the older members.

"He used to hang out there with his mother at the Big Boy restaurant. His folks still live there, and he obviously visits now and then. I don’t think his folks make many public statements about their offspring."

No wonder. Only nincompoops, the liberal media, Hollywood types and French movie critics rave about Moore. His only shtick is slander of conservatives and corporations.  

Targets of liberal venom sometimes strike back. One is reminded of Spiro Agnew, President Nixon’s first vice-president.

After prolonged attacks on himself and Nixon – particularly by the New York Times and Washington Post -- Agnew characterized the liberal media as "nattering nabobs of negativism."

Agnew’s alliteration stuck because it was apt. It goaded the media into a frenzy. The personal attacks against Nixon and Agnew intensified until both were driven from office by contrived "scandals."

Alliteration has gone out of style -- but not character assassination.

Still plugging away are such radicals as John Kerry, Al Gore, the Clintons, Ted Kennedy, Robert Byrd, Carl Levin, Nancy Pelosi and Charles Rangel.

The Bush-2 campaign last week aired a commercial featuring negative, false, vitriolic commercials previously aired by Democrat attack dogs.

Kerry and his cohorts went berserk. How dare Bush "go negative" by re-playing Kerry’s negative anti-Bush commercials!

One would think the replay of Kerry’s public speeches condemning Bush – paid for by Bush -- would be a bonanza.  

There is some political advantage in bad-mouthing the opposition. Nevertheless, there are limits.

If there is too much carping, non-affiliated voters -- who decide elections, are turned off.

 Reasoned discourse about issues – and the perceived state of the economy – are the most persuasive factors in electioneering.

Sadly, the craft of punditry has declined woefully in quality as outlets for it have increased at warp speed. We suffer from an overload of trivial information.

There are many pre-disposed commentators on both sides of the fence singing to their choirs.

But too few for heavy thinkers like you and me.

Lindsey Williams is a Sun columnist who can be contacted at linwms@lindseywilliams.org