Rumsfeld wants me to back off

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has, according to this morning's newspaper, "urged [us] critics of administration policy 'to just back off' and 'relax.'" Wow, this is perhaps the most significant endorsement I'd had.

Sort of like negative campaign ads? The same newspaper, in a front-page article titled "Political ads hit sleazy lows," quotes Stanford professor Shanto Iyengar: "The more negative the ad, the more likely it is to get free media coverage. So there's a big incentive to go to the extremes."

In case you haven't heard about any of the current negative campaign ads, how about "Rep[resentative] [name withheld to stop the innuendo right here] pays for sex!"

That's what the Republican challenger for his Wisconsin congressional seat, Paul Nelson, claims in his new ads, the ones with 'XXX' stamped across [the incumbent's] face.

It turns out that [the incumbent]—along with more than 200 of his fellow hedonists in the House—opposed an unsuccessful effort to stop the National Institutes of Health from pursuing peer-reviewed sex studies. According to Nelson's ads, the Democrat also wants to "let illegal aliens burn the American flag" and "allow convicted child molesters to enter this country."

To Nelson, this doesn't even qualify as negative campaigning.

"Negative campaigning is vicious personal attacks," he said in an interview. "This isn't personal at all."

If Wisconsin voters can ignore Nelson's "impersonal campaigning," it might be fair to say that they have lost some of their innocence.

But, oh, you're wondering how Rumseld's endorsing me is "sort of like negative campaign ads"? Well, it's like this. As newspapers pick up and amplify Karl Rove-type ads (because they have historically aroused emotion and sold newspapers), so do desperate politicos like Rumsfeld eventually have to mention the criticism that is piercing them like so many arrows into St. Anthony's flesh...thus amplifying those criticisms. Or sharpening their arrowheads, as it were.

Thanks, Rummy. Now, would you square your shoulders and turn this way, please. There's another volley coming.