"Swift boating" Cindy Sheehan

The "swift boating" of Cindy Sheehan, Frank Rich explains in Sunday's edition of the New York Times, is just another sign that the Administration is trying to hide from their Iraq policy that is heading down a disastrous road of no return (NYT):

   

When these setbacks happen in Iraq itself, the administration punts. But when they happen at home, there's a game plan. Once Ms. Sheehan could no longer be ignored, the Swift Boating began. Character assassination is the Karl Rove tactic of choice, eagerly mimicked by his media surrogates, whenever the White House is confronted by a critic who challenges it on matters of war. The Swift Boating is especially vicious if the critic has more battle scars than a president who connived to serve stateside and a vice president who had "other priorities" during Vietnam.

   

The most prominent smear victims have been Bush political opponents with heroic Vietnam résumés: John McCain, Max Cleland, John Kerry. But the list of past targets stretches from the former counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke to Specialist Thomas Wilson, the grunt who publicly challenged Donald Rumsfeld about inadequately armored vehicles last December. The assault on the whistle-blower Joseph Wilson - the diplomat described by the first President Bush as "courageous" and "a true American hero" for confronting Saddam to save American hostages in 1991 - was so toxic it may yet send its perpetrators to jail.

   

True to form, the attack on Cindy Sheehan surfaced early on Fox News, where she was immediately labeled a "crackpot" by Fred Barnes. The right-wing blogosphere quickly spread tales of her divorce, her angry Republican in-laws, her supposed political flip-flops, her incendiary sloganeering and her association with known ticket-stub-carrying attendees of "Fahrenheit 9/11." Rush Limbaugh went so far as to declare that Ms. Sheehan's "story is nothing more than forged documents - there's nothing about it that's real."

It is indeed sick how the GOP go after people.  They went after John McCain during the 2000 primaries, telling residents in South Carolina that he fathered an illegitimate black child.  The GOP attack machine destroyed the reputation of Georgia Democratic Senator Max Cleland in 2002, airing ads that featured him alongside Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein in an effort to hint that he was unpatriotic for vetoing a defense bill even though it was nothing more than a slush fund for rich military contractors. This came despite the fact that Cleland lost three limbs in Vietnam.  How much more patriotic did he need to get in order to receive GOP approval?

Republicans also had an attack plan in place for Howard Dean just in case he got the Democratic nomination. GOP operatives were sent to Vermont to dig through his records to find dirt. Because the nominee turned out to be John Kerry, they focused their efforts on claiming that he did not earn his Vietnam medals.

And when the going gets though for Bush, GOP strategists orchestrate attacks against their toughest political opponent -- who right now is nothing more than a dead soldier's mom that has a lot of heart.

People often wonder why the tone in Washington has become so unsanitary? All you have to do is take a look at Pennsylvania Avenue -- or for now, the fake ranch in Crawford, Texas.