Two things distress me about these rumors that John Kerry had an affair with an intern, and neither makes me more or less likely to vote for him. One is that it's only February. Kerry doesn't even have the nomination and the attacks have already reached this level. I hate to think what we're going to be hearing about him and his running mate by October, especially if they're ahead, and I'm no more thrilled about the quantity of mud that will be lobbed back at Bush-Cheney or Bush-Whoever. (I'm guessing we haven't heard a lot of Democratic attacks on Cheney lately because they want to wait until it's too late to dump him from the ticket before they launch the TV spots that say, "Our men and women are dying in Iraq because of inadequate equipment while Cheney and Halliburton line their pockets with money from the Defense Budget." Anyone think we won't be subjected to that sales pitch?)
The other thing that bothers me is that the rumors about Kerry and this lady seem to have come out of absolutely nowhere. There are no secret tapes, no stained dress, no appointment logs that show Kerry and this woman in the same location at the same time. I'm not even sure there are any witnesses who ever saw them together. Someone somewhere said Kerry was involved with an intern and that was enough for some folks to run with it. On some of the Conservative sites, it's now an accepted truth…and if it's denied by everyone involved or can't be proven, well, that just shows what Kerry's money and power can accomplish.
I'm always suspicious of any charge that (a) serves the cause of the parties doing the charging and (b) is configured such that it can never really be disproven. How does Kerry prove the charge is bogus? Come up with a photo of them not having sex?
The charges that George W. Bush was AWOL in the National Guard have occasionally dipped to the same level. Yeah, there's some paperwork (and therefore, potential proof) there but the people pursuing the story seem unwilling to consider, for example, that government files and paperwork could be legitimately missing. Or that some of the data on the records that do exist might just be wrong. Certainly, some of the witnesses who are coming forth to confirm or deny Bush's version of things are exhibiting a shaky, though perhaps earnestly-believed grasp of dates. I wish politics could mature beyond the level where if someone says something that hurts your guy, he's obviously lying…and if someone says something that hurts the other side, it's an established, incontrovertible fact.