Joe Sonka September 9th, 2008

(crossposted at Barefoot and Progressive)

As you might have seen from yesterday, the McConnell campaign is in a tizzy because they were able to catch 2 old guys getting angry about having a camera stuck in their face by 2 snot-nosed kids. The two McConnell Youth with the cameras are trust fund kids whose job it is to play the “Macaca” role: follow Bruce Lunsford everywhere he goes and hopefully catch him saying something dumb so they can use it in an attack ad. Since they have been unable to catch Lunsford making any kind of gaffe, they settled for the next (waaaaay next) best thing: finding two random old dudes who support Lunsford getting pissed off at some stranger playing paparazzi with him.

The resulting video is pretty hilarious. Not just because of the pissed off reaction of the two old men, but the pearl-clutching DRAMA of the captions in the video, as they grasp their parasols and declare “look at the ghastly company that Bruce Lunsford keeps!” and collapse onto their fainting couches screaming that they’ve been assaulted and battered by these brutish Yankee fiends.

It’s the single funniest thing that I’ve seen in this campaign, so far.

But I’ll tell you what isn’t funny: some in the mainstream KY political media picking up this pathetic narrative and running with it.

Pat Crowley, best known for playing Charlie Brown to Brett Hall’s Lucy, predictably bit on the story first and linked to it, calling it “Lunsford supporters caught on tape shoving, cussing”. John Stamper bit over at PolWatchers too, with the headline “Democrats behaving badly”

So…… Mitch? Republicans? KY media? You really want to go down this road? OK, let’s do it.

Let’s take a look at this little video, shall we? This is a video taken of an Iraq War veteran protesting an appearance that Mitch McConnell made at Northern Kentucky University this January. Check out what happened at about 2:20 into it. A crusty old bald man comes up to this Iraq veteran and tells him “you should be terribly ashamed of your service”.

Who is this old bald guy? Just some random guy who supports Mitch McConnell?

No, it’s Larry Cox, Senator Mitch McConnell’s State Director.

Let me repeat that: Senator Mitch McConnell’s state director Larry Cox tells an Iraq veteran attempting to speak to the senator that he should be terribly ashamed of his service.

So….. Mitch? NRSC? Right-wing bloggers? KY media/stenographers? Would you care to be consistent? Would you like to not be exposed as shallow hypocrites? How about some outrage at his?

Mitch/ NRSC/ right-wing bloggers: do you approve of Larry Cox telling an Iraq veteran that he “should be terribly ashamed of his service” because he disapproved of McConnell’s policy and wanted to tell him that? Or to paraphrase the NRSC ad, “Is this the company you keep, Mitch?”

KY media/stenographers, will you have the same concern over a HIGH LEVEL STAFFER of Senator McConnell saying this? Will you actually ask Mitch if he approves of this (a gesture not even granted to the Lunsford campaign over non-staffers)?

Is this acceptable behavior, telling someone who risked his life for his country that he “should be terribly ashamed of his service”?

And while we’re all talking about hypocrisy, let’s go back to January 15th of this year. On that day, a Navy veteran and mother tried to have her daughter ask Senator McConnell a question about the war in Iraq. To McConnell’s credit, his staff did not push her or tell her that she “should be terribly ashamed of her service”. No, they simply worked behind the scenes to make sure that she was FIRED FROM HER JOB. The job that supported her family with two children.

I don’t think I have to explain the hypocrisy here.

Now, for Mitch, the NRSC and right-wing bloggers, this comes as no surprise, as we don’t expect anything resembling decency or honesty from them.

But for the media? Well, they have another choice. They can either pick up the story about Larry Cox telling an Iraq veteran that he “should be terribly ashamed of his service” and be consistent and professional…. or they can ignore it and expose themselves as lazy stenographers, bowing down at the feet of the almighty Senator McConnell.

Your choice fellas.

Either way, this is what I call upon Senator Mitch McConnell- to answer these questions:

1) do you support the statement of your State Director Larry Cox telling an Iraq War veteran that he “should be terribly ashamed” of his service?

if not, will you

2) ask Larry Cox to immediately resign from his position?

and

3) personally apologize to the Iraq War veteran who Larry Cox told “should be terribly ashamed” of his service?

I know Mitch McConnell won’t answer these questions from me (or LHL’s John Cheves, whom his staff has been afraid to talk to for 2 years). But Mark Hebert, Ryan Alessi, Pat Crowley, John Stamper, Joe Gerth…. the question is: Will you ask him these questions?

Let’s see…

• Mitch McConnell
• Comments(2)