I have an idea about what motivated that those phone calls smearing Mitt Romney. Hugh Hewitt is ultimately mistaken when he speculates that the push poll campaign attacking Mitt Romney for his Mormon religion, Vietnam draft-dodging, and other sins "was concocted by either extreme anti-Mormons unaffiliated with a candidate or a left wing 527."

Not that there isn't some reason to think that the calls might have been pushed by a left. Unlike most right-wing smearing, most of what was said in these phone calls has some connection with reality.

Among the questions the caller asked was whether the person receiving the call knew Romney was a Mormon, that he received military deferments when he served as a Mormon missionary in France, that his five sons did not serve in the military, that Romney's faith did not accept blacks as bishops into the 1970s and that Mormons believe the Book of Mormon is superior to the Bible.

The idea that Mormons "believe the Book of Mormon is superior to the Bible" doesn't ring true. But the rest of these claims are well-known to be accurate. If the smear is a left-wing smear, it's because the smear writers did not claim things like "Mitt Romney spent five months in an insane asylum while on his draft-dodging mission to France" or "did you know that Mitt Romney is a suspect in five Salt Lake murders from the early nineties?" The smear guys didn't even accuse Romney of being a pedophile. Real right-wing smearing has a lunatic edge and a joy in lying that seems to be missing from this particular attack.

Ultimately, however, this smear has to be seen as the work of the right.

The company that placed the calls, Western Wats, works routinely with Republicans. Western Watts did phone operations for Bob Dole in 1996 and "spread negative messages about Democratic candidates in a House race in New York and a Senate race in Florida" during the 2006 campaign. Western Wats has also made calls in the past for The Tarance Group, a Virginia company that is now working for the Giuliani campaign. It seems doubtful that Western Wats would want to risk their GOP clientele by doing work for a George Soros group or other people on the left.

But why such a lame, mostly truthful, smear then?

I've concluded the organization behind the anti-Romney attacks must have started the campaign to get their writers in shape for the general election. Like everybody else, smear writers need to have work in order to reach the peaks of excellence needed for high-stakes performance. GOP related organizations must realize that the Republicans are going to be relying heavily on their top smearing operations in the coming holy war against Hillary Clinton. So they gave their top attack dogs a little work-out by unleashing them on Mitt Romney.

As smears go, this one wasn't particularly effective. Obviously, they need the work.

I am not sure how you can make that judgement at this point.

As for the right wing paranoia that this is a liberal black op, it is just that, paranoia. They want to believe this came from Hillary because that fits their worldview so well, but the accusation is in fact simple projection (likely prescient projection inasmuch as the right would no doubt do someting exactly like this to her).

Doesn't pass the smell test. Why stick your neck out to smear Romney now in a very risky triple false flag, when there are a half dozen Repugs perfectly willing to do that dirty work on their own initiaitve.

Hell, I would go find out where Karl Rove was yesterday before I made any more accusations.

The Dem theory is also painfully self-referential inasmuch as it presume that the Dems fear Romney most of all GOP options and worthy of preempting now in favor of whoever fills the void after that. That is not a given at all. Knocking Milt out early helps Rudy keep his powder dry and funding high.

No, I suspect the writer does not seriously suspect the Dems. It just makes for good Reichstag propoganda to try and rally the Miltoids with accusations of leftist commie infiltration.

Mission accomplished if you ask me. This shit is not going to go away.

The big rub, that is the primary disagreement that Christians have with Mormons is that they, Mormons, consider the Book of Mormon to be a suppliment to the bible, a suppliment which defines and expands upon the bible.

Christians believe the bible to be the inerrant word of God and therefore complete and not in need of any supplimentation.

Mormonism teaches absolute heresy which is demonstrated in many of their core beliefs, Ie: Divine progression, the diety of Christ, and salvation by works, just to name a few.

The Book of Mormon itself is a mish mash of disjointed ramblings, inconsistencies and outright lies. To believe the BoM is legitimate requires a total suspension of logic.

Jack

in the air, I suspect the Democrats. Logic and reason have no part in their decisions.

Democrats pull dirty tricks, that is what they do, that is who they are. It matters not that pulling the trick might not be in their best interest.

Jack

As I see it, a "smear" or a "sliming" either proffers untruths or innuendoes of questionable provenance; or proffers "personal" truths which are irrelevant to presidential qualifications.

I agree with you that the substance is either truthful or a plausible version of the truth. Nor can the subject areas be said to be irrelevant to leadership, character, ethical consistency, and substantive beliefs in a presidential candidate. Whence then the "slime" designation? Even in this day of (often facile and disingenuous) objections to "negative personal attacks", that which is negative or personal cannot (should not) be categorically avoided as such, for the good of public debate and everyone concerned. Senator Clinton is a prime example of using these bloated catchwords to throw the bathwater out with the baby. After all, wasn't even Watergate a "smear" for a good while?

That doesn't match my recollection. Got evidence?

Watergate was, at first revelation, a "third-rate burglary" that took some time to gain traction and be recognized as the tip-of-the-iceberg of scandal that would, rightly, bring down a criminal president.

But a "smear"? Not so much. At least by my recollection of living through it (though I was in college at the time, so perhaps not laser-focused on national/political events?). Not only don't I recall attempts to spin it that way, it's hard to see how/why anyone would/could have attempted such spin, given that it was undisputed from the start that the break-in happened and was criminal. Perhaps you're suggesting there were insinuations/implications/accu­sations of Nixon involvement that were labeled "smears" prior to that culpability being proven beyond any reasonable doubt? But then, I'm back to the beginning: got evidence?

types and like-minded press people tried to call it an irrelevant distraction and a smear before events bore them away.

JackDallas:

Christians believe the bible to be the inerrant word of God and therefore complete and not in need of any supplimentation.

Which Christians would that be? Most Christians I know and have read about do not believe the Bible to be inerrant nor to be the word of god. Only certain Protestant sects insist that the old and new testaments were literally handed down by god.

Right now, Romney polls are at 8%, even with Huckabee and considerably behind Giulani, Thompson and McCain. Romney even trails Unsure by 5 points.

So, who benefits? Is Romney doing well in New Hampshire or Iowa? Enough so that someone would spend the money to attack him on religious grpunds? Certainly, the Democrats would not spend a dime on a Romney attack unless he were a frontrunner. If Giulani's campaign (or MCCain's or Thompson's) did it and word of it leaks, I should think a good sized backlash would result.

So, that leaves Huckabee, who is generally tied in the polls with Romney, is said to be doing better just lately, but who is not likely to steal many points from the front runners just yet. Stealing points from Romney, however, could push his numbers up to the level of McCain or Thompson.

Just a guess, but nobody launches a smear for no reason.

Romney is still considered a threat because of his leads in Iowa, New Hampshire and Michigan. But the lack of a clear motive is the reason why I joked about the smear being more of a workout than anything else.

JD. DEMOCRATS pull dirty tricks? What insane planet do you live on? I doubt even Bill O'LIEly or your pal Rush LimpBrain would try to pull off that falsehood. WHO is the Party of Dirty Tricks? The Republicans, you fool. And everyone knows it. You know, Jack, we're all aware of your rabid loyalty to the Party of Karl Rove, Lee Atwater, Steve Bull, Don what was his last name from Whitewater and the other Repubby Dirty Tricksters but holy cow, dude!! You flew right off the edge with this one. Do you have so little respect for the truth that you could actually write the idiocy above with a straight face? If I didn't know you're not a drinking man, I would have to accuse you, in this post at least, of being stone hot wildman DRUNK when you wrote it. If this is what we have to look forward to from you in 2008, I can only hope the Fray PTB bring back the Block This User function. (Btw, you also went way overboard in your latest ad hominem attacks on Ted Burke on the PFray in the past few days...) tsk-tsk, Jaquito. You're heading back down that dangerous slavish Repubby-Frightwinger slippery slope that we will all remember you being on / down in 2004.

I doubt that you know any real Christians.

Jack

From your perspective, Chatolics are suspect, Episcopalians are suspect, Lutherans are suspect, Presbyterians are suspect and all the rest are suspect except for whichever sick,. twisted pseudo-Christian sect to which you pretend to belong.

Catholic, just as he is a former Democrat. Instructive?