Gentlemen M.I.A.: What the Loss of Campaign Decorum Means for America
Gentlemen, it seems, need no longer apply for President of the United States. The Obama and Romney campaigns no longer pretend that 2012 election will be a respectful, dignified ordeal. There will be little dialog. It won’t be fair or reasoned. It will be ugly.
Last week, when the Obama campaign staged an event in Boston to highlight the low-lights of Mitt Romney’s stint as Governor, the Romney campaign pounced. Not only did staffers counter the event with their own press conference, as is the habit of both campaigns, but they heckled Obama aide David Axelrod with chants of “Where are the jobs” and “Solynnnn-dra” as he tried to speak. CBS News reported that one Romney campaign staffer blew bubbles at the former White House adviser. For a few minutes, it was as if the campaign of the Republican nominee for President was under the direction of Code Pink.
Presidential campaigns on both sides once condemned such antics, or at least denied any official involvement. The premise of the American democratic process has long been that there should be an open and honest debate, with a full airing of opposing viewpoints so that voters can make the best decision. The idea was that both sides got to have their say. At this point in the 2008 race, four years ago, John McCain was proposing that Barack Obama travel with him around the country on the same plane to host a series of joint town hall debates, and Barack Obama was saying that sounded like a great idea. (It was all posturing, but at least they had assumed the posture.)
Now things are different. On the same day that Romney staffers heckled Axelrod in Massachusetts, the Republican candidate showed up at the shuttered Solyndra factory in California, where reporters asked him about his campaign’s unruliness. Romney could not have been prouder. “At some point you say, you know, what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander,” he said. “If they are going to be heckling us, we are not going to sit back and play by very different rules.”