re: #146 Dark_Falcon

2000 wasn’t a freak show (there was effectively no GOP primary in 2004).

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An unidentified party began a semi-underground smear campaign against McCain, delivered by push polls, faxes, e-mails, flyers, audience plants, and the like.[14][15] These claimed most famously that he had fathered a black child out of wedlock (the McCains’ dark-skinned daughter Bridget was adopted from Bangladesh; this misrepresentation was thought to be an especially effective slur in a Deep South state where race was still central[49]), but also that his wife Cindy was a drug addict, that he was a homosexual, and that he was a “Manchurian Candidate” traitor or mentally unstable from his North Vietnam POW days.[14][48] The Bush campaign strongly denied any involvement with these attacks;[48] Bush said he would fire anyone who ran defamatory push polls.[55] During a break in a debate, Bush put his hand on McCain’s arm and reiterated that he had no involvement in the attacks; McCain replied, “Don’t give me that shit. And take your hands off me.”[47]

Did I just imagine that? Because, y’know, I kind of remember all of that happening.