{"id":14232,"date":"2008-01-14T12:50:12","date_gmt":"2008-01-14T17:50:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/14232.html"},"modified":"2008-01-14T12:50:12","modified_gmt":"2008-01-14T17:50:12","slug":"how-a-political-hitman-sleeps-at-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/how-a-political-hitman-sleeps-at-night\/","title":{"rendered":"How a ‘political hitman’ sleeps at night"},"content":{"rendered":"

I suspect most Dems have a caricature in their mind of devious Republican smear artists, who help GOP candidates pander to the public’s worst instincts. These operatives specialize in opposition research — or, “oppo” — which, as the caricature tells us, involves political hitmen digging through dirt and peddling in innuendo, all in the interests of conning voters.<\/p>\n

In reality, the caricature is probably a bit of an exaggeration. These smear artists don’t literally dig through Democrats’ garbage; they usually pay someone else to do that. But if we wanted to match this image with a real-life example, we’d have to point to Stephen Marks, who recently published, “Confessions of a Political Hitman,” and who chatted<\/a> with the NYT’s Deborah Solomon about his career.<\/p>\n

What led you to write your new book, “Confessions of a Political Hitman,” which chronicles your rather unsavory career as a Republican Party operative who was hired in hundreds of political campaigns to dig for dirt on Democratic candidates?<\/b> I wouldn’t use the word unsavory. The voter has the right to know the history of any candidate in order to make the most educated vote.<\/p>\n

Why do you make yourself sound as benevolent as a reference librarian?<\/b> Because opposition researchers perform a needed public service. <\/p>\n

In the 2000 election, you produced an infamous anti-Gore commercial, juxtaposing footage of Gore saying Al Sharpton couldn’t be altogether discounted with unrelated footage of Sharpton giving an inflammatory speech.<\/b> I happened to have gotten some footage from some anti-Sharpton groups where he urged college students to kill cops: to off the “pigs,” as he put it.<\/p>\n

How can you justify misrepresenting Gore like that?<\/b> I’ll admit that the ad was nasty and negative, but it was accurate, just like the Willie Horton ad that finished off Dukakis. <\/p>\n

Who paid you to make the commercial?<\/b> Some folks in Tennessee who didn’t like Al Gore.<\/p>\n

How do you sleep at night?<\/b> Very well, thank you.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The smugness just oozes from the page. Asked specifically if he has any “moral qualms” about his professional efforts, Marks said, “No.”<\/p>\n

Marks seems to understand perfectly well that he’s sleazy, and has smeared honorable candidates with garbage, but at the same time, he’s also quite pleased with himself.
\n
\nThere was one exchange that stood out for me:<\/p>\n

It is often said that the Republicans are better at negative campaigning than the Democrats.<\/b> I don’t think that’s true. Look at the 2006 election. When you look at the tight races, the stuff that they killed George Allen with…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The broader point seems to come up quite a bit in Democratic circles — we bring knives to gun fights; they bring ICBMs. “Pshaw,” Republicans say, “You guys are every bit as vicious.”<\/p>\n

Objectively, I think that’s silly, but that’s what makes Marks’ comment all the more interesting. To him, there’s a reasonable connection between his Sharpton\/Gore commercial and George Allen undermining his own campaign with racist language. It’s astounding that anyone would consider the two analogous, but Marks seemed quite serious about it.<\/p>\n

Solomon followed up:<\/p>\n

[Democrats] didn’t kill [George Allen]. He self-destructed. They didn’t need anyone to dig up the word “macaca.” He said it.<\/b> But the Democratic research people were smart enough to have some kid with a camcorder to go out and film it. That’s also part of research, following the candidate when he is preaching to the choir. That’s when they say stupid things.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That’s it? Dems play just as dirty because they sent a guy to listen to a George Allen speech? That’s<\/i> proof of Dems and Republicans playing by the same rules?<\/p>\n

Please.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I suspect most Dems have a caricature in their mind of devious Republican smear artists, who help GOP candidates pander to the public’s worst instincts. These operatives specialize in opposition research — or, “oppo” — which, as the caricature tells us, involves political hitmen digging through dirt and peddling in innuendo, all in the interests […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14232\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}