Update on MS-1 Congressional District

Article from the NE Mississippi Daily Journal out of Tupelo, hits on some of the same points I did about a week ago.  Since I first wrote on the subject, the attacks from Greg Davis have become much more bitter and divisive. I do have faith in Mississippians to choose not to let a man who stands for nothing but himself and his own personal gain pull one over on them.

Our 1st District race has seen consistent examples of the kind of personal attack campaigning that McCain is urging his party to abandon. It was evident even in an intra-party fight when Davis went after Glenn McCullough with highly personal attacks on his performance as TVA chairman and a misrepresentation of his position on the volatile immigration issue. The distortions continued when the opponent was Childers and the TV ads, direct mail pieces and telephone messages were about Childers’ nursing home and his tax payments.

Not in context? Half-truths? So what, the cynical political professionals would say -that’s politics. That’s how the game is played.

To which John McCain is saying: Not on my watch.

Of course, it’s his party’s congressional campaign committee that developed much of the Davis campaign’s attack-ad arsenal since the primary, and as the North Carolina episode suggests, he can’t control every part of the party apparatus or the interest groups that will buy the ads. But he can do a whole lot simply by keeping his own campaign on a high plane.

[hattip: Andrew Sullivan]