http://www.blogster.com/winning/the-vetting-of-american-presidents-and-presidential-candidatesa-uniquely-american-process
The Vetting of American Presidents and Presidential Candidates....a uniquely American process!!!
Controversial Content
Added: Monday, March 12th 2012 at 8:36pm by winning
Category: News & Issues
Related Tags: conservative politics, republican party, democratic party, liberal politics, tea party
5 / 1 rating
Over the last 3 decades we have gone through something in american politics that we refer to as "vetting" of our Presidents and Presidential Candidates. It is a process that at times has been a comedics as it has been serious.
Both sides, the left and the right have spend time, talent and treasure attempting to highlight the faults of the other side, while the media who should be the unbias party in this effect has from time to time stuff their foot in their mouths as they have tried to sway the public one way or the other. But before we get to those very interesting stories, lets first get a definition of "Vetting":
Vetting is a process of examination and evaluation, generally referring to performing a background check on someone before offering him or her employment, conferring an award, etc. In addition, in intelligence gathering, assets are vetted to determine their usefulness.
Now that is a fairly simple explanation of the process, but in the American Political Process this concept has taken on a completely different meaning. We now use the vetting process as a weapon.....its true purpose is to undermine and undercut an opponent......especially if the vetting is done by the media.
Vetting is a process that by its own definition should be done by an employer or an awarder....whereby someones background is checked to ensure he or she is either qualified or at the minimum not an embarrassment. In the vetting process the operative word is "Truth".....as the vetter your goal should be to seek the truth.
Back in the 70's Gary Hart was a prominent Democratic Politician who actually was considered a front runner for his parties nomination. There was one problem.....Hart was reported to have had a history with the women. He ofcourse denied it and even challenged the media to prove he was a womanizer by offering to allow them to follow him around. Well guess what, they took him up on it....followed him, caught him womanizing and the Modern day Political Vetting process was born.....find the dirt and make it stick.
Over the next 30 years very few Presidential candidates escaped the meat axe that is the American Pollitical Vetting system. Edward Kennedy felt the sting of the vet when he ran for his parties nomination and found himself over and over again having to relive the accidental death of an aide that happened to riding in his car in his early career. To say it was fair game as a topic is to go to the depths of the vetting process. Did it effect his chances for election...you bet it did!!
Then there was the sudden need to reharsh the role Ronald Reagan had played during the McCarthy Era and the attacks on Hollywood. I remember the left trying to dig up all sorts of stuff implying that Reagan was a "Snitch" for McCarthy and had turned on his fellow actors in order to save his own skin.....it of course was false and never caught on. Bias Political Vetting brought this stuff up....proper vetting put it to rest!
Then there was the "Skull and Crossbones" stuff about GHW Bush...Bush 41.....you remember how those on the left and the extreme right tried to say that he was part of some secret organization who was part of the "New World Order" and that he was going to sell America out. Bias political "vetting" brought this stuff up.....proper vetting put it to rest!
Then there was "Slick Willie" Clinton. You remember the stories.....he was a radical communist mole who had been seen in Moscow as a college student.....a real closet communist. Bias political "vetting" brought this stuff up...proper vetting put it to rest, but Clinton did something a little different. He actually attacked the "Vetters"....that's right, if you attempted to "Vet" the Clintons...the Clinton machine made you the subject of their own Political "Vetting" process.....as a result the public received conflinting reports on matters of critical personal importance and Bill Clinton slipped by. Clintons role as a womanizer was well known and established before he came on the National scene...but his reverse "vetting" process definitely clouded the field.
When GW Bush came into play "vetting" had taken on a life of its own. Those of us who supported John McCain in 2000 remember well the Bombshell dropped on John in South Carolina that required him to be "revetted" in order to prove that he did not have a Black Child in some out of wedlock affair!! By the time the truth got out....it was too late the damage had been done and GW was on the way to being President.
But GW had his own problems....if you remember the left spent an awful lot of time trying to claim that he was some kind of drunken rich kid who received special favors because of who his father was. Remember how bias political vetting brought this stuff up.....and proper vetting put it and the career of Dan Rather to rest!!
And then we had Hilliary Clinton and Barck Obama!! Remember how Hilliary lied about how she had landed under fire in Serbia and conducted important foreign policy discussions? Well proper vetting put that myth to rest....but because the same Clinton Machine that had clouded the field for her husband was now working for her....the public and the media seemed to give her a pass.....why, because the Clintons throw the media "vetting" machine something better.....Barrack Obama!!
That's right......it was Hilliary Clinton who threw the bias political "vetting" machine information on Barrack Obama....let's just take a look at some of those tic bits:
This was the article that brought into question whether or not Obama was a Law Professor...remember?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/28/university-of-chicago-oba_n_93896.htmlRemeber this jewel about Obama being a Muslim?
http://www.bestandworst.com/v/111349.htmRemember this one about Religion and Guns?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1014942/Hillary-Clinton-hits-Barack-Obamas-God-guns-gaffe.htmlRemember her stand on Jeremiah Wright?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/25/clinton-wright-would-not-_n_93318.html?And then there was the release of Michelle Thesis and Obamas Law Course Syllabus...remember?
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/politics/2008OBAMA_LAW/Obama_CoursePk.pdfThis was that Clinton reverse "Vetting" Machine at its best; yet in the end.....it did no good, possibly because either there was nothing there.....or maybe the people have had enough? When the left started going after Sarah Palin and by their own admission the McCain team had not done a very good job of inside vetting.....maybe just maybe folks just said enough!!!!
As we enter this new political season.....I have noticed a trend.....the left hasn't started that habit of bias political "vetting".....maybe because it it early or because we know all the candidates. The right should maybe follow the same trend....there is nothing new out there on Obama.....trust me if there was something out there....the Clintons would have found it!!
Let's beat this guy with policies.....to go the bias 'vetting" route is to give him another 4 years....learn from the Clintons!!
. (