Sen. McCaskill: Conway "reasonable" moderate

Hello all,
Imbedded is a clip from Morning Joe containing an interesting round table discussion of the Kentucky Senate race between Rand Paul and Jack Conway. I post it not because I am paying close attention to the race itself, but because it touches more broadly on political discourse and how candidates should conduct themselves.

The portion in question extends to about the 7:00 minute mark. I tried to imbed the video but for some reason the "imbed" link wasn't working so I'm just going to link it the old fashioned way.

Click here to see video

I don’t agree with McCaskill (who btw, I like from what I've seen of her) about shaking opponents’ hands and the respect issue. Yes, there are circumstances in which an opponent can cross the line in attacking you or your family to such a degree that they have lost the privilege of being shown respect and Conway flirted with that line if he didn’t cross it entirely. What was implied in the ad - the innuendos in it - are pretty startling and Paul has a right to be upset about them (unless of course he’s just guilty as charged). Smarmy (or unctuous) is a word that comes to mind as accurately describing that sort of ad. Maybe that’s a bit too extreme on my part though.

Speaking to what McCaskill said regarding Conway being a moderate - while I haven’t followed the Paul/Conway race closely - Conway does appear to have some major inconsistencies in his record past and present (flip flops) that perhaps show Conway to be more politically motivated than “reasonable”.

Irrespective of how true the claims made by the Conway campaign are, the ad in question was an extreme ad making extreme accusations. Hardly something a “reasonable” moderate would put out if they were not thoroughly substantiated.

To the best of my knowledge they aren’t.

McCaskill needs to call out people like Conway even if they are in her party if she wants to have credibility when she speaks of being “reasonable” and of cross aisle collaboration and cooperation. By the same token, Republicans should do the same. This doesn’t mean people pounce on everybody who goes too far (Meghan McCain?) but you have to apply to you and your part the same standard that you apply to the other party.

God bless and veritas supra omnis!