"Once an assertion is made, it sticks"

Sam Donaldson was at UNC the other day, and while I didn't go to the presentation, I did read an article about it. This caught my eye:

On truth, and the time and energy most people have to prove or disprove what they read or see on television: "Once an assertion is made, it sticks. People don't have the time."

This is mostly true in and of itself... mud gets thrown against the wall and inevitably some of it sticks. This is really where the right excels... Swift Boat Veterans, McCain fathering an illegitimate black child (he has an adopted Bangladeshi girl), and number of Clinton-era rumors/allegations/scandals...

However, I take issue with two things... first, I don't really buy it that people don't have the time. Yes, not everyone has the time (or rather, the procrastination skills) that I do in order to dig deep. But you can learn about a lot of this stuff in a very short amount of time if you are willing to look... I simply think the public is lazy and doesn't really care about their own ignorance.

The second item is with Donaldson himself: a lot of these allegations and assertions would be a moot point if they media (I am looking at you there, Sam) did their job. The media publishes without much in-depth analysis... the Swift Boat Veterans pop up, and the media reports on it, but without the caution of waiting to look through what they are saying. When it gets debunked, it is too late... for both the people *and the media*

For example, this happened to Gore on several occasions: it ranged from Love Canal to inventing the internet to all sorts of other craziness. Of course, he never said those things as the media portrayed it, but once it was in the news cycle the media was too lazy to take it out. And the pundits perpetuate the myths on the news shows with nary a comment from the moderators.

Sigh... part of me wants to stay above all this, but part of me wants to take the line of "the ends justify the means" and encourage the use of this sort of tactic by the Dems...