The World According to Oatney

Bob Corker does the work of his Father

I may be a bit late to write on this story, but I wanted to give it a few days to simmer down and see if any of the papers backed up their words with action. Sadly, they have not. I do not expect the Knoxville News-Sentinel to take back its endorsement of Bob Corker, especially since its editorial board often seems to be in bed with the Haslam clan. However, KNS editor-in-chief Jack McElroy was bold enough to call Corker's ad saying that Ed Bryant and Van Hilleary voted themselves a pay raise "a lie." Hilleary has already jumped on McElroy's statement, running a commercial that highlights McElroy's statement. What Van Hilleary does not spotlight in his ad is something else McElroy said in his commentary:

Why would the Corker campaign include something like this in a political ad? He is a strong candidate, well ahead in the polls and with far more money to spend than his opponents.

Besides, there are so many substantive issues to argue about. Why slip in a fib?

My guess is that the campaign just overreached. In the heat of the closing days, it overstated its case.

In other words, Corker may have told a major lie that the uninformed voter will believe and may make a decision based on that outright falsehood. Yes, many people in politics manipulate the facts to prove a point. Yes, many people twist the truth into something that it doesn't really mean-when that happens, it seems like a lie and causes many people in public life to be labeled-perhaps unjustly- as "all a bunch of liars." Corker has gone way beyond that, however. He didn't just manipulate the facts or twist the truth, as politicians often do in the heat of a campaign, he has told a bold-faced lie. He has made a habit in this campaign of twisting the truth and manipulating the facts, and now he wishes to win this race based on an outright falsehood.

For McElroy to simply dismiss this as Corker's campaign having "just overreached" shows just how low the KNS is willing to go to endorse "their man," and that the paper's sence of ethics is apparently non-existent.

The Tennessean was far less kind:

Corker should pull the ad and admit it is misleading. Otherwise, all the assertions in his campaign, regardless of how long it lasts, could draw not just scrutiny but skepticism.

Indeed Corker should pull the ad, not least because it is the right thing to do. Because it is the right thing to do, however, that is precisely why Corker will not do it. He has shown that when it comes to doing the right thing, he is at least ambivalent and at most deliberately chooses the wrong.

Corker's reasons for running a deliberately false advertisement involve one of two things: Either Corker is not doing as well as his cronies in the establishment press would have all of us believe, or a major scandal will be uncovered after the election involving Chattanooga city government and Corker is already running for cover, trying to protect his "clean" image.

As Christians know, Satan is the Father of Lies. The words of Christ in John 8:44 could rightly be applied to Mr. Corker:

You are of your father the devil: and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning: and he stood not in the truth, because truth is not in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father thereof.

Bob Corker has apparently chosen his means of winning and his lord. He is doing the work of his Father.

(Partly cross-posted from Where I Stand)

posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 6:46 AM