By the Editorial Board
You might have heard this before — “politicians are liars.”
What that used to mean was that they can’t be trusted and that constituents should keep them accountable and be the watchdogs. Since when did it start to mean that we should accept what they say and move on?
Politicians’ careers — or at least, their campaigns — have been ended for much less than lies and offensive statements. In 2004, Democratic presidential candidate from Iowa Howard Dean was running a hot campaign when it all came crashing down once he made a strange yelp at a rally. A little yodel was enough to kill a campaign in its tracks.
20 years later, look where we are now.
In 2016, then-candidate Donald Trump was exposed for a 2005 Access Hollywood tape where he stated matter of factly that when you’re rich, you can do anything to women, and they’ll let you.
“I’ve got to use some Tic Tacs, just in case I start kissing her,” Trump said. “You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything … Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything.”
He became president anyway.
Let us be clear, Trump isn’t the only one who has said unsavory things about groups of people. Republican vice presidential nominee, JD Vance, when addressed about Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric, said he’s willing to “create stories” so that American media will pay attention. He also echoed a racist stereotype against Black people, quipping that the White House may smell like fried chicken if Kamala Harris wins.
Children create stories to get attention, and they get their toys taken away. Grown men make things up for political campaigns and are met with “hurrahs” from their base.
After the Parkland, Fla. school shooting in 2018, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said a survivor of the shooting was an “idiot” who “only talks when he is scripted.” She is still serving in the House of Representatives.
In 2020, President Joe Biden called a voter a “lying dog-faced pony soldier.” That’s definitely weirder than the “Howard Dean Scream,” but he won the election that year anyway.
Politicians — the ones who craft our laws and run our government — should be held to the highest standard of speech imaginable. Yet, we are constantly letting them get away with it every time. For a country who claims open disdain for almost all politicians, how are we so lax on keeping them accountable?
Average people have scholarships revoked and their college enrollments nullified when similar video or audio resurfaces. In the real world — the world of everyday citizens — words have meaning and consequences. But in the world of politicians, words are just an opportunity to spin an event one way or the other.
Voters are in complete control of where the line is drawn. The thing is, there will be a point where politicians can say whatever they want, good or bad, without any repercussions. If parroting racial epithets and slewing insults against one another — and towards large groups of people — isn’t a dealbreaker, what is? If you’re tired of hearing just one more headline about the latest thing a politician has said, take your power back. Tell your politicians if they cross the line, they don’t have your vote.
