Team Clinton didn’t factcheck a story that was heard from a well-intentioned cop. Instead, it’s become a favored anecdote to highlight the fact that our healthcare system is seriously flawed. It’s a leap of logic to call that a ‘lie’ however. It’s correct to say that Team Clinton should have checked out the facts of the matter before adopting the story as gospel. The fault lies with the supporting cast whose job it is to root out fact from fiction. It only reflects poorly on the candidate if they have no fact-checkers or if they repeatedly hire incompetent staffers. After all, any employer is likely to hire an occasional dud.

John Cole at Balloon Juice highlighted the story and his commenters provided a reflection of differing views. With minor modifications, I repeat the response I left in a comment there:

Anecdotes that are false and the revelation that a candidate has made lots of money are not campaign killers. Both worked wonders on blue collar voters for Reagan. Especially racist blue collar voters who lapped up his welfare mom anecdotes.

And the term ‘Clinton Derangement Syndrome’ being tossed about today at Talk Left in response to the discredited healthcare story … wasn’t that lifted from ‘Bush Derangement Syndrome’, a dismissive term used by rightists to lump all Bush critics together as invalid, because they’re motivated by hatred instead of a regard for the truth?

I submit that it’s entirely possible to attack a candidate or officeholder on their words and policies without a speck of hate involved. It’s also possible to limit one’s critique to the candidate or officeholder without personally attacking their supporters directly. And it’s usually wise to do so.

Indirectly and non-personally, I think it’s safe to say that supporters who volunteer to do damage control for their object of adulation who resort to logic contortionism to achieve that, often tend to be blind to the distinction between well-founded reasoning and the contortionism they utilize. It makes for sloppy and confusing discourse, muddying the waters for all but the most observant audience members.

Remember the old bumper sticker: ‘If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit.’ It certainly applies here.

There’s an hysterical tone to it with some supporters on either side, and it’s hard to take seriously the claim that such contortionism is being advanced by any real progressive. They rest on the shaky foundation that rightists have advanced for the past quarter century: all that matters is winning.

Oh really? A key part of that is the evil twin that accompanies that reasoning: if you try to win by disregarding the truth and you lose anyway, then the winner must have disregarded the truth even better.

Which might be true … except when it isn’t. It’s also possible that the winner simply told the truth.

My point is, the people projecting messiah-hood on their candidates aren’t doing any favors to anyone by getting enmeshed in labyrinths of lies or badly flawed logic. As a mutual exercise, voters are supposed to be seeking the best interests of the country they reside in, not developing infatuations based on the belief that their candidates are capable of superhuman feats and errorless performances.

Ultimately, such excessive enthusiasm is built on emotionalism that permits no compromise. When Clinton fans view Obama as a real enemy, or vice-versa for Obama fans, one of those groups will have to be disappointed eventually. And some will find themselves unable to support the candidate that bested theirs. They may then vote for McCain, a third-party candidate, or - most likely - simply not vote in November.

And why? What are they advancing progressively then?

It’s entirely logical to determine that one candidate is pursuing an agenda that offers little or no progressivism and oppose them for that. But if they simply defeat someone you consider to be more progressive (or someone you relate to better) then that hardly means they’ll advance policies that will hurt the country or hurt your personal interests.

The risk of this contentious primary is not that the candidates will destroy party unity. It’s that their supporters may make the conscious choice to abandon the pursuit of a better government and a better country because they didn’t get the candidate they wanted.

And that type of spoiled baby, insolent brat decisionmaking is not done for the sake of ‘us’. It’s done for the sake of selfishness and self-centeredness.

It’s not impressive. And it’s not at all progressive. If you think like that, no-one’s likely to reach you through the self-constructed walls around your delusion.

Deliberate lies deserved to be called lies. They usually happen when a candidate describes an event they were directly involved in. Planted memes or promoted memes that are intended to send dogwhistles that appeal to unfair and hate-based biases deserve to be attacked for advancng themselves and hatred simultaneously. Advancing unchecked stories, however, points to nothing more than the incompetence of somebody within a campaign. If enough incompetence rises to the surface to indicate a repetitious problem exists, then it’s pretty logical to conclude the candidate bears responsibility for poor management for their decisions about who to hire.

Look, real progressives can promote an idea that’s ‘out there’ in the realm of wishful thinking. Or even in the ‘downright loopy’ galaxy. It should be a comfort to everyone that no person and no political ideal is 100% correct. Perfection’s pretty damn annoying and can get you killed. I think the core of progressivism is the belief that humans evolve in their actions and deeds and via experience, study, science, and logical discourse, we welcome change for two basic reasons:

1) Change is inevitable while stasis isn’t (unless, in the latter case, you happen to be dead).

2) No matter how bad things are, and even when they seem damn near perfect, there are ways to improve some more, so it is both virtuous and logical to pursue improvement as a constant complement to that unstoppable change.

And there’s a selflessness to real progressivism. Change for the better for the most. Changing to better one’s self while ignoring or denying the greater good ain’t the real deal.

In both Democratic candidates, I see some progressivism in some of their policy proposals. I also see some waffling being done by both, in other policy areas. I see some status quo positioning and see some conservatism in both, as well. I have ultimately concluded one’s accurately described as a progressive moderate who is offering a few liberal policies. And the other is moderate to conservative, offering some Blue Dog proposals, but also offering a few liberal policies.

In other words, one’s slightly more progressive than the other and I think that candidate offers the most positive change that will advance the greater good for the most. And I respect the fact that some will logically conclude the other candidate will do that, despite my disagreement with them. I’m least impressed by people who take the all or nothing position and are incapable of discussing the flaws of their candidate, while they knee-jerk defenses into place as if all matters are of equal import. That’s as silly as suggesting Mccain’s a horned devil who gets nothing right.

We really don’t have to be that rigid. Every critique doesn’t carry the gravitas of a Swift Boat Liars’ assault. Progressives depend on reason and reasonableness while acknowledging that some events require strategic response. Conservatives and especially neo-conservatives abandon reason and reasonableness in their perpetual pursuit of dominance, no matter who gets hurt, who gets hungry or how many die for no better reason than their preservation of dominance ideology.

If this contentious primary hands a win in November to the dominance candidate, it really won’t be the fault of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Howard Dean, the DNC or the DLC. It will only happen if too many voters aren’t really progressive, don’t really want change and remain compulsive and selfish. After all, there’s a chasm between McCain and the two Democratic candidates. And while there’s an important gap between the two Dems, neither will be Bush III.

Dislike them if you wish, but save the hatred for people who consider the killing of hundreds of thousands to be collateral damage that’s dispassionately acceptable. Emotion best accompanies logic there, not in a primary campaign like this.

You can do it.

If you’re into a progressive evolution.