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Monday, September 22, 2008

Sarah Palin's Strategy Of Dealing With Personal Attacks

Sarah Palin has seen Internet rumors and personal attacks since the day it was announced she would be the GOP Veep. Attacks on her children to false claims about her policies, Palin has largely ignored them to expose how petty the attackers are.

The first attacks were immediate, coming from the popular liberal website called Daily Kos which accused Sarah Palin of pretending to be the mother of her youngest child, Trig, who has down syndrome and attacking her daughter with claims that she was the real mother.

Palin announced that her daughter was pregnant and video footage of interviews conducted while in her last months of pregnancy showed those original attacks to be lies and nothing more than rumors reported as news.

From there a long list of rumors started being spread, to which Fact Check.org investigated and exposed them for being lies or mass misrepresentations.

Book banning, belonging to a separatist group called the Alaskan Independence Party, claims she supported Pat Buchanon were all debunked by Fact Check in a piece they called "Sliming Palin."

A few examples of the attacks that have been debunked by Fact Check .org. are:

*Palin did not cut funding for special needs education in Alaska by 62 percent

*She did not demand that books be banned from the Wasilla library. Some of the books on a widely circulated list were not even in print at the time.

*She was never a member of the Alaskan Independence Party

*Palin never endorsed or supported Pat Buchanan for president.

*Palin has not pushed for teaching creationism in Alaska's schools

Other than having a group called the Truth Squad formed to counter online rumor and lies, Palin herself has generally gone about doing her job as the vice presidential candidate, helping to raise campaign funds, making campaign stops, giving interviews and interacting with the people of America from state to state.

Those attacking her on a constant basis are basically being completely ignored by her and I think it is a good strategy on her part to allow those attacking to show themselves for the what they are, small, petty and willing to lie and spread those rumors and lies amongst themselves, with others watching and witnessing, noticing and speaking, about how in their desire to attack, they are ruining their own reputations and any credibility they might have once had.

These are the same type of people that will accuse their opponents of smears, lies and accuse them of attacking others, yet they themselves are becoming the worst offenders of all they speak about.

Better yet as reported by The Hill today, Palin is using those attacks against her for campaign fundraising, turning the tables on her attackers and using their tactics as a tool to help garner support for John McCain and the Republican party.

Why bother getting into the mud with her attackers when she can let them show themselves for what they are and use the public's perception of such attacks and the lowering public opinion of her attackers, to her benefit.

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