There they go again. The Republicans running Thomas Kean’s campaign for U.S. Senate in New Jersey are now outwardly saying that they’re producing a swift-boat like film trashing Democrat Senator Bob Menendez. This is disgusting and truly astonishing that they’re so willing to admit to this brand of trash politics.

From the NYTimes:

Mr. Kean’s chief campaign consultant, Matt Leonardo, a strategist for Republican candidates, disclosed the plans in an interview and said the film would be “very similar” in purpose to the commercials used to attack the military record of John Kerry during the 2004 presidential race.

Nevertheless, the Kean campaign will challenge that biography in “a long-form film,” Mr. Leonardo said, just as commercials broadcast in 2004 attacked Mr. Kerry’s military record. Those commercials, relying on claims by a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, purported to expose Mr. Kerry’s military decorations as exaggerated or fraudulent. Although the premise and many elements of the Swift boat advertisements were strongly disputed, as a whole they were seen as successful in hobbling the Kerry campaign.

The media, obviously more aware of this type of slash and burn politics, is already fact checking these accusations- something that took much longer for them to do during the ‘04 cycle.

Mr. Kean’s charges are not, however, supported by the public record and were repudiated by independent authorities including the four assistant United States attorneys who prosecuted Union City officials of that era for racketeering and corruption. There is no truth, those former officials say, to the Kean campaign’s charge that Mr. Menendez made a deal to keep himself out of prison.

This is disgusting and I hope the Menendez campaign is ready to fire back.