The Associated Press has presented its spin on the first Bob Casey-Dave McCormick debate (“Casey, McCormick hammer home their attacks in Senate debate” (Reading Eagle, Oct. 5).
The report artfully portrayed an equivalence of each candidate making personal attacks.
Casey made, by my count, eight different character allegations against McCormick, mostly from his business career. With repeats, this totaled 25 smears, generally irrelevant to the questions posed. (Regarding McCormick’s alleged false address, why didn’t the party sue like they did to take Robert F. Kennedy Jr. off the Pennsylvania ballot?)
Attacks by McCormick: an accusation about Chinese lobbying money plus a gratuitous insult about Punxsutawney Phil. The AP singled out McCormick’s use of “weak” (10 times, by my count), “liberal” (five times) and a “career politician” (nine times). Hardly an equivalence.
Remarkably absent from the AP account was inflation, perhaps lacking confidence in Casey’s signature issue of “greedflation.”
Even the AP couldn’t ignore the exchange on the proposed sale of U.S. Steel. Casey pivoted and slammed the company for opening a facility in Arkansas, a nonunion state. McCormick’s jujitsu response: they wanted it in Allegheny County, but local Democrats raised regulatory roadblocks and Casey didn’t intervene. Casey’s rejoinder: McCormick was in Connecticut investing in China and that he’s an expert in outsourcing and favored outsourcing jobs to Arkansas.
There’s much more spin, but no room here.
Irvin Rathman
Lower Heidelberg Township
Source: Berkshire mont
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