Personal attack politics in America is nothing new. Aaron Burr repeatedy slandered Alexander Hamilton before finally killing him in a duel. Gen. George McClellan referred to Pres. Abraham Lincoln as a "baboon." Pres. Grover Cleveland's political enemies accused him of having a secret illegitimate child. FDR's foes in Congress accused him of sending a battleship to pick up his dog, Falla, left behind on a vacation trip. To their critics, Pres. Eisenhower was lazy and detached, Pres. Ford was slow-witted and George W. Bush was completely inarticulate.
In our 24/7 cable news cycle personal attacks on Pres. Barack Obama have trumped all others. He has been called variously "a liar", a foreign alien, a Communist, a "Muslim extremist", an appeaser, a dictator, a perpetrator of treason and a reverse rascist.
Personal political attacks usually depend on half-truths, exaggeration, innuendo, distortion and fabrication, for their effectiveness. They do more harm to the public than to their targets because they taint and pollute the streams of information flowing to the people, making an informed electorate difficult to attain.
These anti-democratic practices which cry out for reform were the inspiration for my latest non-fiction work of history, "A House Divided, The Story of Ike and McCarthy" (amazon.com). www.donaldjfarinacci.com.