Yesterday Matt Yglesias wrote:

I don’t blame candidate for doing what they think will win the election.

He couldn’t be more wrong.

Candidates are ultimately responsible for the campaigns they run. Boundaries are set from the top.  When advisors cross the invisible line, they are removed. For example, after Samantha Power called Hillary a “monster” she was removed from the campaign.

In 1988, Michael Dukakis fired his Campaign Manager John Sasso and Political Director Paul Tully for releasing an “attack video” against Joe Biden.

I like negative politics. Defining your opponents is a vital part of winning elections, but there are lines that should never be crossed. When a campaign is so negative that it inspires crowds to spew racial epithets, you’ve probably gone to far.

Right now, John McCain has sunk so far down in the mud that pigs are complaining he’s messing up their sty. TPM has summed up the strategy:

John McCain’s latest gambit is to juice up his and Palin’s crowds into calling Obama a "terrorist", hurling racial epithets at black reporters (presumably, there aren’t many in attendance as supporters), or just random calls for murder. This morning there was more ..

In the latest instance of inflammatory outbursts at McCain-Palin rallies, a crowd member screamed "treason!" during an event on Tuesday after Sarah Palin accused Barack Obama of criticizing U.S. troops.

"[Obama] said, too, that our troops in Afghanistan are ‘air raiding villages and killing civilians,’" Palin said, mischaracterizing a 2007 remark by Obama. "I hope Americans know that is not what our brave men and women in uniform are doing in Afghanistan. The U.S. military is fighting terrorism and protecting us and protecting our freedom."

Shortly afterward, a male member of the crowd in Jacksonville, Florida, yelled "treason!" loudly enough to be picked up by television microphones.

It’s clear John McCain will do or say anything to win. So why does it matter?

In 2000 George Bush decided he would do or say anything to win, smearing John McCain with a vicious campaign of lies in South Carolina. After the election was over we were told to put the past in the past. Elections were one thing, governing is another and George W. Bush was a uniter.

However if your campaign will do or say anything to win the Presidency, you will do or say anything while you are governing to hold onto power. Instead of smearing John McCain, George Bush, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove sought to destroy Joe Wilson. When the law said he couldn’t wiretap or torture, he did it anyway. U.S. Attorney’s who didn’t fall in line – fired.

The way George Bush ran his campaign in 2000 mirrored his Presidency – slimy, underhanded, with no sense of basic decency. The way John McCain is running his campaign now, will reflect how he conducts himself as president.