We, the voters, have the power to stop campaign ads that stoop to personal attacks.
Personal attacks are nothing new in politics, and candidates won't stop using them as long as they work. That's why it's up to voters to act.
In the aftermath of controversial tactics regarding the gubernatorial campaign of state Auditor Tom Schweich, criticism of attack ads has resurfaced. Schweich died from an apparent suicide last week.
In remarks at Schweich's funeral Tuesday, former U.S. Sen. John Danforth, R-Mo., said existing politics "amounts to blaming the victim, and it creates a new normal, where politics is only for the tough and the crude and the calloused. Indeed, if this is what politics has become what decent person would want to get into it? We should encourage normal people - yes, sensitive people - to seek public office, not drive them away."
State Sen. Mike Parson, R-Bolivar, has called on candidates to commit "to the people of this state, and ourselves, that we're not going to use propaganda, and we're not going to destroy people's lives at all costs, to win an election."
And local resident Mary Wood wrote in Tuesday's Your Opinion forum: "Little wonder why many good, honest qualified candidates refuse to run for office. There are cold-blooded, anonymous jerks out there making a living destroying people and their families with everything from innuendo to down-right insults."
Political campaigns are tactical battles, and a customary strategy is to rely on independent groups to do the dirty work on behalf of a candidate. Consequently, the candidate can distance himself or herself from the group's message, even condemn it.
During the GOP's Lincoln Day event, a group - paradoxically calling itself Citizens For Fairness - characterized Schweich as a "weak candidate for governor (who) could easily be confused for the deputy sheriff of Mayberry," a reference to Barney Fife, portrayed by Don Knotts on television's Andy Griffith Show" of the 1960s.
And who among us doesn't recall the Republican State Leadership Committee's attack ads against Democratic Cole County Circuit Judge Pat Joyce in the November election?
In those campaigns and countless others, the opposing candidate can say: "I don't like it, I don't condone it, but what can I do?"
And they're right.
The real question is what you, the voters, can do?
Don't vote for them. Send a clear message that any association with attack advertising by an independent group will not be rewarded. Candidates who cannot or will not call off such attacks have demonstrated they cannot control their own campaign message and, consequently, have not earned the power to govern.
Attack ads will not end until they become synonymous with defeat at the polls.