WASHINGTON - So unpopular is President Obama these days that the (D) following Democratic candidates' names might stand for Denial.
And, so desperate are political pundits for any fresh news crumb that a molehill quickly becomes a mountain. One ill-chosen word -- or, worse, failure to answer a reporter's question -- and the candidate is suddenly redrawn into a caricature he doesn't recognize.
Just ask Mitt "47 percent" Romney or former Virginia Gov. George "macaca" Allen. Now add to the list Kentucky Democrat and U.S. Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes, who, upon dodging a question about whether she voted for President Obama, is sitting atop a mountain of media pain.
A bright, attractive candidate any state would be proud to claim, Grimes staked her campaign on how much she isn't like Barack Obama. Her ads have been so starkly separatist -- "I'm not Barack Obama" -- that she might as well have been wearing a haz-mat suit.
Note to politicos: When your ad begins "I'm not ... ," you're probably already in trouble. And, when you choose to distance yourself from your own party's leader, people are going to wonder whether you ever supported him -- and when you stopped.
Thus, when an editorial board asked Grimes whether she had voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 (she was a Hillary Clinton delegate in 2008), Grimes tepidly mentioned "the sanctity of the ballot box," and then tried to direct attention elsewhere.
Later, when asked the same question during a recent debate with incumbent Sen. Mitch McConnell, she elaborated on her principled position against such questioning, but her reply was too little too late.
The point she was trying to make is the only one that matters: How people vote is no one else's business. This is foundational in a free, democratic society. Yet, voters will hear little else in the remaining weeks before Election Day than that Grimes wouldn't come clean, followed by all the implicit questions and doubts about her honesty, forthrightness, and, the only sin Americans won't forgive, hypocrisy.
Oh, what tangled webs ...
But of course Grimes voted for Barack Obama! (Or did she?)
By her refusal to answer, are we to infer that she voted for John McCain or Mitt Romney? Perhaps she didn't vote at all. Lie avoidance seems a more plausible explanation than fear of revealing the obvious.
I admit to some ambivalence on the molehill that didn't have to become a mountain. On the one hand, the question shouldn't be asked. Or rather, it needn't be answered. On the other hand, well, why not just answer the dadgum question?
Media reaction to her dodge at first seemed a function of narcissistic injury than virtuous pursuit of public interest. How dare she flout our right to know? In fairness, reporters (including yours truly) will always ask the (or any) question on the well-grounded assumption that the victim, I mean respondent, will usually answer.
Right or wrong, the unanswered question will linger if only because we are a little bored. The truth is, Grimes' only substantive error was not being prepared for a question that, given her campaign ads, was all but inevitable.
Too bad Grimes didn't seize the opportunity and make memorable the moment when she chastised the media for forgetting the bloodshed by our forebears and, not long ago, our fellow African-American citizens, who suffered and died for the right to cast a ballot without fear of retribution.
Well, you don't get a chance to take a principled stand every day.
This bitter episode -- or teachable moment, if you prefer -- may yet prove less than fatal, but we are reminded nonetheless that the unanswered question often reveals more than the answered one.
Washington Post Writers Group