These are a summation of the thoughts which were in my mind last night, after reading many of the articles, diaries, and comments regarding the questions raised about Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal's statements on his military service, specifically the allegations that he had misrepresented himself on more than one occasion. While it is easy for me to say these words now, now that the initial article has been called into question, I nevertheless wish, for the little it may be worth, to express my reaction as it was before the conflicting information that called the NY Times' story into question appeared.
First of all, I have no dog in this fight at all. I do not live in Connecticut. I have not donated money to Richard Blumenthal, or to anyone else in the Democratic Senate primary. I had, until yesterday, few particular feelings about him. From the little I knew of him, I viewed him as a fairly standard, stock model New England liberal. There is nothing wrong with that, of course; I happen to be generally fond of New England liberals. But nonetheless, I thought at the time that there was very little to distinguish him. I was not an enthusiastic supporter of his, nor was I hoping for his defeat in the primary (I certainly was not hoping for his defeat in the general election).
Then appeared the political typhoon of Raymond Hernandez's front page New York Times article, claiming that Blumenthal had lied or misrepresented his service during the Vietnam War. Many of us, understandably, took the article at its word. Some of us demanded, based upon the information provided in that article, that Blumenthal immediately withdraw his name from the Senate primary. Some few, here and elsewhere, were unrelenting and unforgiving in their harsh criticism of Attorney General Blumenthal.
Against this harsh, unrelenting, and unforgiving criticism, my considered reaction was that we should all try to calm down. The first thing we must do in these situation is get to the bottom of them, to the real truth of the matter. I thought then, and I still think now, that if Blumenthal had indeed lied and misrepresented his service on a consistent basis, then he should indeed step down from the race. However, that is a very large "if." My reaction, upon reading a particularly harsh comment on 538.com, was that before we nail Blumenthal to a tree, pierce his side and break his legs, the very least we could do is do him the honor and decency of a fair hearing. If he had committed a real wrong, then I have no problem whatsoever with cutting him or anyone else off. However, that is contingent upon real, positive proof that he actually did a wrong.
I found the article, even at first blush, to be rather short on real, positive proofs of that nature. It had much more of a feel of implication, of innuendo, than of real, cold, hard, Joe Friday-grade facts. Furthermore, it struck me as almost unbelievable, and certainly difficult to credit, that the entire state of Connecticut could have been misled by this one man for so long. As I understand it he has spent nearly thirty years or more in public service. I would have thought that somewhere during those thirty years, some enterprising opponent, whether a fellow Democrat in a primary or a Republican in the general election, would have picked up on this fact and would have pointed it out. Employing Ockham's Razor would lead one to conclude that against thirty years in which no one noticed this apparent falsehood or misrepresentation, one front page article and one allegation by a political opponent are insufficient to prove the case.
Furthermore, it must be remembered that every person is fallible. There are various alternate explanations for any statement Blumenthal made that would seem to indicate he had been in Vietnam. People misspeak all the time; many times they will say one thing, when having meant to have said something entirely different, and in fact thinking that they said what they meant to say. It is not surprising that someone might on occasion mislay one preposition for another, even when that person is an accomplished lawyer and a state Attorney General. It also should be noted that for all the street cred it has among many liberals and progressives, the New York Times has a rather less than sterling record. The editors at the Times occasionally seem to fall asleep at the switch, as the examples of Jason Blair and Judith Miller will show. And these same examples also show that not everyone who works at the Times is a pillar of journalistic integrity.
There is little more to say upon this point. I only wish to leave you with the thought that the next time an event of this nature occurs, our first reaction should not be to accuse in haste, and just as hastily commit ourselves to a course of action that could ruin the career of a perfectly honest and blameless man; but rather, to calmly and coolly seek the truth, to find out what the real facts of the matter are, as far as they may be found. Only by doing so can we assure ourselves that the right thing has been done. Very little of any consequence is accomplished by sound and fury; and less than half of what is so accomplished is anything at all good.