The opening days of the campaign for Indiana’s 8th Congressional District opened up in a style fitting of the District’s moniker of the Bloody Eighth: with Republicans taking shots at Ellsworth’s teenage daughter. The Evansville Courier Press published a story after Indiana Republican and blogger Joshua Clayborn blew the whistle on pictures Ellsworth’s daughter, age 19, posted containing images of herself with bottles of beer. Clayborn’s sites include In the Agora and The Indiana Barrister.)
By way of full disclosure, I drank underage in college. A lot. By the caseload, on at least one occasion. I even drank in the presence of my parents between the ages of 18-21. I’m comfortable saying this since I don’t figure my parents will be running for office anytime soon. (And, if they did, they would most assuredly be running as Republicans — my political leanings these days are likely a source of some disappointment, my college drinking, on the other hand, wasn’t really counter to our family ethos.)
Taking Down Words has a lot of words addressing this tactic. I have just one more: Classy.
Just to be clear, the pictures were noted in an anonymous comment left on a general post about the race. I sent along a link to my post, as I often do, and noted that there were some interesting comments which followed it.
The paper apparently found the comments newsworthy, called me back, and asked for my reaction. I gave reaction, probably in error. And I may have erred in noting the comments to the paper. But I did not seek out attacks on Ellsworth or go snooping around. This is arguably splitting hairs, but I don’t think the article portrayed the notification as it happened.