Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal’s exposure as a hoaxster boasting of a nonexistent record of service in the Vietnam War is a splendid example of what is known as the Taranto Principle. Someday the Taranto Principle will be taught in all the journalism schools, assuming one or two survive the present detumescence of journalism. Formulated by the inimitable Wall Street Journal editorialist James Taranto, the principle posits that when the liberal mainstream press indulges a liberal politician’s deceits or fails to hold the politician accountable for his misbehavior, it encourages the politician to ascend to a higher level of misbehavior.
Thus, for years Sen. Jean-Francois Kerry was wont to boast of his exploits in the Vietnam War. His sympathizers in the press never bothered to remind him or to remind the citizenry that Kerry had embellished his military record and that — worse! — upon returning from Vietnam, he cast his lot with the rising anti-war movement. As an opponent of the war, he even was emboldened to appear before Congress and mendaciously testify that his comrades had “personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, (and) razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan.”
