This really got me pissed off:

Gary Lankford, the Ohio Republican Party’s recently hired “social conservative coordinator” this week dispatched a mass e-mail to so-called “pro-family friends” that featured his 10-point introduction to U.S. Rep. Ted Strickland, the Democratic nominee for governor.Strickland, an ordained Methodist minister who has thrown Republicans for a loop by speaking about his faith during the campaign, is running far ahead of scandal-plagued Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, the Republican nominee who gained national fame in 2004 when he was broadly accused of manipulating election processes and vote counting to favor Bush in the presidential race. What’s the GOP strategy for getting Blackwell back into the running? Imply that Strickland is gay.What are Republican staffers pointing to as evidence? Reports that the Democratic congressman and his wife of 20 years reside in different locations when he is in Washington.In his email, Lankford, the GOP “social conservative coordinator,” links to an Internet posting by a conservative operative that is headlined: “Article Adds Fire to Strickland Gay Rumors.” The posting suggests that a mid-June Toledo Blade newspaper article implies “the Stricklands are both gay.”The article turns out to be a wide-ranging Father’s Day feature on Strickland and Blackwell, in which mention was made of the fact that Strickland and his wife have no children. Blackwell was quoted as saying that it would be absurd to try and make an issue of whether the Democrat was a father or not. “Some of my most adored, most respected leaders are not parents,” said the Republican. “Pope John Paul II was not a parent.”

It is the same hack job the GOP used on McCain in South Carolina, the same Swiftboating that John Kerry got. On top of that, it is a line of attack that the candidate said he wouldn’t use! Not only is he a slime ball (or someone who likes to hire slimeballs), but he is a liar.Now, it would be silly to say that Democrats are above this sort of thing, because they have their own dirty tricks, but it is so upsetting that we have seen this crap from the GOP over and over, and nobody even seems to care inside the party. Sure, the advisor got taken off this campaign, but how much do you want to bet he takes a step up in the Republican ranks, just like Rove did after pulling similar crap.(Hat-tip to AS)