Truth is out of style

What do you do when you campaign on a lie and it gets exposed on a fact-check, but the lie turns out to sell well? If you’re pond scum or Arkansas Rep. Tom Cotton (R), you double down on that lie:

In Arkansas last week, Rep. Tom Cotton (R), his party’s U.S. Senate nominee, was caught in one of the most brazen lies of the 2014 campaign season. The right-wing congressman claimed he voted against this year’s Farm Bill because President Obama “hijacked” it, “turned it into a food-stamp bill,” and added “billions more in spending.”

As a factual matter, literally none of this is even remotely true, and fact-checkers came down hard on such shameless dishonesty – all of which might matter if Cotton gave a darn. But as Peter Urbanreported yesterday, the congressman just doesn’t care about getting caught.

Rejecting criticism of its latest TV ad, Republican Senate hopeful Tom Cotton plans to keep running the “Farm Bill” message beyond its current ad buy.

“We’ve gotten such great feedback from farmers, taxpayers, and supporters that we’re actually going to increase the size of the ad buy,” said David Ray, a spokesman for the Cotton campaign.

For more, see:

• The Washington Post: Tom Cotton’s invented version of Farm Bill history
• Politico: Fact checking the Arkansas senate race

I think I’d better just close with this classic alt-rock piece by MC 900 FT Jesus, Truth is Out of Style:

Thanks to Michelle Gimore Day for the find!