Politicians have the basic decency to sign their smears openly. Though it helps that they're legally required to do so, at least in the US: http://en.wikipedia

Politicians have the basic decency to sign their smears openly. Though it helps that they're legally required to do so, at least in the US: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_approve_this_message http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_approve_this_message Secret smearing is a whole other beast.