Like all of us in the fifth, I received a mailer from Susan Bitter-Smith today, alternating with the ones I am receiving from David Schweikert.  I understand the race is at a minimum contentious, and at a maximum an outright battle, but this mailer goes over the edge like Thelma and Louise.  In fact, it is about as over-the-top as Sproul’s piece on Russell Pierce. It looks like Bitter-Smith is betting it all on red, because red is what people are going to be seeing when they open their mailboxes tonight.

As an example, let me recount my internal stream of consciousness as I opened the mailbox tonight:

“hmmm…..water bill….valpak…..credit card bill… What the?”

“What the h*ll is…this?”

“Oh my God….”

“She didn’t. Oh boy.  It’s gettin’ nasty.”

“Has she lost her mind????”

It is one thing entirely to incite derision, mockery and goading of office seekers and public figures.  It is practically an enshrined habit of political americana to do so.  But the tone of the front of the mailer lurks with an implied threat that Schweikert wants to harm you with that Beretta .40 right when you open your mailbox.  That is just too much to stomach.  If these two want to argue over whose record is the most conservative and who is a tax raiser and a tax cutter, that is fine.  But the tone of this mailpiece from Susan Bitter-Smith is what turns everyone off.  It only lends credibility to Schweikert’s claims that she is the one running negative.  Frankly, it could have been a prize notification from Publisher’s Clearinghouse and I still couldn’t ever get past the taste it put in my mouth.

Rhetorically, how many people does she think aren’t going to find this mailer outrageous?  Moreover, how many law abiding gun owners are going to cringe and see it as yet another example of the demonization of their cherished hobby?  How many victims of a crime aren’t going to recoil when they see that? The idea of arguing about what she claims is a tax increase and he claims is a tax cut, is fair game.  But the subtle intimidation of voters by the initial shock out of the mailbox is what is going to send them the other way – likely to one of the other lesser known candidates, but the other way nonetheless.  This one has the creepy-meter pegged.

I know the primary grows close, but seriously, is Bitter-Smith coming unraveled?