I get a lot of political mailings from my Georgia House representative, Jill Chambers. Thus far, they have painted a pretty decent picture of her. She is a fiscal conservative. She genuinely seems to want to keep my taxes low. Some of the mailings are fairly technically detailed in terms of budget and policy issues. She doesn't insult my intelligence.

At least, not until today.

Today, I received a mailing from her with a supposedly drunken picture from her opponent's MySpace page, some off color sarcastic quote from him about drinking, and a mention of his blog (chrisishardcore) with the implication that it is some sort of porn site or place he picks up women online.

Look, Jill, I HAVE A MYSPACE PAGE. When you drag your opponent's personal Internet presence into the campaign in an obviously dishonest manner, you're not just attacking your opponent. You're attacking every voter in your district who uses the Internet for fun, labeling us all as unelectable because we might have said something somewhere online that wasn't polished or intended for a campaign.

That is insulting, and its wrong. Jill, before I received this mailing I had no idea who your opponent was and I had a least a decent impression of you. Now, there is no way I'd vote for you. Not a chance.

In the age of blogs and social networking sites there is a need for campaigns to draw a line between people's personal and professional internet presence, and focus on the issues, unless there is a real, substantive question of character.

These mailings crossed a line that shouldn't have been crossed.

Jill Chambers, my Republican opponent in my current campaign for state House, decided to send a mail piece clearly intending to make this blog appear somehow sinister or otherwise inappropriate. I’m now bringing it back so the voters of the 81st District can judge it for themselves. Take a look around. Although many of the entries are a bit out-of-date, I hope you find at least some of them informative and/or entertaining.

As for the picture of me on Ms. Chambers’s mail piece, that was taken and posted by my younger brother when I was around 20 years old. Despite her allegation that I was “drunk,” I can assure you that is not the case. I personally believe the fact that Ms. Chambers would use a picture posted on the Internet several years ago as proof that I “post pictures of myself drunk” says a lot about her character, or lack thereof.

chrisishardcore.com: An Important Message from Chris Huttman