Keller @ Large: The Cruz/Trump Mud Bath
BOSTON (CBS) - It started with a risque photo of Donald Trump's wife Melania, a former model, sent to Utah voters by an anti-Trump super-PAC independent of the Ted Cruz campaign.
Then Trump tweeted an attack on Cruz that read in part: "Be careful, lyin' Ted, or I will spill the beans on your wife," a reference to Heidi Cruz, a lawyer who has acknowledged a past bout with depression.
And yesterday, it continued with public comments taunting Trump from both Mr. and Mrs. Cruz.
Welcome to the 2016 GOP campaign, where hardly a week goes by without a new low in campaign comportment. And while the Democrats have avoided attacks on each other's spouses so far, just wait until after the conventions.
Which makes you wonder - are they running for the White House, or the mud house?
"You have to be able to live above the fog," says Swanee Hunt, the former US ambassador to Austria who is an expert in conflict resolution. She says the presidency requires humility, measured intelligence, and other specific skills missing at times from this campaign:
"To be able to maintain equanimity no matter what is coming at you, and to be able to build consensus. Threats and bravado have the opposite effect."