Presidential campaigns are long, nasty roads into hell. They travel through the darkest moments of candidates’ lives and survive off poor taste and childish finger pointing, often leaving voters dizzy and disgusted with every candidate.

Life experience prepares one for the mudslinging and completely tactless approaches to candidacy races, but occasionally, a remark or claim is so absurd or so deeply prejudiced your lunch nearly projectiles onto the floor. It’s rare, but my gut turned when I read black Senator Barack Obama’s character was called into question because his grandfather, five times great-, owned slaves.

To add to the rancid taste in my mouth, the possibly discrediting lineage of Obama was released days before a debate between Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton in Selma, Ala., during a commemorative celebration of the 1965 Selma voting rights march. The debate was designed for the candidates to rally support within the black community, a community which Baltimore Sun reporters David Nitkin and Harry Merritt apparently felt Obama was too credible with.

The value of the information in their article, headlined “A new twist to an intriguing family history,” is almost an absolute zero, yet somehow it is being thrust into the forefront of the candidacy race. What’s even more absurd is their primary source, who admits he practices genealogical research as a hobby, says the information he compiles is incomplete and shouldn’t be assumed as true but rather as a first draft. Despite this, Obama doesn’t deny their claim, but why would he? It is an irrelevant, obvious attempt to discredit him.

The authors even admit genealogical experts would not vouch for the accusations. Legitimate genealogists dismissed the research as using non-cited and non-annotated documents (i.e. not credible). One they interviewed said, “He has nothing here that I can see that would allow you to make any logical link,” regarding the amateur research done by the Sun’s source, William Addams Reitwiesner, whom they say is employed at the Library of Congress, holding a position they choose to omit.

So what’s the point? The article admits its failure to be credible, so it must be promoting an agenda. This becomes more obvious when the story identifies candidates John Edwards (D-North Carolina) and John McCain (R-Arizona) as descendants of slave owners too, then quotes conservative writer and essayist Debra J. Dickerson’s statement, “I didn’t have the heart (or the stomach) to point out the obvious: Obama isn’t black.” Real classy, suggest a black candidate isn’t black, prior to a rally for black votes. Does that mean I lose my Italian heritage because my mother’s French?

This is a new low for American politics. What’s next, a claim that Hillary Clinton isn’t a woman because she liked wearing her father’s shoes at age three? Just the fact that this topic remains relevant during the campaign trail today discredits the state of press and voters who concern themselves with these “issues.”