John McAfee Quotes
Every newspaper on earth has called me a liar.
McAfee, John. Interview in Guatemala. Reuters, Thomson Reuters, 2012.
This quotation is the root of a great dilemma for all politicians who are attacked on a personal level. Most slanders are soon forgotten. The politician who reacts and publicly counters the slander inevitably does two things. More people become aware of the slanderous charges then there is a public battle over it, and the media tend to report the contest and hence the slanderous charge for a longer period of time than if it were uncontested. However sometimes the undefended charge is perceived as being true especially if it is a major charge. If the politician does not defend, the charge can get accepted and damage the politician’s standing. In the Kerry-Bush Prudential campaign, Kerry had the edge until the so-called Swiftboat Veterans made up a fictitious tale of Kerry, a decorated war hero, being a coward in the Vietnam war. Kerry thought the charge so preposterous that he didn’t bother to defend it. His lack of reaction was taken by much of the public as his admission of the charge. Kerry’s hero image was destroyed by a large enough proportion of the electorate that the electoral votes shifted to Bush, even though Kerry had the most votes by far. For each politician, the decision must be made for each charge and there is no clear way to know in advance which is the better strategy when a false charge is made.
John David McAfee is an English-American computer programmer and businessman. He founded the software company McAfee Associates in 1987 and ran it until 1994, when he resigned from the company. McAfee Associates achieved early success as the creator of McAfee's first commercial antivirus software, and the business now produces a range of enterprise security software. The company was purchased by Intel in 2011, though it still bears the McAfee brand name. McAfee's wealth peaked in 2007 at $100 million, before his investments plummeted in the financial crisis of 2007–2008.
