By contrast, liberals and progressives who embrace certain kinds of political tolerance (e.g., racial tolerance) find it more difficult to use established cultural stereotypes to castigate their political opponents with. Granted, liberals and progressives bandy about such terms of castigation as "racist" and "sexist" and "old white men" and "patriarchy" -- the typical stuff of political correctness. In addition, they have recently gotten some mileage out of the expression "war on women."
But Newt Gingrich did a far better job of castigating Mitt Romney in the Republican presidential primary than President Obama himself did in his own speeches. Then again, perhaps he did not want to appear to be too much like Newt Gingrich.
No doubt Mitt Romney hurt himself in the presidential campaign by his comments about takers versus makers. President Obama skillfully turned this contrast against him.
But when it comes to castigating their political opponents, conservatives excel -- they are the superstars in the castigation game. By contrast, liberals and progressives appear to be amateurs.
Edsall's analysis of voter turnout shows that the Republican Party could possibly adapt its "anti-" messages to attract more white voters to vote for Republican candidates in elections, provided that the "anti-" messages do not back-fire and instead prompt certain mainstream, moderate whites to stand up and fight against such messages.
Barbara Koziak's Book About Aristotle's Views
In her fine book RETRIEVING POLITICAL EMOTION: THUMOS, ARISTOTLE, AND GENDER (2000), Barbara Koziak reminds us of Aristotle's views of political emotion, the kind of political emotion that motivates voters in the
Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
