Fighting Words
janet w has left a new comment on your post "Psyop":
Them's Fightin' Words!
When I read John McCain's oft-repeated line, that the transcendent challenge of the 21st century is radical Islamic extremists" I hardly know where to start parsing the sentence. Words do matter and saying "transcendent", "challenge", "Islamic" inflames the situation, imo, and leads not to solutions but to the intensifying of positions and that is not helpful.
How can we dial back or tone down the exaggerated rhetoric of a campaign year?
Them's Fightin' Words!
When I read John McCain's oft-repeated line, that the transcendent challenge of the 21st century is radical Islamic extremists" I hardly know where to start parsing the sentence. Words do matter and saying "transcendent", "challenge", "Islamic" inflames the situation, imo, and leads not to solutions but to the intensifying of positions and that is not helpful.
How can we dial back or tone down the exaggerated rhetoric of a campaign year?
posted by Tom at 6:52 PM
1 Comments:
How can we dial back or tone down the exaggerated rhetoric of a campaign year?,
Well good luck on that one Janet :) Although, I will say, we as voters, can dial back the exaggerated rhetoric in our mind, by becoming aware of, and focusing on, and dealing with the "reality of the situation", and not the media, or campaign slogans. I was thinking Tom's "The greatest and most dangerous of these is protecting the present at the expense of the future (pg 53) could be turned into an awesome campaign slogan!!
As we head into the "second super Tuesday" (everything has a sound bite) have you seen Hillary's new ad? "Who do you want answering the phone?"
Here's the link if you've missed it.
http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/recent_democratic_presidential_candidate_videos
It will be interesting to see if that ad works. I felt Obama's response was great for a democratic rebuttal, but I think McCain's team will reuse Hillary's ad to McCain's advantage, no matter who is the democratic candidate, and especially if Hillary and Obama end up on the same ticket.
How about the economy too? Unemployment is at 5.2 % or there about, and the economy goes in cycles, we all know this. Not that our economy couldn't use some help, but "the sky is falling" is happening on more issues than terror. In an election year campaigns exploit any weakness for votes.
What I have never figured out is why it works! Especially, when the candidates saying how horrible things are, are in fact those in charge of running things. We have three Senators running for President, and they all say how they will work together to "change" things. Well excuse me, but why haven't' you "changed" things" already ? I mean if you're( the candidates) so capable of "change" in Washington, then show me the "change" you've already accomplished as a Senator.
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