{"id":28467,"date":"2018-03-05T15:42:10","date_gmt":"2018-03-05T15:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=28467"},"modified":"2018-03-05T15:42:10","modified_gmt":"2018-03-05T15:42:10","slug":"conservatives-winning-labeling-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=28467","title":{"rendered":"Conservatives are winning the labeling war"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Let’s give a sort of shout-out to the conservative media and the politicians they are backing.<\/p>\n

Those on the right wing of the spectrum are winning the war of epithets, labeling and name-calling. They have turned the term “liberal” into a four-letter word.<\/p>\n

I see it daily as I watch the political debate swirl and churn across the land. To be called a “liberal” in Texas — which is run by Republicans at every level of government — is to be called the son of Satan himself. A candidate for the Texas Senate who is running against state Sen. Kel Seliger, an Amarillo Republican, has called him “liberal” and “corrupt” — in that order. Do you get it?<\/em> The implication is that to be liberal is to be corrupt. By the way, Seliger is campaigning for re-election as a dedicated conservative<\/em>, which he is.<\/p>\n

It’s gotten so bad among liberals that they no longer are even identifying themselves with that epithet. Oh, no. The operative word now among those on the left is “progressive<\/em>.”<\/p>\n

Admission time: As one who tilts to the left, I find myself using the this new P-word when describing myself. Have I gotten, um, self-conscious about what liberalism? Oh … maybe.<\/p>\n

Liberals, er, progressives, haven’t yet been able to turn the right wing’s labeling against them. I suppose they could shorten the word “conservative” to, oh, “con,” which of course brings up another connotation altogether. I mean, liberals are called “libs” on occasion. But I digress.<\/p>\n

The political debate often becomes a contest of sorts. One side seeks to demonize the other with words that sound a bit jarring. Republicans back in the early to mid-1990s began using the term “Democrat” as an adjective, referring to “Democrat politicians,” which doesn’t sound quite the same as “Democratic<\/em> politicians.” That word usage was part of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s strategy to label “Democrats as the enemy<\/em> of normal Americans.”<\/p>\n

If I were wearing a cap at this moment, I would tip it toward Republicans, conservatives and those in the right-wing media for the success they have enjoyed in this rhetorical battle with those on the other side.<\/p>\n

However, as a dedicated political liberal, I offer my salute as a form of damning them with faint praise.<\/p>\n\n

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Let’s give a sort of shout-out to the conservative media and the politicians they are backing. Those on the right wing of the spectrum are winning the war of epithets, labeling and name-calling. They have turned the term “liberal” into a four-letter word. I see it daily as I watch the political debate swirl and … Continue reading Conservatives are winning the labeling war<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,13,14,18],"tags":[1941,2780,7630,4622,4701],"class_list":["post-28467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","category-national-news","category-political-news","category-state-news","tag-gop","tag-liberals","tag-progressives","tag-texas-gop","tag-texas-senate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28467"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28467\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28468,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28467\/revisions\/28468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}