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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (5933)	11/30/2005 5:23:34 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 542563

I agree that it is used in a sloppy way, but I don't see it as being sloppier than most of the rest of political discourse (again admittedly a low standard). And I do think the issue of someone having no firm principles, and going back and forth with the wind should be tossed out just because the accusation is at times made sloppily or even falsely. If the charge is false than count it against the person making the charge. Its not really the term I am defending but the idea behind the term. I think the term is used primarily because its much "punchier" than "extreme inconsistency" or something like that. Of course this is an example of negative campaigning. I just don't see how it is any worse than the rest of negative campaigning. If you want to criticize negative campaigning in general I would understand. It certainly deserves some criticism, or at least many applications of it do. But even more generally I think negative campaigning, if used correctly, can be useful (and not just as a tactic to win elections, but as a way to inform the electorate). Tim Edit - My inital post in this particular discussion was about when and how the accusation can be appropriate and useful. I was not asserting that it was always used in such a way, but rather that it can be.