On Monday, Rick Santorum and President Barack Obama said essentially the same thing in campaign speeches they each gave: that if the other party wins in November, the America that their supporters love will disappear forever.
Santorum said, “If Barack Obama is re-elected, then America as we know it…as we know it…will be gone. We will be a statist country.”
Obama said, “The very core of what this country stands for is on the line — the basic promise that no matter what you look like, no matter where you come from, this is a place where you could make it if you try. The notion that we’re all in this together, that we look out for one another — that’s at stake in this election.”
The fear-mongering here is identical: “my opponents will destroy our way of life.” Neither man has the respect for his supporters to be any more subtle than that. There are no shades of gray, no agreeing to disagree, no benefit of the doubt and credit given for the values and motives of others. The message is that those who don’t fall in line are simply evil.
This isn’t much different from what the actress Cameron Diaz said on Oprah in 2004, that if George Bush were reelected, rape could become legal: “We have a voice now, and we’re not using it, and women have so much to lose. I mean, we could lose the right to our bodies. We could lo–if you think that rape should be legal, then don’t vote. But if you think that you have a right to your body, and you have a right to say what happens to you and fight off that danger of losing that, then you should vote…”
People vying to be the leader of the free world now use language not far removed from that of hysterical starlets. Shame on both Santorum and Obama for such cheap, shallow demagoguery.
