Why Such a Negative Campaign?

Senator Albert J. Beveridge

The 2016 presidential campaign has reached great depths of negativism. Americans seem sick of the election.

1. Crazed negativism has long plagued American politics. The 1800 campaign was much nastier. Yes, that's right, our Founding Fathers knew how to get very negative. The great Republican orator Albert J. Beveridge (winner of college speech contests!), a prominent United States senator, wrote eloquently and humorously about the nasty political speeches that he heard as a boy growing up in the post-Civil War era. Beveridge was a firebrand himself early in his career, but eventually developed sober, conservative attitudes toward speaking.

2. Politicians go negative because it works. If positive visions won elections, politicians would have more positive visions. It's up to us, the voters, to vote for candidates who express a positive vision - if that is really what the voters want!

3. Voters need to sort genuine negative things from wild accusations and bizarre conspiracy theories. My earlier post about conspiracy theories gives some suggestions.