In his recent column comparing President Barack Obama's slogans "Change" and "Forward" to Mitt Romney's "pathetic" catchphrase "Believe in America," Benjamin Schwartz uses overtly biased language and damaging assumptions to incorrectly characterize Romney's campaign and personal character ("What's in a Slogan?" May 7). Schwartz relates Romney's motto to the "birther movement," arguing that it taps into some of his supporters' racist and xenophobic sentiments as part of a larger intentional strategy calling on voters to "fear Obama's foreignness." By doing so, Schwartz contributes to the exact extremism he refutes, perpetuating the partisan rhetoric that runs rampant in our increasingly superficial political culture.
It is outlandish to deduce such a hostile meaning from a phrase as generic as "Believe in America." Schwartz may be right to argue that Romney's slogan is unoriginal or mundane. But to imply that it has a hidden agenda to enrage and enliven the racist, anti-Obama constituency is an unreasonable leap that is both unconstructive and damaging to our already hyperbolic political system. By making such a claim, Schwartz's argument is no more viable than the Fox News report that he sardonically references and denounces, which equated Obama to Karl Marx because of the president's "Change" slogan.
In reality, Romney's slogan is likely as simple as it appears. It does not hide some deep-seated racism, but is a surface-level attempt to refocus voters' attention on the constitutional foundations of American society. Schwartz belittles the slogan by stating that it does not emphasize Romney enough it is not "Believe in Romney," whereas the Obama slogan focuses on the candidate himself. But this is not a mistaken flaw in the slogan, but rather a deliberate effort by the Romney campaign to put country before candidate to focus on the nation as a whole rather than the ambitions of a single man. The emphasis is on American patriotism and resilience, which portrays a sense of confidence in the American people to push through these turbulent times. To argue that the slogan has some sinister ulterior motive is entirely unreasonable.
In addition, Schwartz's assertion that the similar slogans of Mitt Romney and John Kerry imply that both men share similar traits is an overly generalized simplification. The "Believe in America" tagline used in the Kerry campaign was not the main slogan, but was instead the name of a two-week bus tour across the country. Kerry's official campaign slogan was "A Stronger America." To use Schwartz's line of reasoning, George W. Bush's 2004 bus tour titled "Yes, America Can" sounds eerily familiar to Obama's "Yes, We Can." But to equate Bush and Obama due to their similar catchphrases would be a glaring misrepresentation of their vastly different mentalities, policies and ideologies. To make this case about Romney and Kerry is equally misguided.
Perhaps most disconcerting about Schwartz's analysis is not its blindly partisan accusations or allegations of implicit racism. Instead, it's his use of a few words as evidence of a candidate's entire character. Deeming Romney an intentionally divisive, almost treasonous figure because he decided to print "Believe in America" on his campaign flyers is an illogical distortion of reality. Using the slogans "Change" and "Forward" to bolster Obama's campaign is equally superficial. By referencing hollow promises as proof of Obama's validity, Schwartz depreciates some of the genuine accomplishments the president has made over the past three years.
To be fair, this issue is not isolated to Schwartz's column. Instead, Schwartz demonstrates that he is yet another victim of our nation's political "sound bite" culture, one in which 10-second gaffes or one-line catchphrases are more important than entire political platforms. Candidates have risen and fallen based on a single response during a debate. Campaigns have ended because of quick one-liners caught on strategically placed cameras and played on repeat by news channels and websites.
The fact that so much lip service has been paid to such meaningless mistakes and gimmicks threatens to erode the very foundations of our government. Our political system relies on voters making educated and informed decisions about potential candidates, a requirement that is impossible to achieve when so many individuals focus their attention on biased, inflammatory rhetoric. We need to move beyond slogans and focus on the actual issues.