Couture: Perpetuating Partisan Rhetoric

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.