Party loyalists calling the opposition stupid is a tactic that spans all of political history. Mostly, it involves tilting at strawmen and ignoring the material conditions that make one or another party attractive to a voting base.
The fact that plenty of state and municipal politicians are virtually interchangeable (often even explicitly changing parties as the wind blows) and voter recognition of these names has eroded away with a rise in strict partisan identification only adds to the degree to which politicians can camouflage themselves to be whatever the local plurality is looking for.
Calling the local Republican a moron for failing to favor Pete Buttigieg over Mike Pence belies a lot of what drives that voter to affiliate with the party to begin with and ignores what a politician needs to do to establish a local positive reputation in the voting district.
Party loyalists calling the opposition stupid is a tactic that spans all of political history. Mostly, it involves tilting at strawmen and ignoring the material conditions that make one or another party attractive to a voting base.
The fact that plenty of state and municipal politicians are virtually interchangeable (often even explicitly changing parties as the wind blows) and voter recognition of these names has eroded away with a rise in strict partisan identification only adds to the degree to which politicians can camouflage themselves to be whatever the local plurality is looking for.
Calling the local Republican a moron for failing to favor Pete Buttigieg over Mike Pence belies a lot of what drives that voter to affiliate with the party to begin with and ignores what a politician needs to do to establish a local positive reputation in the voting district.