January 24, 2012

Fear and Contempt on the Campaign Trail

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This is hardly the most important thing in the world, but I’ve heard an awful lot of people lately saying that Newt Gingrich’s recent success is due to the fact that no one is better than him at channeling the anger of the Republican base. There’s nothing really wrong with that formulation, but for the record, I don’t think anger is quite the emotion in play here. Rather, it’s fear and contempt. The tea party wing of the Republican Party fears that the America they love is being taken away from them, and they have almost unbounded contempt for President Obama, the taker-away-in-chief.

And who does fear and contempt better than Newt? No one. Those are the emotions he’s channeling, not just boring old anger.

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Managing an independent, nonprofit newsroom is staggeringly hard. There’s no cushion in our budget—no backup revenue, no corporate safety net. We can’t afford to fall short, and we can’t rely on corporations or deep-pocketed interests to fund the fierce, investigative journalism Mother Jones exists to do. That’s why we need you right now. Please chip in to help close the gap.

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