This is a class discussion post that needs to be approximately 2-5 paragraphs in length. 

***Discussion Post should be followed accordingly Each question asked needs to be answered.

********I will post the students response below.  With the Student response it should be 1-2 paragraphs in length reply to the students disccusion.

********************Discussion Post*****************

Death taxes vs. estate taxes. Illegal aliens vs. undocumented workers. These are just a few examples of words which have become exclusively affiliated with either the Republican or Democratic lexicon.

At present, elections for gubernatorial, Senate, and House races are being held all over the country. Select one race, besides those in Georgia, and examine the language used by one or more candidates. In what ways does this candidate’s language fit or stand out from the typical lexicon of their party? Do some candidates within the same party use competing words, phrases, or frames to discuss certain issues? Provide links to press conferences, news stories, tweets, etc. to illustrate your point.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2018/governor/2018_elections_governor_map.html

************************ Student Response***************************

To answer this discussion post, I’ll look to Mississippi state senator Chris McDaniel’s campaign for the U.S. senate. Chris McDaniel is an interesting player in an interesting race. In November, Mississippi will hold a special election to fill the seat left vacant by Sen. Thad Cochran. The Republican interim Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, who is a known Clinton supporter and former Democrat, will square off with Sen. McDaniel and Democrat Mike Epsy in a blind jungle primary. McDaniel’s campaign is centered around a (Ted) Cruzesqe brand of conservatism and opposition to Hyde-Smiths questionable ideological status as a Republican.

A few days ago Sen. McDaniel said “All of a sudden, that disqualifies this man? All of a sudden, he’s a terrible human being? No, not a chance. You know, I don’t fall for it anymore. And I hope the American people aren’t falling for it. These allegations, 99 percent of the time, are just absolutely fabricated” on a local radio show in reference to the Kavanaugh circus. The left media in Mississippi took off with this gaff and of course spun it to “McDaniel, who is running for the U.S. Senate, went farther and suggested that only 1 percent of all sexual assault allegations have merit” in one instance. When it comes down to what McDaniel said it obviously came off as clumsy and is perhaps something other politicians would avoid saying. Many Republicans tread lightly around matter of whether or not Fords allegations are falsified while McDaniel stomps right through it. Why does McDaniel stray from the reserved speech of Republicans? Two things to consider are the nature of the special election and the precedent set by Trump.

A blind primary means that party identification is not given on the ballot, a natural response to this would be an effort to garner name recognition and McDaniel’s commentary got his name out there. There have been many other instances of McDaniel making bombastic utterances in the past that got the same or more media attention. I would assume McDaniels habit is more strategy than bumbling.

During Trump’s 2016 campaign, the president made a multitude of crude comments that were distasteful to some. The reality was his comments served to rally himself around the sometimes ugly sentiments of the majority while also distinguishing him from the other candidates who looked squeamishly politically correct in comparison. I would argue that McDaniel has the same affect when compared to Cindy Hyde-Smith.

Hyde-Smith approached the Kavanaugh issue this Wednesday when she said “It seems opponents of Judge Kavanaugh are engaged in character assassination to destroy the reputation of a devoted public servant, and a loving husband and father,” while reading from a speech prepared for her on the senate floor. Ashton Pittman from the Jackson Free Press commented “In her speech, she said that while her heart “breaks for victims of assault and abuse,” she considers the accusations “unjust” and a product of the Democrats’ partisan goals.” Compared to McDaniel these are generic, predictable, and pursed words. It is obvious the McDaniel and Hyde Smith are approaching the same issue from two different angles despite being from the same party.  

       Source of first two quotations: https://mississippitoday.org/2018/09/19/fact-check-mcdaniels-claim-that-women-fake-99-percent-of-sexual-assault-claims/

Source of second set of quotations:  http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2018/sep/26/hyde-smith-defending-kavanaugh-my-duty-woman-congr/