Word: panderer
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...Maryland, a state with a proven affection for low-key cerebral Democrats, remains his best shot. Tsongas' challenge is to show that he is an economic statesman with the courage to tell the truth to the American people, while painting Clinton as just another glad-handing Governor willing to pander to the voters with giveaways. That is why Tsongas, the candidate of pain -- both economic and personal -- zings Clinton over his advocacy of a middle-class tax cut, a ! popular, but economically questionable, nostrum...
None of the announced candidates can top Mario Cuomo, who scores a perfect 10 on the Pander Meter. Some highlights: in 1988 Cuomo unsuccessfully advised Michael Dukakis to break with the 30 Democratic U.S. Senators (most of them strong supporters of Israel) who had urged Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to negotiate with the Palestinians. In June 1990 Cuomo praised Shamir for "correctly refusing to offer any guarantees that would limit the settlement" of Soviet Jews "anywhere in Israel." Last month Cuomo derided President Bush's Middle East maneuvers, saying, "I don't believe you should be evenhanded between the people...
Both share a fear of the mongrelization of white Western culture, with an implicit belief in the inferiority of non-Western culture. Both appeal to the ideal of tolerance in defense of intolerance. Both pander to anti-intellectualism, using the academy as an easy target for frustration over larger social change. Both are discomfited, most basically, by the erosion of traditional forms of power...
Crime is the one arena where prime time drops its Panglossian pose to pander to public hysteria. This is not to argue that the narcotics squad on Nasty Boys should instead pursue jaywalkers or that the cops on Hunter should stop shouting, "Freeze. Police. Drop the gun!" O.K., so you cannot have detective shows without serious crime. But why are sitcoms also menaced by a crime wave that resembles New York City during a blackout? In this single week, there was an interracial team of angry drug dealers on A Different World, a psychotic killer rudely intruding on an office...
Zwirm acted neurotically and would pander to almost any group, no matter how politically repulsive. One of the council candidates was a Republican whom we nominated "for balance," taking the nomination away from an intelligent, articulate Democrat who could have run a much better campaign. The other council candidate was the hardest worker of the bunch. A liberal college professor, he is probably the only one on the slate with a chance...