Wake of Echoes

Back in January, when I wrote about why I love Millennials , I mentioned that Millennials are media cynics who neither watch nor trust what the mainstream media has to say about politics. It's true, and I respect that. Truly. But I know what some of you were thinking: Yeah, but whether they watch the mainstream media or not, Millennials are still overwhelmingly liberal. Yep, that's true too. There are lots of explanations for that, just like there are lots of explanations for why senior citizens are mostly conservative. Some are detailed, some are vague. Some are logical, some are just insulting. Some go back hundreds of years, like the one below, which I've heard in one form or another for most of my life ( For more information on the origin of this saying, visit:  Quote Investigator ). We could talk for a long time about the influence of teachers, parents and peers on the political and ideological outlook of Millennials (okay, and everyone else too), but to...

Juliet said that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Maybe. But only if I'm holding the rose and smelling it while calling it an onion. If I don't have a rose in my hand, I mentally "smell" something very different when the words "rose" or "onion" are mentioned. The fact is, words have rich, full-bodied value. We attach meaning to them without even thinking about it. We make judgments based on words we didn't even consciously hear. And that, my friends, is why labels are so important to politicians, strategists and media types. About this time four years ago, a friend of a friend posted something about the Obama/Romney election on Facebook that I (unwisely) decided to respond to. (I don't remember every word she wrote, so I'm paraphrasing, except the part in bold, where my recall is perfect.) Here it is: She:  I know one thing about this election: you just can't vote for the party that supports corporations ...