Bumper sticker politics

Re “Hearts before minds, he tells Democrats,” July 9

I’m not sure which is more disheartening: that we need a psychologist and brain scans to point out that the secret to right-wing ascendancy has been a concentrated campaign to motivate voters by fomenting indignation, or the impending similar strategy being proposed by Democrats.

FRANK THOMAS

Covina

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Passion will always overcome intellect. It is the nature of human beings. He who cares the most wins. A person who uses cool logic in a debate will never be able to successfully oppose the person who yanks his audience’s emotions. FDR was right: We have nothing to fear but fear itself. If logic and calmness ruled, many mistakes would never be made. Unfortunately, we live in an era in which the fear card has been co-opted, and my deepest fear is that fear is the strongest emotion of all.

DEBRA L. WILEY

Inglewood

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Now I finally understand. Thank you, Drew Westen, for your scholarly observations about the average American’s disinterest in facts and the nation’s great enthusiasm for slogans, sound bites and quick retorts. What a sad commentary on how our attention is caught and what we value when making our most important decisions. Newspapers, TV news, radio talk shows -- all have dumbed down and all but eliminated bringing those issues that affect our democracy to our attention. Westen has made it clear -- we don’t want to know, we don’t want to think. Just give us a good bumper sticker!

MARY ROSS

Cambria