1.0 link 103619 <![CDATA[Assassination Chatter and the End of Legitimacy]]> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-bromwich/assassination-chatter-and_b_103619.html Legitimacy is the most elemental and elusive of political goods; a gift which only a society can give its leaders, and only the same society can take away.

To deprive a politician of legitimacy is long and serious work. A good deal of the process has always taken place behind the scenes before the evidence comes into view.

Thus, from 1994 onward, a language of generalized insult and contempt was used by Republicans about Bill Clinton in order to deprive him of the claim to be recognized...

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