As old as politics! People say they don't like it but is seems to work.
Most campaigns use the tactic but they don't want to admit they do.

Here is a story from 2008 CNN
http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/wayoflife/08/22/mf.campaign.slurs.slogans/

Founding Fathers' dirty campaign

Things got ugly fast. Jefferson's camp accused President Adams of having a "hideous hermaphroditical character, which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.

"In return, Adams' men called Vice President Jefferson "a mean-spirited, low-lived fellow, the son of a half-breed Indian squaw, sired by a Virginia mulatto father."As the slurs piled on, Adams was labeled a fool, a hypocrite, a criminal, and a tyrant, while Jefferson was branded a weakling, an atheist, a libertine, and a coward. Even Martha Washington succumbed to the propaganda, telling a clergyman that Jefferson was "one of the most detestable of mankind."

Last edited by Common Sense (3/17/2016 10:11 am)