[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by Cohaagen

Cherry-pick horror stories and unflattering/manipulated/made-up statistics, safe in the knowledge that they're reinforcing already negative views, rather than attempting to persuade through robustness of argument, held by people who have likely never visited the place in question, have no interest in it beyond its use as a stick to beat the opposition with, and probably can't even find said country on a map? Perhaps with the aid of an unknown, ultra-marginalised hobby-horse crank (eg. Daniel Hannan) with many axes to grind, presented as an expert on the side of prevailing opinion? Or, failing that, fabricate stories about "death panels" and "Sharia Law" (both outright lies, the latter a particularly dangerous one, yet still accepted as fact by a worrying number of Americans).

And that, folks, is how you hit the nail on the head.