Here’s a great little term I’d never heard before, courtesy of the Double-Tongued Word Wrester Dictionary:
dog whistle politics n. a concealed, coded, or unstated idea, usually divisive or politically dangerous, nevertheless understood by the intended voters. Also dog whistle issue.
In a particular piece of serendipity, I came across it at roughly the same time as I found this post by Koby mentioning a few of the more charming things some Canadian politicians on the right have had to say about immigration over the years.
And ID…guess that just might be dog whistle, what?
Certainly not science.
That’s a British term – trust Fleet Street for slang, at least.
Funny I should read your blog today. This is precisely what an NDP colleague and I were talking about this afternoon – but in the context of the Alberta government’s pronouncements on SSM and a rise in attacks on LGBT people in this province.