To succeed, Adams had to resort to exaggeration, picking out and emphasizing the cases in which the English were heavy-handed. His was not a balanced picture; he ignored the ways in which the English had treated the colonies rather well. His goal was not to be fair but to spark a war, and he knew that the colonists would not fight unless they saw the war as just and the British as evil. In working to spoil your enemy’s moral reputation, do not be subtle. Make your language and distinctions of good and evil as strong as possible; speak in terms of black and white. It is hard to get people to
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