The Rice University Neologisms Database

one who vocally expresses and advocates extremely partisan political ideas. Wingers loudly express their views and strongly advocate for a conservative, limited federal government dominated by their specific ideals and values. Wingers represent political activists that push for extreme conservatism in the government, but they fervently lobby and articulate their political agenda. : ‘Wingers’ reflects a spatial association to the wings of a bird. Wings are on the extreme periphery of a bird’s body and not a part of the central, main part of the body. ‘Wingers’ are similar in that they represent people who support extreme views that deviate far from the central, mainstream views of the populace. By omitting ‘right’ in ‘right-wingers,’ the author is able to describe the judicial rejection of Harriet Miers in an abstract way such that political extremists are related to the deviating wings and extremities of a bird. In the author’s context, she is describing the judicial scrutiny and harsh criticism toward Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers from extreme, conservative advocates like Rush Limbaugh who defiantly oppose the moderate, ambiguous views of Harriet Miers. The author probably used ‘winger’ to be politically correct and nonpartisan in her judgment of the failure of President Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers. If the author had blatantly pinpointed extreme conservatives by labeling them as ‘right-wingers,’ then she would have been subjected to a flurry of complaints and rebukes from conservatives. They would sharply denounce her as a part of the liberal media. As a columnist and journalist, she is supposed to be unbiased in describing the news, so she does not want to offend the conservative Republicans in pinpointing their criticism of Harriet Miers. In doing so, she maintains the integrity of writing about the news. Instead, ‘right-wingers’ is easily implied and insinuated in the article. ‘Wingers’ could also be a generalized form of jargon used by political analysts to broadly describe any sort of political extremist who vocally expresses partisan views.