The mud slinging technique
"The grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down."- Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf
A definition of ad hominem tactics
Throw enough mud, and it doesn't matter if it's all lies. The assumption is that "where there's smoke, there's fire" - if someone's endlessly being accused of something, maybe they actually are guilty, despite all evidence. The whole anti-Clinton machine uses this technique.
"Go negative early" says a republican strategy memo. The sheer size of conservative mud-slinging rhetoric is phenomenal -bleeding-heart, feminazi, hippie, beatnik, pinko, anti-life, red, homo-promo, commie, dumbocrat, n*gger-lover etc. etc.
And the reverse - Personal offense
For people who's favorite saying is "deal with it", conservatives still manage to be personally offended by every argument and fact used against them.
Here's a strange sort of debate in rock songs - Neil Young's "Southern Man" and Lenyrd Skynrd's "sweet home Alabama"
"tall white mansions and little shacks / southern man when will you pay them back?" - Neil Young
The rebuttal is "I hear old Neil put her down / Well I hope Neil Young will remember, she don't want 'im around anyhow" (or to that effect anyway) Instead of giving a reason why southern men should keep their inherited slave-loot, he brings the image of a woman being insulted.