These devices fool us because they appeal to our emotions rather than our reason. They make us do things that we would not normally do if we thought about it rationally and dispassionately. They work because sometimes we are too lazy to think things through and accept the automatic explanation offered up. Name Calling is a device to make us form a judgment without examining the evidence on which it should be based. Here the device is very close to the fallacy of arguementum ad hominem but differs in the respect that it is not directly attacking the person instead of the argument.
Name calling ignores the argument.
This implies that so and so is sympathetic with the communist Chinese and agrees with their human rights record. Name calling probably reached its overt best in the Mcarthy Era. The use of bad names without presentation of their essential meaning, without all pertinent information, comprises perhaps the most common of all propaganda devices. Glittering Generalities is the opposite of Name Calling. Here the appeal is to our emotions of love, generosity, and goodness.