Trapped in the Wrong Paradigm: Three Handy Rules
This post by Arthur on Crooks and Liars is a common sense distillation of the kind of post I’ve tried to write about logical fallacies. Arthur gives a set of simple rules when arguing with the rhetoric of the Administration and its supporters.
When you argue within the framework and using the terms selected by your opponent, you will always lose in the end. Even if you make a stronger case about one particular issue, your opponent still wins the larger battle — because you have permitted the underlying assumptions and the general perspective to remain unchallenged.
Intelligence is completely irrelevant to major policy decisions. Such decisions are matters of judgment, and knowledgeable, ordinary citizens are just as capable of making these determinations as political leaders allegedly in possession of "secret information." Such "secret information" is almost always wrong — and major decisions, including those pertaining to war and peace, are made entirely apart from such information in any case.
The administration has a more insidious game plan instead: it has manufactured and milked this controversy to reboot its intimidation of the press, hoping journalists will pull punches in an election year. There are momentous stories far more worrisome to the White House than the less-than-shocking Swift program, whether in the chaos of Anbar Province or the ruins of New Orleans. If the press muzzles itself, its under-the-radar self-censorship will be far more valuable than a Nixonesque frontal assault that ends up as a 24/7 hurricane veering toward the Supreme Court.
Will this plan work? It did after 9/11.
The Rove/Bush stance wins the field before the opening kickoff. Play on their field and you’re toast. For example, get in an argument asserting that Bush has mismanaged the Iraq War. You’ve already lost, because it is immaterial, actually, that he’s mismanaged the war. What matters is that he shouldn’t have started it in the first place. Or, unless you are specifically involved in the Pro-Choice or Gay-Marriage movements, as soon as you engage in those discussions, you are the Defendent in a Prosecution with a stacked deck. It’s the "if you’re not with us, you’re against us" trap. If you ever plan to have a discussion with another Republican or Conservative, read this article and tape it to the case of your Blackberry…
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