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Tag Archives: hollow man
Civility for jerks
Mallard Fillmore’s got a nice way to capture the civility problem — with a straw man followed by a tu quoque! If President Obama charged the Republicans with wanting to kill the elderly and starve the poor, I don’t remember … Continue reading
Posted in Ad hominem tu quoque, hollow man, Specious allegations of fallacy, Straw Man
Tagged hollow man, Mallard Fillmore, Straw Man, tu quoque
7 Comments
Bill Maher’s Ham Jihad
Bill Maher thinks there's too much manufactured outrage in our national discourse. When Bobby De Niro recently made a white people joke at an Obama fundraiser dinner, noted defender of the rights of minority groups Newt Gingrich leapt to our … Continue reading
Posted in False equivalences, General discussion, hollow man, Weak Analogy
Tagged bill maher, hollow man, Weak Analogy
1 Comment
Grown ups
People acquainted with media narratives know that the "adults" and the "grown ups" and the "serious people" are very often the Republicans, especially when we're talking about entitlements. Democrats and their union friends, we're often told, are childish or immature for … Continue reading
Posted in false trichotomy, hollow man
Tagged Adult Conversation, Chicago Tribune, hollow man, Jon Stewart, Medicare, Medicare Reform, Steve Chapman
2 Comments
Iron man
Corresponding to the three versions of the straw man scheme (straw, weak, hollow), one may identify three forms of dialectical distortion going the other way–i.e., that is the "positive" way. That is to say, one may be guilty of not … Continue reading
Posted in General discussion
Tagged hollow man, Iron Man arguments, Michelle Bachmann, Poe's Law
3 Comments
Something had to be done
Richard Cohen, (allegedly) liberal columnist for the Washington Post, writes a column in favor of the Libyan military intervention. Unfortunately, he's spent enough time around his right-wing counterparts at that paper to believe that making a rhetorical case against his … Continue reading
Posted in False Dichotomy, hollow man, Straw Man, weak man
Tagged False Dichotomy, hollow man, libya, only a fool or a Frenchman, Richard Cohen, Straw Man, the Nation, weak man
2 Comments
The Thirty
Sometime soon we'll have a post up about the "Hack Thirty" at Salon.com. We were surprised that some made the list (B-list hacks) and that some didn't (Charles Krauthammer? Seriously). For that reason we wondered about the methodology and the … Continue reading
Posted in General discussion
Tagged economic sabotage, Hack 30, Hack Thirty, hollow man, Michael Gerson, political hack, Straw Man, Washington Post
1 Comment
Take this job and shove it
Sitting now on Capitol Hill is a bill, The Paycheck Fairness Act, which aims "to amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to provide more effective remedies to victims of discrimination in the payment of wages on the basis … Continue reading
W-T-F
Some maintain that arguments are dialogues and such therefore be evaluated as such. I have my doubts about this view, because so many of the arguments I encounter seem to be monologues, or at least the critical parts of them don't have anything to do … Continue reading
