Here's Republican idea man Newt Gingrich on Obama:
"What we need is a president, not an athlete," Gingrich said during a question and answer period after his speech. He added: "Shooting three point shots may be clever, but it doesn't put anybody to work."
Big ideas.
Today Robert Samuelson, mustachioed captain bringdown of the Washington Post op-ed page, meditates on the obvious fact that people who think they're right about something feel good about being right. The only thing is that he mistakes this for some kind of profound discovery. He writes:
Obama's approach was politically necessary. On a simple calculus of benefits, his proposal would have failed. Perhaps 32 million Americans will receive insurance coverage — about 10 percent of the population. Other provisions add somewhat to total beneficiaries. Still, for most Americans, the bill won't do much. It may impose costs: higher taxes, longer waits for appointments. [argument please–eds]
People backed it because they thought it was "the right thing"; it made them feel good about themselves. What they got from the political process are what I call "psychic benefits." Economic benefits aim to make people richer. Psychic benefits strive to make them feel morally upright and superior. But this emphasis often obscures practical realities and qualifications. For example: The uninsured already receive substantial medical care, and it's unclear how much insurance will improve their health. [WTF? –eds.]
Purging moral questions from politics is both impossible and undesirable. But today's tendency to turn every contentious issue into a moral confrontation is divisive. One way of fortifying people's self-esteem is praising them as smart, public-spirited and virtuous. But an easier way is to portray the "other side" as scum: The more scummy "they" are, the more superior "we" are. This logic governs the political conversation of left and right, especially talk radio, cable channels and the blogosphere. [Or it's even easier to portray them as having ulterior psychological motivations about feeling good about themselves-eds.]
I think a country as rich as ours ought to be able to provide health insurance for everyone. I think this for moral reasons and practical ones. On the practical front, the total costs, I think, of our current system outweigh the benefits. The new bill, by the way, wasn't just about the uninsured (and really Samuelson ought to know this)–it was about reforming the insurance you already have (which in many cases barely qualifies as "insurance"). Now, thankfully, if Samuelson develops a new condition–mustache cancer for instance–he can't be "rescinded" (that was the idea, anyway) by his insurance company just because he's sick. If his kid has a preexisting condition, the Post's insurance policy can't not cover him. Well, that's the idea anyway.
Does it make me feel good about myself to have supported such a position? Maybe. Did I think it was the correct position to take? Yes. That feeling–feeling good about having the right position–is a consequence of my thinking I have the right position, rather than the cause of it.
But in any case, I think we can all assume for the sake of argument that everyone always wants to feel good about himself. We can also assume that people want to feel good about themselves for good reason. The relevant question here is whether people who supported (or opposed) HCR have good reason to feel good about themselves.
Maybe they do, maybe they don't.
Too much of our critical political discourse depends on one single virtue: consistency. This is why Pat Buchanan, a man who writes articles (I am not exaggerating) in praise of Hitler–is a kind of pundit saint. Since consistency matters, and consistency depends on memory–or rather, detecting someone's inconsistency depends on remembering what she's said in the past, let's have some fun with our favorite son on an economist, Robert Samuelson. Samuelson, is like the captain bringdown of the Post editorial page. He's got a droopy mustache, a dour expression, and he poo-poos just about everyone who tries to do something about something–environmentalists are dumb and self-indulgent for buying Priuses!.
For a while–for those who remember–Samuelson been poo-pooing Obama's "self-indulgence" on health insurance reform. A more competent rhetorical analyst, by the way, might have fun with the way he always goes ad hominem on Obama–treating his own impoverished and uncharitable image of Obama rather than Obama's stated positions (he even admitted once that this was his own problem). But it's worthwhile to poke fun at Samuelson's priorities. Way back before we spent 700 plus billion dollars in Iraq, chasing what turned out to be an easily uncovered deception, here is what Samuelon wrote:
A possible war with Iraq raises many unknowns, but "can we afford it?" is not one of them. People inevitably ask that question, forgetting that the United States has become so wealthy it can wage war almost with pocket change. A war with Iraq would probably cost less than 1 percent of national income (gross domestic product). Americans have grown accustomed to fighting with little economic upset and sacrifice.
Pocket change. In reflecting on this piece (called "A War We Can Afford") Samuelson wrote:
Yes, that column made big mistakes. The war has cost far more than I (or almost anyone) anticipated. Still, I defend the column's central thesis, which remains relevant today: Budget costs should not shape our Iraq policy. Frankly, I don't know what we should do now. But in considering the various proposals — President Bush's "surge," fewer troops or redeployment of those already there — the costs should be a footnote. We ought to focus mostly on what's best for America's security.
When it comes things that are actually real, on the other hand, Samuelson is skeptical:
When historians recount the momentous events of recent weeks, they will note a curious coincidence. On March 15, Moody's Investors Service — the bond rating agency — published a paper warning that the exploding U.S. government debt could cause a downgrade of Treasury bonds. Just six days later, the House of Representatives passed President Obama's health-care legislation costing $900 billion or so over a decade and worsening an already-bleak budget outlook.
900 billion? That figure is almost exactly what we've spent in seven years of war. Weird. But this time cost is all that matters.
Thankfully Cornell University's very excellent philosophy program is off the hook for the following travesty:
As I approach my 10-year college reunion, it's clear that I missed a few classes that would have proved helpful.
Those classes include "Leadership and Ethics" and "Ethical Theory," offered by the Program on Ethics and Public Life at my alma mater, Cornell University.
See, I'm certain that at some point those classes would have covered the issue I've been grappling with recently, in which case I'd be able to tell you what Plato and Aristotle said about it. Maimonides and Thomas Aquinas, too. I bet you Hobbes and Locke have really super advice on this one. And you just know Ayn Rand would be all over it.
Alas, I chose to commune with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles of the art history department instead – Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello and Raphael. So to sort through my philosophical conundrum, I will enlist your help.
With President Obama making his final push for health care reform, I ask you to consider the following "If, Then" theorem: If our health is the President's business, then the President's health should be our business.
What follows is a series of ad hominem tu quoques. For instance:
* The President's push for health care is disingenuous.
In June 2009, he called the sweeping tobacco legislation that he passed "a victory for health care reform" and "a step that will save lives and dollars." Whether Obama's main interest in passing health care reform in America is to save lives or save dollars – and it has been both over the past year – one could argue that a President who smokes isn't really doing much of either.
One could argue that, but one would be wrong. Perhaps she should have taken a logic class as well.
Courtesy of the guys at Sadly, No!
It's a been a while since I've rapped at ya', but things have been busy in my neighborhood.
This–click here–Daily Show interview with Marc Thiessen, torture apologist, sophist, and for that reason Washington Post columnist is well worth watching. Not only does this fellow advance a bunch of silly arguments (which Stewart shoots down) he whines relentlessly about not being able to talk. He got to talk just fine, it's just that he got called on his silliness.
Stewart's case I think is an interesting one. We might all agree that Thiessen's argument fail miserably on logic and facts. For instance:
Would most Americans want to know if the Justice Department had hired a bunch of mob lawyers and put them in charge of mob cases? Or a group of drug cartel lawyers and put them in charge of drug cases? Would they want their elected representatives to find out who these lawyers were, which mob bosses and drug lords they had worked for, and what roles they were now playing at the Justice Department? Of course they would — and rightly so.
That analogy completely blows, to use a technical term. For starters, the lawyers worked pro bono, unlike Tom Hagen. Second, being someone's lawyer doesn't entail you endorse their alleged criminality. Third, everyone is entitled to a lawyer. Fourth, we have a nation of laws, allegedly.
But how one points this out most effectively is another matter. Arguments, for too many people in our silly televised and printed discourses, are just monologues: there is no common purpose, no shared goal, and no commonly agreed-upon rules to which we can refer to resolve our disagreements. It's nice to see someone successfully knock one of these monologues off the tracks.
Update. Media Matters beat me to the Tom Hagen reference. Drats.
George Will should not use the phrase "non sequitur." He writes:
Some liberals argue that the Constitution is unconstitutional. Their reasoning is a non sequitur: The Constitution empowers each chamber to "determine the rules of its proceedings." It requires five supermajorities (for ratifying treaties, endorsing constitutional amendments, overriding vetoes, expelling members and impeachment convictions). Therefore it does not permit requiring a sixth, to end filibusters.
No one I know of argues that–and Will doesn't try to cite anyone. It's a dumb argument, after all. So he's right about that. He ought to know, of course, because that is precisly Will's argument against everything else about government he doesn't like. Since the Constitution doesn't expressly provide for it, it doesn't exist. There is no right to x, because the Constitution doesn't say so.
Now since no one argues for this silly view (other than Will), it's a perfect example of the hollow man. Note the use of "some."
Thanks to Aaron at the Stopped Clock for the hat tip, the pointer, and for generally reading this blog.
The argumentum ad imperfectionem is a kind of fallacious argument advanced by lazy meta commentators. It consists in alleging that the imperfections in the arguments of certain peripheral exponents of a particular view justify the weak-manning of the opponents of those views.
So for instance, some less than responsible or scientifically accurate characterizations of the family of views known as climate change justify the wildly erroneous allegations of global warming deniers. Here's an example from the Washington Post's Dana Milbank:
As a scientific proposition, claiming that heavy snow in the mid-Atlantic debunks global warming theory is about as valid as claiming that the existence of John Edwards debunks the theory of evolution. In fact, warming theory suggests that you'd see trends toward heavier snows, because warmer air carries more moisture. This latest snowfall, though, is more likely the result of a strong El Niño cycle that has parked the jet stream right over the mid-Atlantic states.
Still, there's some rough justice in the conservatives' cheap shots. In Washington's blizzards, the greens were hoist by their own petard.
For years, climate-change activists have argued by anecdote to make their case. Gore, in his famous slide shows, ties human-caused global warming to increasing hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, drought and the spread of mosquitoes, pine beetles and disease. It's not that Gore is wrong about these things. The problem is that his storm stories have conditioned people to expect an endless worldwide heat wave, when in fact the changes so far are subtle.
Other environmentalists have undermined the cause with claims bordering on the outlandish; they've blamed global warming for shrinking sheep in Scotland, more shark and cougar attacks, genetic changes in squirrels, an increase in kidney stones and even the crash of Air France Flight 447. When climate activists make the dubious claim, as a Canadian environmental group did, that global warming is to blame for the lack of snow at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, then they invite similarly specious conclusions about Washington's snow — such as the Virginia GOP ad urging people to call two Democratic congressmen "and tell them how much global warming you get this weekend."
That's just nuts. Gore and the climate change activists are correct (Milbank doesn't doubt that), but examples used in their arguments may give lazy or just plain dishonest people the wrong idea. It's their fault, in other words, that they have used anecdotes to illustrate claims about the consequences of a warming atmosphere. Giving examples, anecdotes in other words, is one way a view can be communicated. These anecdotes, by the way, are not perfect. They are not perfect especially in the hands of people with no particular scientific training or real grip of the view they hold. A view, in this circumstance, which turns out to have a sound justification.
Misrepresenting the scale or significance of the imperfect anecdote in order to undermine the view is what we call "weak manning," that is, distorting a view by selection of its weakest justifications. There likely are lots of these. But this does not justify the dishonesty of people who know of better arguments. And the existence of weak exponents of a particular view does not entail that the view itself is weakened.
Now that a Democrat is President, some Republicans and other conservatives have rediscovered the fine art of logical analysis. I think that is something we ought to applaud. But their memories are short and their skills are rusty. Take for example the following pot-and-kettle peice from a former speechwriter to George W. Bush, Noam Neusner. He writes:
Some people get quoted in presidential speeches by writing heartfelt letters to the president about personal loss, or by doing something heroic, like landing a plane in the icy Hudson River.
I just sit in the Oval Office, and mouth off to President Barack Obama, one inanity after the next. And sure enough, my words—word for word, mind you!—show up in his biggest speeches.
Who am I? Sotus—Straw man of the United States. I'm Mr. Obama's most trusted rhetorical friend.
In his speeches, Mr. Obama says there are "those" who suggest we "can meet our enormous tests with half-steps and piecemeal measures." He suggests there are "some" who are content to let America's economy become, at best, "number two." He says that on health care, "some people" think we should do nothing.
Listen, there is no "some people." He's just quoting me, Sotus.
Like William Safire before him, Mr.Neusner confuses not naming your opponent specifically with the straw man (well, actually the hollow man). They're different. See, Presidents don't typically name their opponents in arguments. George W.Bush, the man for whom the author of this clueless piece wrote words, did it all of the time–in speeches. Sometimes, of course, and Mr.Neusner is right about this, the "some" is more fantastical than others. Sometimes, however, the "some" is almost exactly the platform of the opposition. Skipping a few paragraphs (as always folks, I expect you read the entire piece I discuss!):
And then there was the nice talk we had right before that historic January afternoon, when he was sworn in. I turned to him and said: "Mr. President-elect, our system of government can really only tolerate small plans, and limited ambitions." Think how good it felt to hear my own words echoing across the Mall: "There are some who question the scale of our ambitions, who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short, for they have forgotten what this country has already done." Good one, Mr. President!
As an assignment for the folks at home, try to identify whose views is accurately characterized by that bolded part. For that matter, do that with the rest of this piece. Just for fun. And just to close out with a little bit of absolutely justifiable tu quoque:
Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: "Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided." We have an obligation to call this what it is – the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.
Guess who said that? More here.
The other day the Washington Post published a piece by a professor of politics at the University of Virginia (Gerard Alexander) called "Why are liberals so condescending?" (we discussed it here). It remains today a few days later one of the most emailed articles on the Post's website, so it's worth looking at it in more detail. To be fair to this juvenile piece, however, would be a labor of many days, so I'd just like to point out a few quick items.
First off, the title has the ring of a complex question: that is two questions, one unfairly assumed to get to the other. What the author ought to establish is whether liberals are more condescending than conservatives (in similar circumstances), or whether liberals are particularly condescending. Once he established this, then he can ask the follow up question: why are they this way to such a degree (as we have established)? His failure to understand this elementary logical notion makes me look down on him.
Second, the author is silly. Not to be an even-hander here, but I think liberals are no less "condescending" than conservatives. I'd suggest, in fact, that such labels and broad generalizations are really meaningless. Turns out, in fact, that such equivocal terms were used to great effect by this author. You see, liberals are one solid group, each one guilty of the sins of the other, while conservatives were always able to avoid group guilt. Here's an example:
This liberal vision emphasizes the dissemination of ideologically driven views from sympathetic media such as the Fox News Channel. For example, Chris Mooney's book "The Republican War on Science" argues that policy debates in the scientific arena are distorted by conservatives who disregard evidence and reflect the biases of industry-backed Republican politicians or of evangelicals aimlessly shielding the world from modernity. In this interpretation, conservative arguments are invariably false and deployed only cynically. Evidence of the costs of cap-and-trade carbon rationing is waved away as corporate propaganda; arguments against health-care reform are written off as hype orchestrated by insurance companies.
Before I comment on what I wanted to comment on, here and throughout the piece the author doesn't bother to counter the claims against "conservatives." Perhaps he takes it as self-evident that what Mooney said (in his well-documented–I didn't say "true"–book) is false. I can think of a couple of Republicans, for instance, whose ignorance of science is concerning. Here's Republican Senator Jim DeMint on the snowstorm this past week in Washington:
It's going to keep snowing in DC until Al Gore cries "uncle"
I find myself looking down on Jim DeMint, an extremely wealthy, powerful, and capable man for the idiotic thing he said. It's obvious that he doesn't know jack about the science behind global warming. This same claim of many other prominent "conservative" and "Republican" leaders and intellectuals.
Back to what I think I was going to comment on (it's now several hours from when I wrote that line above, so I don't really remember what I was going to say)–Alexander's characterization of Mooney's book disregards its content in order to criticize its form. This, I think, is a hopelessly dumb and unproductive way of interacting with people with whom you disagree. Not only does Mooney have an argument, but, judging by the numbskull policies of the last eight years, he might even have a good one. But you can't really tell that, of course, until you actually look at the argument. Alexander maintains, of course, that you don't need to look at the argument, because he knows what it says. That, I think, is just what Mooney was complaining about.
No doubt, as I've said many times before, many liberals condescend to conservatives. Many conservatives condescend to liberals. The narrative, however, is that liberals are intellectual snobs, when conservatives are not. I think that's hardly the case as a matter of fact. It's also almost a matter of logic (I said "almost") that when you say someone's view is wrong, you're bound to appear snobby to them. Especially when that person, such as is the case with Alexander here, doesn't seem to know what makes a view right or what makes it wrong.
Here's another article about how liberals condescend to conservatives. It begins:
It's an odd time for liberals to feel smug. But even with Democratic fortunes on the wane, leading liberals insist that they have almost nothing to learn from conservatives. Many Democrats describe their troubles simply as a PR challenge, a combination of conservative misinformation — as when Obama charges that critics of health-care reform are peddling fake fears of a "Bolshevik plot" — and the country's failure to grasp great liberal accomplishments. "We were so busy just getting stuff done . . . that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people about what their core values are," the president told ABC's George Stephanopoulos in a recent interview. The benighted public is either uncomprehending or deliberately misinformed (by conservatives).
This condescension is part of a liberal tradition that for generations has impoverished American debates over the economy, society and the functions of government — and threatens to do so again today, when dialogue would be more valuable than ever.
Perhaps this guy is joking. Or he is just very seriously misinformed, because it has been a mainstay of conservative opposition to any Obama initiative to call it "socialist" or worse (Liberal fascism anyone). I'm not going to bother linking to anything because just googling the combination of "Obama" and "Socialist" nearly crashed the Google server.
It's not, in other words, condescension. It is a plain and to my mind surprisingly charitable interpretation of an opposition many of whose key members and leaders have excluded themselves from minimally reasonable discussion. That's just true, whether or not many liberals are condescending a–wholes.
As he wraps up this factless and meme-driven piece, the author goes for a little balance:
Of course, plenty of conservatives are hardly above feeling superior. But the closest they come to portraying liberals as systematically mistaken in their worldview is when they try to identify ideological dogmatism in a narrow slice of the left (say, among Ivy League faculty members), in a particular moment (during the health-care debate, for instance) or in specific individuals (such as Obama or House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whom some conservatives accuse of being stealth ideologues). A few conservative voices may say that all liberals are always wrong, but these tend to be relatively marginal figures or media gadflies such as Glenn Beck.
Really. Again, I'd say this is plainly false. No bother. This guy doesn't even try to produce evidence (here's an assignment, google "liberals" and see what comes up–it's entertaining. Then google "liberals" and the name of any leading conservative, you won't find George Will making fine-grained distinctions). Perhaps, however, as a conservative, he doesn't know that claims about reality stand or fall on the basis of the evidence offered. "Just trust me phrases" in an advocacy piece don't count.