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<\/a><\/p>\nThe thought here is a familiar sour-grapes yuckface that those on the losing ends of elections make about what they think wins<\/em> elections — catering to the intellectual tastes of a credulous and decadent electorate.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a old Platonic worry about democracy, and it’s usually invoked by those who think their own democracy has made a bad decision.\u00c2\u00a0 (It’s all about what a good means for decision-making democracy is when they win elections, of course.)<\/p>\n As I take it the trope here is a form of what I’ve started calling the ‘No Reasonable Opposition’<\/strong> strategy for political argument.\u00c2\u00a0 Take the move here as follows:\u00c2\u00a0 The electorate made a decision I disagree with;\u00c2\u00a0 from this, we can infer that they were deeply distracted and mis-informed.\u00c2\u00a0 They wouldn’t have made that kind of decision if they knew what they were doing.\u00c2\u00a0<\/em>\u00c2\u00a0 There are two bad consequences of this line of thinking.\u00c2\u00a0 First, it’s self-sealing (as losing elections isn’t taken as evidence one needs to rethink one’s views, but of how fargone the rest of the citizenry is).\u00c2\u00a0 Second, it’s a perfect way to not even bother to get one’s views out for inspection — pearls to swine, at this point.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Check out last Friday’s Mallard Fillmore: The thought here is a familiar sour-grapes yuckface that those on the losing ends of elections make about what they think wins elections — catering to the intellectual tastes of a credulous and decadent electorate.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a old Platonic worry about democracy, and it’s usually invoked by those who … Continue reading Love democracy, despise your fellow citizens<\/span>