What Democrats should be saying

[Sock Puppet]

Originally Posted by LionsDen

The fact that Democrats dumped Clark for the likes of Howard Dean and John Kerry means that any plan is poison.

No, it means that the most simplistic message, however wrongheaded, generally carries the day with voters. That certainly accounts for Dubya's victory, both in the primaries and the general election.

[ManM]

Originally Posted by LionsDen

Still it makes more sense to vote for a candidate who is further along the way toward good public policy from the start. HINT: Conservative, not flaming liberal.

It makes sense to me to vote for a candidate who I can endorse in good conscience.

Originally Posted by Puck

Noooooooo. That's what got us in the damned mess in the first place, us putting in our own guys. We've been doing it for decades and it's gained us terrorists. That's about the worse idea ever, and we've got to stop doing that.

Think, man, think.

What Clutch said, minus the ridiculous notion that I somehow need the Democrats to have no plan, and the junk following it.

Originally Posted by Clutch

So was leaving out all the irrelevant pages uncharitable to you?

If so, could you explain this remarkable view?

You leave out relevant information, presenting a subset of the facts as if that were the whole story. A person reading your posts alone would not find out that the “missing link fallacy” was specifically identified and described in an essay titled, “The Handbook of Logical Fallacies”, with the description being repeated in an online free thought journal titled “Port of Call”. You provide no details about your “vague resemblance to the use I made of it” claim, because doing so would reveal just how vague those resemblances are, and demonstrate that they are not comparable to a specific appearance in an essay that identifies logical fallacies. Of course, that’s not relevant to your point that it is not accepted as a formal logical fallacy, but, and here is the catch, I never claimed that it was universally accepted as a formal logical fallacy.

You employed the same method of omission by cherry-picking the White House document. You obviously had scanned it all, given your comments about the more detailed section. However, when trying to demonstrate my alleged double standard to the audience, you specifically relied heavily on the summary.

You make solid conclusions based on the subset of information presented by your posts. Since your conclusions follow from the things in your post, it provides an illusion of correctness. However, the information you omit casts doubt on your conclusions. It’s a crafty and useful rhetorical technique, but it doesn’t do much to further a productive discussion.

And when I point out what you are doing, accurately describing it as misrepresentation, you call me a dipshit.

Originally Posted by Clutch

If not, could you explain what this endless nonsensical whining is about, except your need to engage in fractally-patterned evasions?

The irony is that this “missing link” argument is an exercise in misdirection, as is the following:

Originally Posted by Clutch

Do you think any actual person's views do fit "neatly" within that scale? The point is quite straightforward: virtually everyone, including GW Bush or even Ann Coulter, can point out that there are people further towards the poles of any dispute who disagree with them. Hence this fact alone, to which you appealed as evidence that you are "doing something right," in fact supports this inference to no greater extent than it shows that Bush or Coulter is "doing something right".

Fair enough. Although I didn’t actually appeal to mere disagreement, I don’t care enough to whack this mole.

I’m not going to have access to a computer for the next couple weeks, so I’ll end here. For all of your smoke blowing, you still never managed to do the one thing that could end this: point me to a Democratic plan.

Originally Posted by Godless Dave

Because a) that's the sort of thing you don't state publicly and b) they probably assume that most Americans who follow foreign affairs are smart enough to know what the CIA and special forces are used for.

People who follow foreign affairs should also be smart enough to know that bin Laden is operating near the Afghanistan border, and Afghanistan has already given their permission for our troops and the CIA to operate in their country.

Afghanistan didn’t give us permission until after we invited ourselves into their backyard. Do the Democrats plan to do the same things as the Republicans, for the same reasons as the Republicans, but with more CIA and Special Forces people?

Originally Posted by Godless Dave

The Republicans have offered no plan, none, for eliminating Osama bin Laden or al Qaeda.

*sigh*

[Clutch Munny]

Originally Posted by ManM

You leave out relevant information, presenting a subset of the facts as if that were the whole story. A person reading your posts alone would not find out that the “missing link fallacy” was specifically identified and described in an essay titled, “The Handbook of Logical Fallacies”, with the description being repeated in an online free thought journal titled “Port of Call”.

So the fact that I, just like you when you first made your claim, did not judge the fucking title of the webpage relevant, was the gross lack of charity that explains your incessant mewling?

Sweet potato tickle, what a pile of shit.

What the fuck does the title of the page matter? There are three --possibly four if you count a straight copy -- online uses of the phrase: one of which you cited. Wiggle and squirm as you please.

You provide no details about your “vague resemblance to the use I made of it” claim, because doing so would reveal just how vague those resemblances are, and demonstrate that they are not comparable to a specific appearance in an essay that identifies logical fallacies.

Okay, so you are on drugs. My calling it a vague resemblance was out-and-out "dishonest", a "stunt", "antics", even fucking "devious", because it is actually... get this... a vague resemblance!

Dipshit is far too kind a word for you.

And this essay that "identifies" (rather than, say, coining or conjecturing) logical fallacies -- this single, lonely Ayn Randophile source in all of intellectual e-space -- you feel that by failing to make a note of its title, I misrepresented you in some way that explains your ridiculous caterwauling?

Granted that I've followed you into a complete diversion; still, it's worth doggedly chasing down your evasions every once in while, just to put you back in your box. I mean, what you've said here really is dipshittery extraordinaire.

Of course, that’s not relevant to your point that it is not accepted as a formal logical fallacy, but, and here is the catch, I never claimed that it was universally accepted as a formal logical fallacy.

And I never attributed this strong a claim to you, oh Boy Who Cried Misrepresentation, only that there was a received use of the term. Remember? You tried to suggest that I'd made some mistake with the use of the fallacy name, calling it a "fabricated fallacy" and adding, "ironically, if you google “missing link fallacy”, you will find that it is attributed to making a statement that is missing a link in the chain of causation."

Nice passive voice, carefully unspecific as to the force of the "attribution".

Now, did you mean to say instead, Ironically, if you google “missing link fallacy”,you will find only a single self-proclaimed authority, an Objectivist, who has a different definition?

Because that's the full set of facts, isn't it, son? And if you don't report the full set of facts, well, that's dishonest!

Or did you, gosh, mean to insinuate that I'd made some error regarding the fallacy that is actually "attributed" to the phrase? Requiring, then, that there be some received usage relative to which a divergent use would be a mistake?

If you meant the former, then your remark was worded very strangely, and such a complete failure to establish an "irony" as to be pathological. But if you want to say, now, that that's all you meant in the first place, I'll happily take you at word.

If the latter, my observations were and are directly relevant and decisive; there is no received usage; my usage was no mistake.

You make solid conclusions based on the subset of information presented by your posts. Since your conclusions follow from the things in your post, it provides an illusion of correctness.

Oh, damn me and my conclusions that follow from my posts. Why are you still whingeing about this? As you've correctly said, people can read for themselves and decide whether you are systematically cooking your standards in accepting vague Administration proposals as clear implementations while responding to Democrat proposals with an unprincipled round of "But how will that accomplish the goal?" If I've misrepresented the specificity of that Administration document, I'm sure I'll get an earful.

And when I point out what you are doing, accurately describing it as misrepresentation, you call me a dipshit.

No. When you whine for demonstrably -- and already demonstrated -- absurd reasons, I call you a dipshit. Worse words would apply as well.

I didn’t actually appeal to mere disagreement

Huh.

Originally Posted by what you actually said

But hey, the neocons bitch about my liberal bias, and their cohorts on the left (neolibs?) bitch about my conservative bias, so I must be doing something right.

Umm. Okay. No doubt I've just been dishonest somehow. I can't wait to find out how. But for now let's end with a true "moment of zen" bit of irony:

you still never managed to do the one thing that could end this: point me to a Democratic plan.

*sigh*

*sigh* indeed.