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Politics : I Will Continue to Continue, to Pretend....
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To: Sully- who wrote (30417)5/27/2009 3:37:16 AM
From: Sully-   of 35834
 
Fatigue with the straw men arguments

Betsy's Page

Even the New York Times is getting rather exasperated with the plenitude of President Obama's setting up straw men arguments to knock them down. While throwing in that Bush did the same thing, they note how Obama has been doing it over and over again.


<<< “Here’s the trick: Take your opponent’s argument to a ridiculous extreme, and then attack the extremists,” said William Safire, the former presidential speechwriter who writes the “On Language” column for The New York Times Magazine. “That leaves the opponent to sputter defensively, ‘But I never said that.’ ”

The telltale indicators that a straw man trick is on the way are the introductory words “there are those who say” or “some say.”

“In strawmanese, you never specify who ‘those who’ are,” Mr. Safire said. “They are the hollow scarecrows you set up to knock down.” >>>


Many politicians, including Republicans do this. It's an effective technique in your goal is to bamboozle people. It succeeded in making him see more moderate and reasonable than he is. And most people aren't paying enough attention to realize that he is setting up a false dichotomy where only his chosen policy is the apparently rational choice.

The strawman argument isn't one that I would allow my students to use in their papers. Whenever I read a student's strawman argument, I force them to identify and quote specific historians who have made that argument. Perhaps more in the media will follow up by pointing out that no one has been making the argument that Obama is knocking down. And reporters will start demanding that he tell them who specifically is arguing that we do nothing in face of the nation's problems.

betsyspage.blogspot.com
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