Tag Archive for 'fiscal_responsibility'

How To Sabotage An Argument, Part 2

Written by Colin. Published on July 20, 2009 ago in General. 3 Comments

This is the second and final article in a series on how to basically lose an argument before you start it [part 1 here]. This line of reasoning is based on the premise that people who engage in an argument are doing to so in order to discover and communicate truth.

Hence, four more ways to sabotage your argument:

Ascribe Nefarious Intentions and Motives to the Other Side
This is quite prevalent in large, seemingly irreconcilable debates: abortion, religion, left versus right, etc… People who are pro-choice are not seen as intelligent people who are making a self-ownership case for abortion (although this would be wrong), but as “baby killers” or people who “support murder” or “do not support life.”This is ridiculous. Aside from the negligible portion of the population who are homicidal, no one else wants to see babies being killed. These people are not wrongly motivated – rather, they are wrong in methods.

Political leaders are called evil all the time – some of them are. George W. Bush has been hailed as the great Satan for the last seven years or so (and Obama has not been treated any different – except by the media), but it is very realistic that Bush has pursued what he has out of good motives and intentions. He has been sincerely wrong, probably criminally so, but he is not necessarily out there to thwart humanity and bring about apocalypse.

Attack the Personal Actions of Your Opponent
This line of reasoning follows from a very valid principle – practice what you preach. But at the same time, for the purposes of arguing things that aren’t always liveable (or if they are, aren’t lived anyway) it is completely useless. Ron Paul was attacked in the 2008 election for being one of the higher proposers of appropriations (earmarks) in congress. It was alleged that because Paul put forward earmarks, that someone this discounted what he said about fiscal responsibility. But truth isn’t dependent on our acting it out (Paul also voted down every single earmark he proposed). Just because someone doesn’t stop at stop signs, doesn’t mean they would be wrong to suggest that stopping at them is a good idea.

Become Self-Righteous About Your Arguments, Facts and Case
This is an easy mistake to make. After all, if we didn’t think we were right, then why would we argue? But this is not a problem with being right, it is a problem with believing one is infallible or that a morally neutral position is somehow “right” in the sense that it is good, while the other side is bad/evil. But more than that, it is a condescending attitude toward your opponent and/or his ideas. This is presuming a certain argument before your opponent makes it. With your own ideas, it is a blind refusal to allow them to be penetrated by other’s reason, logic or facts.

Forget That You Are Speaking With A Person
This is the most important thing, and the summary of the article.  We aren’t arguing with robots, with brainwashed automatons, with ideologies – we are arguing with people. People deserve to be respected and treated as people – they are intelligent, rational beings – despite how silly, ignorant or radical their worldview is.

War Tax: Democrats Take One From the Right

Written by Colin. Published on October 3, 2007 ago in General. 12 Comments

In a rare show of actual strategic thinking – some democrats in congress have proposed a “war tax” to pay for the current war in Iraq – which has now lasted longer than either World War I or II. Though the purity of the motives were questionable, the action itself stretches deep into American conservative tradition when it comes to national defense.

Representative David R. Obey declared:

If the president is really concerned about stopping red ink, we are prepared to introduce legislation, which will provide for a war surtax… If this war is important enough to fight, then it ought to be important enough to pay for.

How is it that a democrat, after all the empty talk of “fiscal responsibility” from Republicans for the past two decades, actually invokes the justifiable tactics of the old right? Conservatives have generally loathed new taxes except in the event of war because wars need to be consistently funded and the population needs to feel the cost of the war, so as to be able to gage their own willingness to fight it. A war tax supports the troops who are going to battle by letting them know that the whole country is behind them – and is willing to sacrifice in the present just the soldiers themselves are.

The current “conservative” movement has rejected this principle, and instead chosen to require future generations to pay for their parent’s conflict. As in so many households in this country, the irresponsible pattern of “receive today, pay tomorrow” has been prevalent in Washington. Indeed, billions are borrowed from the Chinese each month to pay for this war. The US would be better off in debt to the mafia then China, which already holds one trillion dollars in reserves (releasing these would cause an inflation storm, the likes of which have not been seen since Wiemar Germany).

Much has been made of the Democrat’s move, especially the tried and true claim that “democrats just want to raise taxes.” However, what we are really seeing is part of a greater ideological shift. Republicans have gradually become the party of leviathan – where war is the health of the state and big government is no longer a threat to freedom, but a means to secure (the formerly left-wing) positive rights and felling of safety and security.

A war tax, in the current state of popular abhorrence to the effort, would result in a speeder exit than even the most anti-war politicians oppose. Again, not because of some political game – but because American’s don’t believe in or want to fund this perpetual war on terror.

However, these same Americans and their leaders on both sides of the aisle in Congress, are glad to pass the buck to their children.