1

Your words are gracious ... thanks for the linkage this week. Good Columbo questions in the Columbo piece. I always try to plug Stand To Reason (str.org) when I teach Columbo ... Greg Koukl is the originator of the term, although the question asking motif has been around since Socraters (I guess).

Blessings!

2

To go along with the Reagan/Kerry juxtaposition of quotes:

Many of you are well enough off that ... the tax cuts may have helped you. We’re saying that for America to get back on track, we’re probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We’re going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good. -- Hillary Clinton

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. -- C. S. Lewis (1898 - 1963)

3

How about this:

"The war between the North and the South is a tariff war. The war is further, not for any principle, does not touch the question of slavery, and in fact turns on the Northern lust for sovereignty."

Guess who said that? Guess... Guess...

Karl Marx.

Just one of a few of the gems that you often don't hear that's in my quote archive.

4

Thanks for the link, Joe. Most generous.

5

How about adding this under the ironic blunder Category to your quotes of the week Joe:

From: The Hugh Hewwit Show via Eschaton

HH: Vice President Dick Cheney, welcome to the Hugh Hewitt Show.

VP: It is good to be on here.

HH: Today you brought attention to John Kerry's plan to wage a more 'sensitive'
war on terror. What do you think John Kerry meant when he said 'sensitive,' Mr.
Vice President?

Cheney: Well, I'm not sure what he meant (laughing). Ah, it strikes me the two words
don't really go together, sensitive and war. If you look at our history, I don't
think any of the wars we've won, were won by us being quote sensitive. I think
of Abraham Lincoln and General Grant, they didn't wage sensitive war. Neither
did Roosevelt, neither did Eisenhower or MacArthur in World War II. A sensitive
war will not destroy the evil men who killed 3,000 Americans, and who seek
chemical, nuclear, and biological weapons to kill hundreds of thousands more....

...[10 minutes later on the same program]...

HH: Will the Najaf offensive continue until that city is subdued even if that
means a siege of the Imam Ali shrine?

Cheney: Well, from the standpoint of the shrine, obviously it is a sensitive area,
and we are very much aware of its sensitivity. On the other hand, a lot of
people who worship there feel like Moqtada Sadr is the one who has defiled the
shrine, if you will, and I would expect folks on the scene there, including U.S.
commanders, will work very carefully with the Iraqis so that we minimize the
extent to which the U.S. is involved in any operation that might involve the
shrine itself

DS~I realize Cheney's such a big liar already and crap such as portraying Kerry's suggestion that we be more sensitive to our allies to mean he said we should be more sensitive to Al Qaeda Terrorists doesn't really stand out anymore. But don't you think that makes a great example of lying and hypocrisy?
What really makes it special in my view is that Kerry, a guy who volunteered for combat and was decorated, is being portrayed as a chicken by a couple of cowards who pulled every string they could to get out of Vietnam.

6

DS,

But don't you think that makes a great example of lying and hypocrisy?

It shouldn't. After all, I thought Bush's critics claim that Iraq isn't a part of the "war on terror." (For what it's worth, though, I think it was silly to go after Kerry for his "sensitive" remark. Kerry has proven himself to be such a bald-faced liar that there really is no need to bother with nit-picky wording. Both Bush and Cheney should stick to pointing out the simply fact that he can't be trusted to tell the truth.)

What really makes it special in my view is that Kerry, a guy who volunteered for combat and was decorated, is being portrayed as a chicken by a couple of cowards who pulled every string they could to get out of Vietnam.

I don't recall Bill Clinton calling Kerry a chicken.

Also, we should remember that Kerry "volunteered" only after he failed to receive a deferment to study in Paris. He tried to pull strings also but failed miserably.

By the way, don't you agree that Kerry should release all his military records so we can clear up all this controversy?

7

See Joe to my way of thinking, making a 200 Billion Dollar blunder is pretty much grounds for dismissal from public office.

200 Billion would give every breadwinner for every family of three or more who was laid off in the last three years $50,000 cash.

It would pay the healthcare insurance for every child below the poverty line for the next 30 years.
200 Billion would rebuild every home and business wiped out by Hurricane Charley and have enough left over to cover Andrew, Camille, Cecelia, and still pay for the Apollo Program.

So, even without the deaths of 1000 GI's, the burned off faces, and blown off limbs of thousands more, even without screwing things up with our allies and then turning around and begging them for help to bail us out, even without Uranium Lies and stoking the fires of paranoia, blowing 200 billion is the kind of thing that gets you fired no matter how noble your intentions.

Obviously you like Bush. He's by all accounts a nice, likable, guy and I don't buy reports that he's any kind of imbecile or learning challenged. But this is the real world, not a Yale Mixer gone wrong or a company in West Texas he can count on being bailed out of by rich people who like his last name. This is his mess, he took responsibility for it.

It doesn't improve Bush's poor polling numbers on Iraq to use as his defense that John Kerry was dumb enough to trust the President with exactly what the President asked for.

Accountability Joe. You're held accountable if you screw up. So am I. So is everyone reading this Blog. So is George Bush.

8

FlyoverNation thanks you for the link, Joe. I'm enjoying the "Know your Evangelicals" series. It should be required reading for journalists who cover religion (the few that do) AND those who cover national politics.

9

Re 'the "Ab Homine" Fallacy: “The fallacy consists in saying, in effect, My argument is particularly valid because I used to belong to the other side”.

I didn't find Master Buck's attempt to refute this fallacy especially convincing, mainly because he missed the principal reason why these sorts of arguments aren't conclusive: that people cross the fence both ways.

Specifically relevant to an evangelical blog,for example, is the fact that for every former Catholic who becomes born-again and publishes his/her testimony (Twenty-One Years In Bondage To The Vatican And Its Corrupted Priests, Forced To Consume The Death Cookie Weekly) you can find a former Protestant who's now swum the Tiber (An Evangelical Realises That Evangelical is Not Enough Because Rome Is Home).

I have no idea how equal the numbers are. The ex-Catholics are usually much angrier, but also more marginalised by the larger Protestant denominations (you don't see Billy Graham or even James Dobson publicly meeting, say, Eric Svendsen or Bill Webster as the Pope has met with Scott Hahn). OTOH, ex-Protestants are almost always much more eirenic and conciliatory in their language, and are more prominently "displayed" by the Catholic Church authorities. So exact numbers are hard to judge impressionistically. But the fact remains that people can and do cross both ways.

In its favour, the ab homine argument can help you allay the criticism that you are prejudiced, bigoted, a "lifelong opponent" of your opponents and their position. "I was once like you" at least neutralises this charge, and may even intrigue some of your opponents into tentatively treading the same path you trod.

By contrast, someone who's never tasted the fruit that you yourself savour, yet still condemns it, can seem as closed-minded as someone who attacks a film as "blasphemous" even though s/he's never seen it. Very often, for example, Catholics simply reject criticisms by Protestants who've never been Catholic on the grounds that "they just don't understand Catholicism, and have never tried it".

(These statements are often printed alongside articles by bishops claiming that use of contraception impairs marital intimacy. Not that "ex-Catholics for Christ" get any less short a shrift: they "must have been badly catechised' and "are using the Church as a scapegoat".)