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Two-Step Arguments |
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Lately I’ve started reading mainstream conservative blogs like Michelle Malkin and Little Green Footballs. Not just to see what they’re up to. And not just for that masochistic thrill of reading opinions that offend me (I know some of you know what I mean). Not to make my attacks sharper. Not even necessarily to be more broad-minded.
No, I read to get a sense of their style of writing and thinking. Because I don’t always understand how they get from A to B - or should I say, from A to A, because all too often in the black-and-white world of party-line pundits there is only room for one kind of thinking.
Take, for example, this amazing essay (kindly publicized by LGF) by columnist Bill Whittle. Emphasizing the value of “critical thinking,” Whittle builds from a de-bunking of the Loch Ness Monster myth to the remarkable conclusion that we should not question our government or big business. Furthermore, those who have questions about 9/11 or the JFK assassination fall into the same category as those who believe the moon landing was faked - all, according to Whittle, are “losers” whose “miserable throats” should be slit before their “cultural suicide pills . . . kill us all.”
To go on record, I do believe the official version of 9/11, though I am disappointed with the way our government has responded to the attacks. And I believe that there are questions about JFK’s assassination (why did Jack Ruby shoot Oswald?) that will never be answered. In no way does either of these opinions make me a marginal extremist - there are millions of perfectly intelligent people who would agree.
What’s important here is the idea that not trusting your government makes you both stupid and a danger to your society. I would strongly argue for the opposite: questioning your government is rational, intelligent, and patriotic. The Vietnam War, the Watergate scandal, and the Iran-Contra scandal should all amply demonstrate that members of our own government, even at the highest level, are willing to lie to and endanger their own citizens and American democracy. These are not conspiracy theories: these are matters of fact, and they demonstrate that things are not always what they seem, and that you shouldn’t always believe what you are told. Does that mean the Loch Ness Monster exists? No. It just means that not everyone who smiles is your friend.
Protecting the right of Americans to dissent has been an American value from day one - and yet columnists like Mr. Whittle, claiming to speak for the “rational majority,” hope to choke off all voices of dissent.
Further thinking along these lines is provided by this essay, kindly linked to by Ms. Malkin. For Kit Jarrell, supporting the troops is “a way of life.”
I agree. I support the troops. I try to live in a way that honors their sacrifices, in other words as a patriotic American. I love our country, which is why I question our government.
But wait . . . “supporting our troops” isn’t all that’s going on here. Because the interesting part about the article was not the article itself, which was pretty standard, but rather a discussion in the comments. James D. Cool, a Marine, a Vietnam veteran, and a retired Secret Service officer, offered the following comment:
I agree basically with the main thesis of your article but there also comes a time when supporting the troops means getting them out of a war that is going nowhere.
Cool goes on to argue that Iraq, like Vietnam, is being lost not because of disloyal Americans but because of the difficulties of sealing off the borders to a country where our presence is not wanted.
Reasonable enough, I think. But for the essay’s other readers, apparently not. Another commenter fired back with this:
James Cool sees it like the rest of the losers. As far as he is concerned, we’ve already lost, and now are just adding our bodies to their land. With his attitude, we wouldn’t win a damned thing, ever! Ones past military service does not insure their future logic. Yeah, Jimmy Cool, you think we’ve lost, and if we don’t it will disappoint you, won’t it? Thank you for your service, now take a patriotism course. nuf sed.
So wait, what does supporting the troops mean? For this commenter, it clearly doesn’t mean hearing what they, as individuals, think. Even a career of patriotic achievement does not give you the right to dissent, apparently. Support the troops only if they keep their mouths shut, is that the message?
So what’s really going on here? Are we supporting the troops, or are we supporting the war? Are those two the same thing? And if so, does supporting the war mean supporting the government? In other words, does supporting American soldiers mean that I cannot question the policies of the Bush administration? And to put it bluntly, is there no conceivable American military action that you would not support? If so, your “way of life” starts to sound pretty scary to me. “Supporting the troops” was a way of life in Nazi Germany too.
Is that what all our American soldiers have fought for? In the Revolution, in the Civil War, in World War II? In high school I was always told that they were fighting for our freedom. Freedom I actually intend to use, specifically by speaking my mind.
I don’t trust our government, and I don’t like the war in Iraq, and guess what? I still support the troops, I’m still smart, and I’m still a patriot, whether you like it or not.
But it’s hard to make that kind of argument in today’s political atmosphere and really be heard, isn’t it? Arguments with more than one step, that is. Arguments that are more complex than “Wave Your Flag, Cry When We Say 9/11, and Then Shut the Fuck Up While We Do Whatever We Like With American Lives and Dollars.”
This country used to be known for its deep traditions of thinking and speaking. Our Founding Fathers, including generals like Washington, were intellectuals and masters of the English language. Read the Lincoln-Douglas debates. Americans are critical thinkers in the true sense of the term - questioning easy answers, questioning the status quo, questioning authority. That’s our tradition.
But the age of sound bites, mass media, and cheap politics based on emotional appeals, ad hominem attacks, and fear-mongering is destroying our right to hear sophisticated ideas and sophisticated debate in the public arena. To hear real dissent. In today’s mainstream politics, there is room for only one-step arguments. Saying something like, “I support the troops, but not the war” takes too long to explain in a climate where you only ever have fifteen seconds to speak, and where a thousand pundits are poised to scream “traitor!” the moment you deviate from their way of thinking. Or to scream “socialist!” the moment you suggest that perhaps a capitalist country could have a national health care plan and a free market at the same time.
Both parties exploit this kind of politics. Both hide behind slogans and shy away from explaining their ideas and their policies. It’s the politics of the gut, to paraphrase Stephen Colbert. And until we can find a way to restore complexity of thought to American politics - which will mean celebrating dissent instead of vilifying it - we will be stuck in the cage of simplified arguments where not trusting your government is equivalent to being a fringe loonie, and where supporting the troops means using your freedom to shut up.
I think the political atmosphere created by the extended primary campaigns has done nothing for our democracy, only furthering the image based TV-ready candidates and their one-liners and slogans. Of course, in primary season it is a race to see who is more extreme, as evidenced by two Republican candidates advocating the use of torture and every Democratic coming out strongly against the war in Iraq. However, once the primaries are over we see a race towards the center. Perhaps we should be thinking about shortening primary season and increasing the amount of time devoted to the national race. If a 2 year long election cycle is what America wants we can at least try to shape it so it furthers debate on real issues.
I definitely know what you mean. I find myself reading opinion pieces because I have this desire to be outraged.
nice article ish. The inability to develop a thoughtful, multi-step argument is paralyzing to political movement and development. People may say this is all the people can handle, that their attention spans will cut out any speech longer than that, but I dont buy it. It underestimates the people and panders to the lowest common denominator.
That being said, however, I agree with dude’s loch ness article on a couple levels, the most prominent being the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not one to be listened to, and anyone who preaches 9/11 conspiracy theories without doing the research is irresponsible (the popular mechanics article should be required reading for them). While I’m not as hostile towards the theorists as this guy is (i don’t think i’m capable of that towards someone who hasn’t done something violently criminal) this guy is partially justified in his venom. The Rosie O’Donnells of the world perpetuate the absence of sustained, developed arguments.
Well, this is really plain vanilla talk by an obviously sharp and admirable chap. We all know that open air debate is the basis of governance. These pat lines of the bilge bags defending their eroding position isn’t about what they are saying. The more the words are repeated, the more the air is filled with talk of it, instead of talking about reasonable public policy. And the more we do not hear about the hundreds and thousands of aspects of the ongoing dismantling of good policy in all areas of governance and law. And the more we wince when “certain words are spoken”, since we know what must pile forth from lips right and left, in endless file dumps of thoughts by thoughtful and no so folk. And the more people can remember them and repeat them, hypnotically. I think you have to fight back with the things that start the walls crumbling. Not the little lies of lame lines, or pointing out hypocrisy, or laughing at ineptitude, or talking about the person instead of the policy. Those things don’t move the independent middle of support for bad policy. Only the simple plain words by smart chaps like yourself on what is wrong, really wrong, with policy are needed to overcome the media soundchamber, make people think and talk, and from where you sit change the world. You’re the guy for the job - we all have to be, and now.
You can rest easy, the JFK assassination was exposed. E Howard Hunt confessed on his deathbed. There’s a slew of new information from his son if you search for it. Unfortunately, the mainstream media didn’t really cover it at all. Only Rolling Stone had an article worth merit. Scroll to the bottom of the Wikipedia article to see the full text of the confession:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._Howard_Hunt
So you believe the Official Conspiracy Theory (OCT) on 911 provided by the same government that you don’t trust?
This is the same government that has killed over 3000 of our brave troops and 600,000+ Iraqis due to lies about WMDs?
Have you looked at the facts (not opinions) of 911, including the near free-fall collapse times of the buildings? Have you looked at the considerable gathering of intelligent, credible people (www.patriotsquestion911.com) that question the OCT, people far more credible than Rosie O or Charlie Sheen?
It amazes me that people will line up behind our dishonest regime’s party-line about the most pivotal day in American history without giving it some careful analysis. Until someone can tell me why WTC 7 was completely, symmetrcially demolished in 6.5 seconds, defying the law of conservation of momentum, then I believe there is certainly reason to question the OCT and ask for better, independent answers.
Please, do some research on your own. What really happened on 911 is simply the most important question Americans can ask, because the OCT is the basis for so many horrible things going on today.
Dissent is Patriotic!
dissent is undoubtedly valuable, and I love to hear intelligent discussions of why and how the US government has mislead the people over 9/11, or any other issue. To me there is no doubt that the 9/11 commission was an abysmal failure, and intentionally steered attention away from areas that should have received extensive coverage. But it’s a matter of informed dissent, it’s a matter of not shooting from the hip. When someone comes out with allegations against the US government, come correct, with thoroughly researched evidence. When you fail to do so, you do a disservice to any movement you hope to further.
Here’s an example from the believers side, linked to in the Bill Whittle article. While it may not address WTC 7 adequately, it’s rather convincing on other points. An informed piece of dissent should give researched reasons against this proposed scenario for the tragedy of 9/11. If you have any such links, Bob Crawford, I would sincerely like you to post them. I’m not predisposed either way, and am ready to let sound logic sway me either direction.
I too am slow to trust the government, but I am equally slow to trust conspiracy theories and the like. The event was so public, and so picked over by scientists, journalists, and government officials, that I think any real conspiracy theory would have been discovered years ago. Just my opinion…
DailyKos has a policy that users may not dispute the official version of the events of 9/11 on their site. I will not advocate that policy for the Seminal, but I believe it is worth asking what can be gained from accusations that 9/11 was a conspiracy by our government. As you say, Mr. Crawford, 9/11 is invoked to justify many things, including the War in Iraq and the existence of prisons and torture at Guantanamo Bay.
But we can successfully criticize the Bush regime, the Iraq war, and so forth without reference to conspiracy theories. The discussion about “what really happened” on 9/11 is one that I believe skeptics should conduct in private; when and if they are ready to make extremely serious allegations against the government, they should do so in an organized and disciplined manner, and not (and please don’t take this the wrong way) by sounding off on the internet. I believe that Michael Moore came close to making such a charge in Fahrenheit 9/11, but ultimately shied away from such a move; perhaps film would be a useful platform through which to present such charges.
As for the rest of us, I repeat that we can make sophisticated political arguments against the Iraq War and other Bush policies not by attacking the reality of 9/11, but by attacking how history has been used and manipulated to justify the erosion of American democracy. We need to stand up for our democracy but we also need to pick our battles carefully so as to avoid being marginalized and discredited. I see it as a delicate balance between not falling victim to common traps that Republicans set for their adversaries, and taking back control of the terms of the political debate itself.
In continuing with the thread Ish started above, I also think it is useful to explore the causes of 9/11. To say 9/11 happened because “they” hate “us” is an intellectually lazy argument. It would do us a world of good to explore the political and historical causes behind terrorist acts like 9/11 and it would do even more good to acknowledge that we can search for causes without somehow justifying the attacks. Just because we can find blame in ourselves for our past actions does not mean the terrorists were justified in killing innocents. As your mother always told you, two wrongs don’t make a right.
“supporting troops was a way of life in Nazi Germany ”
Problem is that in nazi germany the troops would kill you if you didnt support them, or their efforts.
And as far as J-ROs last comment goes I agree on the lack of justification for 911. I would say that once again organized religion has reared it’s ugly head in the best interest of the world.