Fun With Rhetoric

March 31, 2004

Legal Fiction: Lessons From the Response to Clarke

Another thing that pisses me off about the whole Clarke affair is how many people have (with the help of talking points) made the question of Clarke’s credibility into an all-or-nothing issue. Say what you will about the people who think the truth is in the middle, at least they're willing to concede that Clarke's criticism of Bush has at least some merit. The all-or-nothing people, by contrast, seem to think that if they find one or two slightly inconsistent statements, then his entire set of allegations suddenly becomes 100% false. I’m not sure why we have to take either 0% or 100% of Clarke’s allegations and nothing in between.

This rhetorical strategy-- presenting a binary choice between a preferred policy and a dystopian alternative-- seems to be favored by members of the right (although I'm sure crazy lefties use it as well.) More later...

Posted by Andrew Raff at March 31, 2004 1:47 PM