A Discourse Between Friends

Let us plant flowers instead

This conversation started with some published piece that was talking about what would have happened to the world if Bush hadn't lied about WMDs and invaded Iraq, implying somehow that many bad things would have happened.

HE: I'm usually particularly adept with instances of sarcasm (as opposed to facetiousness) so let me see if I can extract the essential syllogism being made here, implicit by reverse reasoning vis a vis the sarcastic intent:

"If the President had not lied to the American public, some very unlikely shit would probably not have happened. Because we would NOT have wanted some very unlikely shit to have NOT have happened, it is a good thing the President lied to the American public?"

Is that it? Because that's just fucking brilliant!

AE: Well, I just took it for what it was. That if Bush hadn't started the war in Iraq, we'd be planting flowers with the Iranians, and global peace would now exist. Kumbaya My Lord !!!! ;)

Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
O Lord, kumbaya! Someone's laughing,
Lord, kumbaya! Someone's laughing,
Lord, kumbaya! Someone's laughing,
Lord, kumbaya! O Lord, kumbaya!
Someone's crying, Lord, kumbaya!
Someone's crying, Lord, kumbaya!
Someone's crying, Lord, kumbaya!
O Lord, kumbaya! Someone's praying,
Lord, kumbaya! Someone's praying,
Lord, kumbaya! Someone's praying,
Lord, kumbaya! O Lord, kumbaya!
Someone's singing, Lord, kumbaya!
Someone's singing, Lord, kumbaya!
Someone's singing, Lord, kumbaya!
O Lord, kumbaya! Kumbaya, my Lord,
kumbaya! Kumbaya, my Lord, kumbaya!
Kumbaya, my Lord,
kumbaya! O Lord, kumbaya!

YOURS TRULY: Because someone does not commit a treacherous or deceitful act does not necessarily imply in any way that all other events related or not will therefore turn positive. It simply means that possibly the direct consequences of the dastardly deed in question may have a different outcome.

HE: I like that. When you put it in that form, it is a classic non-sequitur called "denying the antecedent." Ahh, logic, you gotta love it. Political hacks, however, seem not too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denying_the_antecedent

AE: I seem to remember a couple of star trek episodes where logic was proven inferior to gut feelings! )

HE: I would be inclined to agree that this administration's concepts can be described as "science fiction" except that they seem not to believe in science as a whole.

That, and your use of the term "proven" would be suspect in any discussion, regardless of Mr. Roddenberry's involvement; but that's a logic issue, so perhaps you will discount it. If that is the case, my gut feeling is that George Bush is a ignorant little meat puppet, controlled by Dick Cheney and directed by Karl Rove and pussy whipped by his wife and anyone who thinks otherwise is a pusillanimous fool, incapable of recognizing an obvious reality... oh, the gut feeling is... so... lovely, Jim!

YOURS TRULY: Must be a gut virus. I think I have the same gut feeling.

HE: What this country needs is a great big bottle of "Authoritarian Colon Blow," to purge the system! I would like to have hopes for the upcoming election. If the opposition party operates as nothing other than cellulose, that would be an improvement; because it would be impossible to do less, as a congress, than this current congressional body has managed to accomplish in the past six years--unless you count rolling like punks to the administration's whims.

The rally cry I hear from the irrational 'right' is that Democrats controlling one or even two houses of congress will mean that the final two years of the Bush administration are embroiled in subpoenas and, perhaps, impeachment hearings. These are the same guys who sent 144 subpoenas to the Clinton administration and accused his efforts to get Osama Bin Laudin during that time frame as a 'wag the dog' to distract from their bullshit investigations. Now, I'm not a big Clinton fan (or the fan of any real 'politician' for that matter--and he certainly was that); but when I hear that same group of neocons now claiming that Clinton "didn't do enough" to stop terrorism in his term--alla the Chris Wallace interview--I just want to puke. Here, again, it is my own issues with logic getting in the way, I'm sure.

Besides, If the executive branch is doing illegal things, that's kinda what the congressional impeachment power was intended to curtail as designed by the founding fathers. To argue that use of that power to halt illegal activities by the executive branch will somehow impede the executive branch's ability to continue in those illegal activities, well that's a logical fallacy called 'petitio principii' or begging the question. And, once more, this is probably a personal problem I have with the neocon approach to logic; namely, that they run screaming from it.