No, not the band. (This is my first DU journal entry, so please critique away. also, my 1st time using html, hence the updates.)
Here's a great example of mastery of the "straw man" argument. Newt is able to simultaneously create not one, but two straw man arguments, and contrast them in such a way as to argue that Dems are hypocrites using a double standard! This is awesome. I may be inspired to blog again...
Gingrich on page scandal: Democrats have done far worse
By JIM DAVENPORT
Associated Press Writer
Published October 4, 2006
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said Wednesday that Democratic sex scandals have been far worse than the suggestive Internet messages sent to teenage congressional pages by former Rep. Mark Foley.
Gingrich said Democrats have wanted to punish their offenders less than the GOP.
"What we don't have to do is allow our friends on the left to lecture us on morality," Gingrich said at a party fundraiser in Greenville. "There's a certain stench of hypocrisy."
Foley abruptly resigned Friday after being accused of sending salacious Internet messages to teenage boys who served as pages on Capitol Hill. The FBI and Florida law enforcement officials are investigating.
Gingrich would not say whether House Speaker Dennis Hastert should step down in the wake of the scandal. He also declined to discuss reports that Hastert may have known about Foley's behavior for more than three years.
"I don't know what he knew," Gingrich said.
After the speech, Gingrich was quick to defend Hastert and condemn Democrats and the media, calling the reporting on the scandal "pretty irrational."
"It's pretty hard to understand. The very people who say you shouldn't be wiretapping for terrorists apparently think you should wiretap a congressman. I don't understand the double standard," Gingrich said.
Straw man argument # 1: "The very people who say you shouldn't be wiretapping for terrorists" - this is very clearly aimed at Dems, none of whom have EVER argued that we should not wiretap for terrorists. All they ever said was that we should do it by following the LAW, which allows for wiretaps to be granted by a rubber-stamp court that only rarely turns requests down; also, the law allows them to wiretap, then come back within 3 days to get the warrant AFTER the wiretap's installed. In fact, Bush made that same straw man argument today, and when WH officials were asked`afterwards who ever made that argument, they couldn't name ONE name (
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/04/AR2006100401707.html). Since no one ever made this argument, it's a "straw man" argument, where you portray your opponent as having made a ridiculous argument/claim, then summarily shoot that argument down with your option, which appears much more reasonable by contrast. You can usually see this coming when they start out with "Some say..." or use general terms to describe the person who supposedly made the claim (e.g. "them," "others," or "those people")
Straw man argument # 2: the same people (again, hinting at Dems) that "think you should wiretap a congressman" - again, no Dem has ever come out and said "we should wiretap that congressman Foley
." What they said was when you are shown/alerted to emails that raise red flags re: pedophilia/predatory conduct, you might want to try doing a little investigation over and above asking the alleged perpetrator did you do it, then telling him not to do it anymore. If a wiretap were ever needed, or a subpoena for his emails, IMs, etc., you could go ask a friggin' judge... This has nothing to do with Bush's illegal wiretapping program. So, once again, the straw man argument is used to portray your opponent's position as unreasonable and outrageous, and yours as the better course of action.
Taken in conjunction, the use of these 2 contrasting straw man arguments here (the "double standard") really portrays Dems, in the midst of what is a GOP scandal, as completely outrageous, when in fact they never advanced either position. Pretty slick.
Let's not forget, this is Newt Gingrich, author of the infamous "Language: A Key Mechanism of Control" 1996 GOPAC memo (http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4443.htm) that told his buddies how to describe their opponents. He even had a series of training tapes for them, I kid you not. Is it any wonder, 10 years later, why we have the poisonous political system we have today? He knows how important these words and arguments really are to his readers and listeners, and voters.
The rest of this article is great, so I'm posting the whole thing. Check out ol' Doug Wavle down yonder in S. Carolina - how can I make sure I'll never be a member of his "crew"?
And if you haven't already, make sure you pick yourself up a copy of Carl Sagan's Baloney-Detection Kit (http://users.tpg.com.au/users/tps-seti/baloney.html)]
While Gingrich said he could think of circumstances under which a speaker should resign, he could also think of times reporters should have resigned too.
"You want a hypothetical possibility? You would argue large parts of The New York Times ought to resign for publishing secrets," he said.
It's another trip to South Carolina for Gingrich, who is deciding if he'll run for president in 2008.
He came to the state in August, telling Republicans it "would be a disaster for the country" if Democrats took over the House.
At his speech Wednesday, Gingrich told about 300 Republicans they needed to get out and vote. "This is an enormous crisis for the country," he said.
While the four Republican U.S. House incumbents appear to be safe in South Carolina, the seeming meltdown for Republicans nationally doesn't bode well for those running for statewide offices, said College of Charleston political scientist Bill Moore.
The Foley situation could affect Christian conservative voters. "If they don't turn out, that can really hurt the party," Moore said.
Moore said Republicans also have to be worried about a broader malaise among their independent and weakly rooted Republicans.
Doug Wavle, a state GOP executive committee member who works at nearby Bob Jones University, said Foley's indiscretions won't affect Christian conservatives like him, who will likely rally around a state constitutional amendment on the ballot banning same sex marriages.
"I'm a fundamental Bible believer. Foley didn't fall in that category," Wavle said. "He practiced his faith in the Roman Catholic Church where alcohol is accepted."
"He's not part of our crew," Wavle said.
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