>Every single one of those statements is an example of knee-jerk responses
>to complex situations and illustrates a possibly unconscious ignorance to
>that complexity.
no they're not. you can't know why people think the way they think. they may well have good, solid, research-based, etc etc reasons for supporting every single statement they make. but more, importantly, a lot of people don't make those claims in quite the way you've put it.