The reason that believing the AQ-Saddam connection thing is irrational is that this is an empirical question which should be settled by evidence, which seems to be absent, from what I see in the public record.
On Friday, September 19, 2003, at 11:34 AM, Kelley wrote:
> At 11:13 AM 9/19/03 -0400, Jon Johanning wrote:
>> In this case, the people who don't believe the AQ-Saddam connection
>> presumably don't have the emotional motivations which cause the
>> believers to switch off their reasoning faculties on this subject.
>
> some people just don't believe it because they have an emotional
> investment in NOT believing anything the US gubmint (or, a Repuke
> administration) has to say. doesn't necessarily require an absence of
> emotional motivations at all. nor does it require reasoning per se. i
> think here of folks i know who are ardent democrats and their disgust
> for this fiasco is more about wanting shrubya out any way they can get
> him out. i think of folks who have a history of run ins with the law
> and/or have become suspicious of the gubmint for other reasons (e.g.,
> Watergate, Contragate, Hummergate, etc.)
>
> could someone refresh my memory as to why belief in a connection
> between Hussein and AlQ is evidence of a lack of reasoning or
> rationality or logic?
Jon Johanning // jjohanning at igc.org __________________________________ Had I been present at the Creation, I would have given some useful hints for the better ordering of the universe. -- Attr. to Alfonso the Wise, King of Castile