[lbo-talk] Why Liberals Lose Elections

[Jon Johanning]

On Thursday, April 1, 2004, at 01:35  AM, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:

> On this listserv, Mike Larkin compared my criticism of Anybody But  
> Bush pundits to Pearl Harbor ("A Day That Will Live in Infamy,"  
> <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20040315/ 
> 006118.html> -- cf. <http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5166/>), knowing  
> that I am Japanese, and one Harry Levine compared Ralph Nader to a  
> suicide bomber, knowing that Nader is an Arab American:

I thought that that "day that will live in infamy" comment didn't make  
much sense, either. What does Nader have to do with Pearl Harbor?  
Neither does the Nader/suicide bomber comparison, unless Levine meant  
to suggest that he hoped that Nader would destroy himself together with  
whatever other mischief he might cause. I think he could easily have  
made the basic point in the quoted text without the suicide bomber  
reference.

Comments like these obviously don't help the cause of rational  
argumentation, either. I'm definitely not saying that Nader supporters  
are the only ones to commit the faults I identified -- it happens  
throughout the Left, as well as the Right and Center. My policy towards  
these snarky comments is simple: the duck's back stance -- let them  
roll off my back.

The question is why it is so difficult for so many politically engaged  
folks to argue rationally. Part of it may be that they don't know how,  
or maybe they do know, but don't care enough to be bothered. Long ago,  
I served a term as a philosophy prof (assistant), and noted how  
difficult it was to get students interested in this activity. I guess  
it's just more exciting to sling insults.

Another reason is that arguing rationally is a heck of a lot of work.  
Not only do you have to take care to avoid logically fallacious  
arguments, when they are often the shortest short-cut to the points you  
want to make, but you have to make some effort to come up with *sound*  
arguments, which means taking due diligence to use premises which have  
some reasonable about of evidential backing. Most political questions  
end up being so complex that great amounts of research are needed. In  
the end, most people just don't have the time or the energy to  
persevere. In fact, it might take years or decades to get enough  
information to be reasonably sure whether what we are saying is well  
grounded. Therefore,  many political arguments, if they were conducted  
by the same standards as a normal scientific discussion, would end up  
by all involved having to confess that they didn't know enough yet to  
come to a conclusion.

In addition, of course, a lot of political arguments involve  
disagreements over values, which cannot be conclusively settled by  
rational discussion, though they can be considerably clarified by it.

Nevertheless, politics is all about action, so how to decide what to do  
on an issue, or, having decided, motivate large numbers of people to  
act with one (effective political action requires masses of people   
moving together)? If the rational argument ends inconclusively, one  
just has to take a risk that one may not be doing the right thing,  
though one thinks that one is. If one is honest, one then also has to  
concede that others who may decide to take other actions are equally  
taking risks; we are all just fallible, imperfectly informed human  
beings, in the same confused situation. Political activists, fired up  
with a holy zeal to save the world according to their own lights,  
usually can't afford emotionally to be that humble and grant that much  
recognition to their opponents. So out come the inflammatory language,  
the silly insults and dopey pseudo-arguments.

On the whole Kerry-Nader, major-party/third-party question, I am at  
this moment on the side of recommending voting for Kerry, i.e., a major  
party candidate. But I am continuously reviewing my arguments and the  
presuppositions they assume, and may at some point change my mind. I  
grant that those who recommend supporting Nader have good arguments  
(along with their own repertoire of snide come-backs and  
not-nearly-so-funny-as-they-seem-to-think cracks), also. Both sides of  
this argument are taking risks that they may be making mistakes, and  
ought to acknowledge this.

But I know from my experience in the trenches trying to teach  
rationality that most partisans in this battle will go on fighting  
dirty. It's just too tempting to resist.

Jon Johanning // jjohanning at igc.org
__________________________________
Belinda: Ay, but you know we must return good for evil.
Lady Brute: That may be a mistake in the translation.
	-- Sir John Vanbrugh: The Provok’d Wife (1697), I.i.