[lbo-talk] Hamid Dabashi on Iran

[ravi]

On Jun 16, 2009, at 5:08 PM, Shane Mage wrote:
> On Jun 16, 2009, at 4:35 PM, ravi wrote:
>>
>> On Jun 16, 2009, at 4:22 PM, Shane Mage wrote:
>>> On Jun 16, 2009, at 4:02 PM, ravi wrote:
>>>> For #2 to not be a *general* statement about the poor/ 
>>>> disenfranchised, #5 has to be significant i.e., Y > X. But given  
>>>> that Ahmadinejad...runs up huge numbers...That makes it highly  
>>>> unlikely that those who support Mousavi from that community (the  
>>>> subset Y) is anywhere close in number to those who support  
>>>> Ahmadinejad (subset X).
>>> But since almost all Iranians are poor, and all but the mullahs  
>>> and their minions are disenfranchised, and given that a winning  
>>> candidate's sponsors have no reason blatantly to falsify  the  
>>> actual vote the way they have in fact done--it is clear that this  
>>> argument is completely false.
>>
>> But Dabashi didn't write "poor" and "disenfranchised". He wrote  
>> "poorest" and "most disenfranchised".
>
> *You* are the one who wrote "poor/disenfranchised."

It doesn't matter what I wrote in shorthand. We are discussing what  
Dabashi wrote. Unless you are playing gotcha.


>  If you had included "est" and "most" your argument would be  
> patently invalid without a census showing the percentage of the poor/ 
> disenfrachised comprising the lumpen.

The census i.e., factual accuracy of Dabashi's statement is not the  
issue. The issue is whether in making the statement, he is suggesting  
that the poorest and most disenfranchised re suckers.


>> I cannot understand the second part of your refutation of my  
>> argument: are you saying that the powerful clerics falsified the  
>> vote because in truth, Ahmadinejad does not draw support from the  
>> [majority of the] poor and disenfranchised?
>
> Again, you write "poor and disenfranchised."  Not poorest and most  
> disenfranchised.

Here I was repeating your terms.


>  The blatant falsification of the election is all the proof needed  
> that "in truth, Ahmadinejad does not draw support from the [majority  
> of the] poor and disenfranchised."

This is circular. And anyway, I don't think that's what Dabashi means  
at all by any reasonable analysis of his sentence.

	--ravi