Working in a field that requires one to be precise, listening to anyone argue from an imprecise position has always been a source of irritation me to. I don't mean to imply the immediacy of the proverbial fingernails screaking against the blackboard. No I mean irritation in the sense of a dripping faucet. Anyone who has tried to fall asleep listening to a dripping faucet knows that this starts out subtly and can build over time.
My latest irritation is the talking point that is vomitted out ad nauseam about the intelligence used to sell the Iraqi War to Americans. You know what I'm referring to, "everyone believed the intelligence so don't blame the administration". My irritation has reach it zenith in the lastest revelation in the NYT story that the foundation of the BushCo's lies started with Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi who our own intelligence agencies expressed doubts about the veracity of his statements.
Formal logic is a set of rules for making deductions that everyone admits to be self evident. The usual example is:
All humans are mortal.
Socrates is a human.
Therefore Socrates is mortal.
The basis for formal logic is truth tables. For the example above the first statement, "All humans are mortal" is true. This is obvious to everyone. The second statement is "Socrates is a human" is also true. It leads to the final statement, "Therefore Socrates is mortal".
In terms of truth tables this works out to be statement 1 is true, statement 2 is true, therefore statement 3 is true. Lets look at how this plays out in the justification for the war in Iraq as it is presented by the administration.
Iraq is training Al Qaeda members.
Al Qaeda is a terrorist organization.
Therefore Iraq is a terrorist organization (state).
Or,
Iraq is acquiring yellowcake uranium from Niger.
Yellowcake uranium is used to make WMD.
Therefore Iraq is making WMD.
These are logical syllogisms according to truth tables only if statement 1 and 2 are true making statement 3 true. These are the types of arguments that BushCo and its surrogates were making surrounding the selling of this war.
Truth tables say that if statement 1 or even statement 2 is false then statement 3 is also false. And herein lies my irritation because the BushCo and its surrogates have consistently made these syllogical arguments. They had convinced the majority of the American people that these arguments are true and they tried to convince the rest of the world too.
Joe Wilson refuted the validity of the Niger statement and Plamegate was the outcome. I'm not going into the details about this as it has been revealed enough to convince a majority of the American people that Joe Wilson was telling the truth even though many pundits still try and spin this as being false.
When the Downing Street Memo was first reported only a minority of Americans saw the truth in it. The majority of Americans did not believe that BushCo had decided to go to war in the summer of 2002 and were determined to 'fix the intelligence' around this decision.
Now the latest NYT relevation that the intelligence agencies had warned the Bush Administration that Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi was a likely fabricator has increased my irritation to the 'fingernails screaking on the blackboard' point. I only hope that for a majority of the Americans this becomes like that dripping faucet, subtle at first but slowly building to irritation.
In order for this to be driven home the argument that the intelligence community had it wrong and the adminstration is not to blame must be revealed to be a false syllogism.
The intelligence was faulty.
BushCo used the intelligence as jusification for the war.
Therefore BushCo was not at fault it was the faulty intelligence.
This is the regurgitated argument that is being spewed out by many in the MSM. This is what I can't stand. Here is the syllogism that is relevant.
The BushCo decided to go to war against Iraq.
The BushCo fabricated intelligence to justify the war.
Threfore BushCo justified going to war against Iraq by fabricating intelligence.