The Beav according to Beav

Still crazy after all these years.

Wednesday, November 07, 2012

It Is Finished

The campaign is finally over. I doubt that the opposing parties will start to get along now that it's done, but I can hope. My biggest complaint, however, is not the constant bickering. It's the manner in which that bickering is done. We truly need to make two changes to the manner of our speech - particularly political speech - if we want to improve the country.

First, eliminate rhetoric. Few things tossed about this past year annoyed me so much as the rhetorical speech. Romney wasn't planning to "fire Big Bird." He wanted to eliminate Federal funding for PBS. (They get funding from many other sources.) Obama never tried to take credit away from the SEALs for killing Bin Laden. (He authorized the mission and added a detail that became important.) If your point is valid, you shouldn't need to remove the truth to make it.

 Second, stop with the stupid anecdotes. As the old maxim says, "anecdotal evidence isn't." Don't tell me that this one person was on welfare and bought beer and cigarettes with their food stamps. Tell me that the best estimates put welfare abuse at roughly 2-3%. Don't say that a proposed tax plan will cause a specific company to lay off people. Show the math and the projected effects on the private sector as a whole.

Don't get me wrong, I realize that both of these devices are powerful tools in a speech or debate. But when they are the entirety of a platform or position, you've brought the discussion to uselessness. Especially when people repeat that garbage without investigating the truth behind the ridiculous claims.

3 Comments:

  • At 2:49 PM, Blogger Soo Mi said…

    Honestly, the mind-blowing crap that I heard come out of the mouths of people who don't even pay attention to the news on a regular basis...!

    Did you know that Obama is going to take away all our guns, and then he's going to enact an executive order declaring him "president for life"? Did you know that Romney hates poor people and he's going to stop all welfare because without welfare, people will finally get off their butts and go to work to earn their bread.

    When I heard people I respected say these things, a little of me died inside. The paid entertainment have displaced proper news reporting, and nobody seems to care.

    :(

     
  • At 8:57 PM, Blogger Beav said…

    I had to avoid many of the people I know (and respect) on Facebook. Something about the "conversation" there seems to encourage the ignorant, uninformed views to spread unchecked.

     
  • At 10:22 AM, Blogger sovereignfunding021 said…

    This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

     

Post a Comment

<< Home