Countering Conflicting Complaints
In an entry yesterday I linked to a post over on normblog making the case that, whatever their real motivation, both Bush and Blair devoted a great many words towards highlighting the need to free the Iraqi people, rendering the claims of a "shifting rationale" for war untenable.
Norm has followed up with what I think is an even more astute point:
Norman Geras - February 19th, 2005 Don't many of the same critics who purvey this after-the-event argument also accuse George Bush of seeing himself heading a crusade on behalf of liberty? Right or wrong, the accusation doesn't sit well beside this charge of post hoccery.
He's right, of course. And that's what happens when the goal is not truth, or coherency, but simply opposition. If your criticisms are not based in any ideological framework, they're going to begin contradicting one another before long.
Another example of this would be the claim that Bush is shrewdly manipulating his religious supporters with wedge issues, juxtaposed with the claim that he's, deep down, a religious zealot. Or that he's simultaneously diabolical and stupid.
» February 19th, 2005
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