Rep. Gohmert (R-TX): There is no credible report of terror babies so take it seriously

Background:

The following discussion (which appeared on Anderson Cooper 360 on August 12, 2010) concerns the topic of so-called "terror babies," the notion that terrorists will come to the United states to have children, then take them back to their home countries and raise them as terrorists. Since the children are born in the U.S., they will be citizens; thus they will be eligible for U.S. passports. Having the passport will allow them to easily enter the country and thus, as the theory goes, the indoctrinated children (now adults) will be able to launch terrorist attacks in the U.S.

Analysis:
Anderson Cooper does a good job of asking Rep. Gohmert for evidence that terrorist groups really are trying to take advantage of U.S citizenship policy and pointing out flaws in his argument. The part of the discussion that I am interested in here begins at about 4:50 into the clip. Cooper tries to point out that a former FBI agent has said that there is no evidence that terrorists are trying to implement the terror baby plan. From the transcript:

COOPER: Are you willing to have a conversation or do you want to just yell?

One of the things that the former FBI agent pointed out --

GOHMERT: You will not let me present what we have --

COOPER: OK, one of the former --

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: One of the former FBI agents pointed out on this program last night that terrorist groups have no problem recruiting U.S. citizens, have no problems sending people over here, that they don't need to prepare 20 years from now.

(CROSSTALK)

GOHMERT: -- there is no credible report of such a plan.

COOPER: Where it is?

GOHMERT: And I bet you, on 9/10, he were to come on your show and say there is no credible report of a plan to take down the World Trade Centers, because he didn't have one.

COOPER: OK. So, you don't believe the FBI when they currently say there is no credible report?

(CROSSTALK)

GOHMERT: -- taking shots at me and look at the gaping hole in the security of this country. I'm an easy target, and you and Jon Stewart can have your fun. But please, at some point, look at the gaping hole in our security.

So, just to summarize: Gohmert admits that the FBI agent has claimed that there is no credible evidence of such a terror baby plan, but then he claims that the same agent would have said, on 9/10 that there was no credible report that terrorists were trying to bring down the World Trade Center. Though once again Gohmert is not explicit about his conclusion, he apparently is trying to argue that we should discount the FBI agent's claim.

Let's formalize the argument:
(1) An FBI agent says that there is no credible report of a terror baby plan.
(2) But the same FBI agent would have said, on 9/10/2001 that there was no credible report of a plan to crash planes into the World Trade Center.
Therefore,
(3) We can safely ignore what this FBI agent says.

I think that there are a number of ways to analyze the fallacy committed here. But I think that the most serious problem is that Rep. Gohmert seems to want us to take a lack of evidence there there is a terror baby plan as actual evidence that there really is such a plan. We might paraphrase this line of reasoning as follows: "The FBI had no credible evidence of the 9/11 terror plot and yet it obviously happened. So since there is no credible evidence of a terror baby plot, we need to take such a plot seriously."

This is a case of an argument from ignorance fallacy. Presumably the FBI is sometimes wrong about future terror plots, but the fact that there is no evidence of a given plot cannot be taken as evidence that the plot is genuine. Of course we are not commenting here on the truth of premise (1); we aren't in a position to say whether the FBI agent would have claimed that there was no credible evidence of the 9/11 plot. We are only criticizing the form of Rep. Gohmert's argument to the effect that we can discount what the FBI says about the alleged terror baby conspiracy. That we lack evidence that some claim is true is not evidence that the claim actually is true. This argument is DOA.

A New Sexual Misconduct Claim On Herman Cain Emerges

Background:

Herman Cain, a GOP presidential candidate, has had numerous claims against him on sexually inappropriate behavior. After the previous two women were paid for the charges they laid against Cain, a new claim from Sharon Bialek has emerged. In the article found on CNN titled “Cain Faces New Claim of Sexual Misconduct”,written by Tom Cohen, Kevin Bohn, and Sharron Travis, Bialek claims that Cain groped her after having dinner in 1997 when she came to him asking for a job.

Premises:

• Cain upgraded Bialek’s suite without telling her.

• Bialek and Cain went out to dinner and spoke about Bialek getting her job back.

• On the way back to the hotel Bialek was staying at, Cain offered to show Bialek where the National Restaurant Association offices were.

• Instead of going inside to see the offices, Cain parked the car and put his hand on Bialek’s leg and up her skirt toward her genitals. He also grabbed her head and pulled it toward his crotch.

• Upon Bialek’s protestation about the situation, Cain said “You want a job right?”

Conclusion:

Bialek says that Cain performed sexual misconduct and wants him to admit what he did.

Premises:

• Bialek’s accusation against Cain follows two other accusations made by two other women that were reported by Politico

• Bialek is the first woman to accuse Cain in public and her accusation could be true as she did in fact work for the National Restaurant Foundation in 1996 and was laid off in 1997. She also provided detailed accounts of what happened.

• It has also been proven to be true that Cain was head of the National Restaurant Foundation from 1996 – 1999.

• Bialek was waiting to come forward about the accusations now because there were other women doing so as well, not only against Cain but against harassment in general.

Conclusion:

“ "I think what you're seeing is a huge assault on women's rights in the Republican parties, and an extreme right-wing that has taken over that is going to make it very difficult for anybody in a general election in the Republican Party to be a centrist," Richardson said on NBC. ”

Analysis:

I think Sharon Bialek performed her speech pretty well, though I do not agree that she is telling the truth about what happened. It is clear to me that her throat tightened up when she began to accuse Cain of groping her. However, the purpose of this post is to point out the fallacy committed within the article, as well as the speech. Within the speech itself, I found no fallacy. However, within the article I feel a Hasty Generalization fallacy is being made. A Hasty Generalization fallacy is one in which a conclusion is made about a group of people based on a very small sample of the group, in this case, one man as compared to the entire Republican party. As mentioned in the previous conclusion: "I think what you're seeing is a huge assault on women's rights in the Republican parties, and an extreme right-wing that has taken over that is going to make it very difficult for anybody in a general election in the Republican Party to be a centrist."

capital punishment

I. This is an argument about the pros and cons for having or not having the death penalty in the United States.
-Issue: US Liberal Politics by Deborah White About.com


II.http://usliberald.about.com/ob/deathpenalty/i/DeathPenalty.htm


III. Arguing for capital punishment, the Clark County, Indiana Prosecuting Attorney writes that "...there are some defendants who have earned the ultimate punishment our society has to offer by committing murder with aggravating circumstances present. I believe life is sacred. It cheapens the life of an innocent murder victim to say that society has no right to keep the murderer from ever killing again. In my view, society has not only the right, but the duty to act in self defense to protect the innocent."

And Catholic Cardinal McCarrick, Archbishop of Washington, writes "...the death penalty diminishes all of us, increases disrespect for human life, and offers the tragic illusion that we can teach that killing is wrong by killing."


IV. P: Premeditated and planned taking of a human life by a government in response to a crime committed by that legally convicted person is the definition of Capital Punishment . It also dubbed “the death penalty”.

P: Supporters and protesters of the death penalty in the U.S. is sharply divide equally.
of rights is the opinion of the Amnesty International.

P: The Death penalty is the premeditated and cold blooded killing of a human and a denial

P: This cruel and inhuman punishment violates the right to life.

C: Society has the duty and right to protect t he innocent.

V. This argument did not have enough evidence to support the opinion to keep capital punishment in effect. The fallacy in this argument would be begging the question . Begging the question fallacy is an informal fallacy that occurs when the arguer creates the illusion that inadequate premises provide adequate support for the conclusion by leaving out a key premise, by restating the conclusion as a premise, or by reasoning in a circle. Also the appeal to the people is committed in this argument. This fallacy is an informal fallacy that occurs when an arguer plays on certain psychological needs for the purpose of getting the reader or listener to accept a conclusion.