A Logic 101 Lesson for the Tea Party

[Freeper]

proud2BlibKansan  Donating Member  (1000+ posts)  Journal  Click to send private message to this author  Click to view this author's profile  Click to add this author to your buddy list  Click to add this author to your Ignore list       Fri Oct-08-10 09:29 PM
Original message
A Logic 101 Lesson for the Tea Party
   
The tea party has been lying, claiming that Phil Hare said that the U.S. deficit is a myth. You can see an example of their lies clearly here, although the story has also been reported on Gateway Pundit and Hot Air

What Phil Hare said was, "Every minute I have here is going to be spent on trying to debunk the myth that this country's in debt and we just can't spend."

So, what was the myth, according to Hare? It was "This country's in debt AND we just can't spend." Now, the word AND means that this statement is a conjunction. In order for a conjunction to be true, the propositions on both sides of the AND need to be true. So the statement "puppies are mammals and Obama was born in Hawaii" is TRUE because both propositions are true. On the other hand, the statement "puppies are mammals and communists are in control of the U.S. government" is FALSE because the proposition "communists are in control of the U.S. government" is false. Note that it is still false even though the first proposition "puppies are mammals" is true.

So, what Phil Hare said is that the conjunction was a myth. This commits him only to saying that at least one of the propositions was false. Obviously, what he was saying is that he thinks it's not true that we "can't spend." We can spend as long as there are ways of bringing in revenue, like, I dunno, letting the tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% of Americans expire. So his claim that "this country's in debt AND we just can't spend" is a myth is correct, or at least is defensible. Just like a claim that "unicorns have horns and live in Australia" is a myth NOT because the first part of conjunction is false, but because the later part of the conjunction is false.

And while we're on the topic, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the claim "tea partiers are smart enough to understand this post and honest enough to admit they were wrong," is also a myth. I challenge them to prove me wrong.

http://stlactivisthub.blogspot.com/2010/10/logic-101-le...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9283803

I love it when these morons challenge people at DU. They know full well we can't post there. Idiot.

And it isn't a myth that we can't keep just spending. You wanna talk about logic?
If you don't have the freaking money, you can't keep spending.
That is such a foreign concept to you idiots. The sad part is morons like you are in Govt.
 

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

2 clauses of a single premise you stupid scrunt.

[USA4ME]

That Anne is allowed to be near children, much less teach, is a black-eye on the teaching profession (though many of them have done it to themselves with their incorrect and un-American political viewpoints).

Anne, you ignorant slut, what he was claiming to be a myth was that we can't spend our way out of the current economic situation because of the current debt.  He believes we can spend our way out of it.  We can certainly spend, but it's just not going to do any good.  Eighteen months and $800 billion dollars later has proven it to be a failure.

You're wrong, as usual.  I personally don't care if you admit it or not.  You're a nobody compared to me and those like me, but you're not smart enough to comprehend it, and honesty isn't even in your vocabulary.

.