onegoodmove

Keith Burgess-Jackson says that Andrew "Sullivan's blog would illustrate an entire course on fallacies." a statement I don't doubt. Fallacious reasoning can be found on most blogs. BJ's post begins with "Andrew Sullivan complains about having his views distorted by William Bennett. See here. Sullivan is in no position to complain about this, for he routinely distorts both the motivation for the Federal Marriage Amendment (which he disingenuously calls the "religious right amendment") and arguments against homosexual marriage. " an excellent example of the Tu Quoque Fallacy. What Mr. Sullivan distorts has nothing to do with the question of whether his views were distorted by William Bennett. BJ doesn't address that question. It appears he is using his criticism of Andrew Sullivan to avoid the question of whether Mr. Bennett is guilty of what he is accused of, distorting Mr. Sullivans views. There is no way that Mr. Sullivan's guilt can absolve Mr. Bennett from his. It is ironic that in a post on logical fallacies Mr. Jackson would let one of his own slip in. Is that a reason to dismiss his criticism of Mr. Sullivan, only if we want to engage in the same fallacy Burgess-Jackson commits. But there is certainly nothing wrong in enjoying the irony.