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<DIV dir=ltr align=left><FONT face=Arial color=#0000ff size=2><SPAN
class=175021313-22082008>It could also be a reduction to
absurdity.</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<P align=left><FONT size=2>Brian Kelsay</FONT></P><BR>
<DIV class=OutlookMessageHeader lang=en-us dir=ltr align=left>
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<FONT face=Tahoma size=2><B>From:</B> Jeffrey Watts<BR><B>Sent:</B> Thursday,
August 21, 2008 1:23 AM<BR></FONT><BR></DIV>
<DIV></DIV>
<DIV dir=ltr>Okay I lied again. One _last_ post, sorry. I had "straw men"
on my mind apparently. Leo's current sin involving Paris is more a hasty
generalization.<BR><BR>Jeffrey.<BR><BR>
<DIV class=gmail_quote>On Thu, Aug 21, 2008 at 1:12 AM, Jeffrey Watts <SPAN
dir=ltr><<A
href="mailto:jeffrey.w.watts@gmail.com">jeffrey.w.watts@gmail.com</A>></SPAN>
wrote:<BR>
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style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: rgb(204,204,204) 1px solid">
<DIV dir=ltr><BR>His Paris Hilton argument is a classic straw man. He
uses her because most people despise her, and takes a trivial relationship
between otherwise extremely dissimilar things and blows it up into a
side-by-side comparison. It's the same silly thing you see on
McCain's "celebrity" adverts. In this case, Paris Hilton is known
primarily for her sex tape, her name, her lack of shame, and her
overexposure. Her criminal problems were just icing on the cake and
fodder for the gossip-mill. What's "wrong with her" is not her disregard
for the law - her problems are much much deeper than that. Thus
comparing her with a complex issue involving MILLIONS of people is
flimsy. If he weren't trying to use a straw man he wouldn't have
selected such an incendiary subject for his analogy. As I said, he's not
stupid.<BR></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR clear=all></DIV></BODY></HTML>