slide into a morass of value judgments. 8 If it is more important for society to
stop drunken driving than for the suspected driver to be free from unreasonable
search of his blood veins and seizure of his blood, then might it not be argued
that it is more important for elected officials and sports heroes to get organ
transplants than mere working stiffs? 9
If rights can be weighed against societal imperatives, what next? 10 Our
rights against self incrimination? 11 Freedom of religion? 12 Speech? 13
Fair trial? 14 The vote? 15
Having personally experienced the heavy hand of tyranny, the Founding
Fathers wrote: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be
violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by
Examples of Analysis 231
Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the
person or things to be seized." 16
Rather than slug it out in the courts, we would hope that our various police
forces would give a second thought or more before resorting to constitutionally
questionable exercises. 17 What difference is there between a hypodermic
needle and a battering ram? 18
If we vigilantly guard and revere the rights of individuals, society in general
will be better off. 19
Conclusion: Police should not be allowed to use reasonable force to obtain
blood samples from first-time drunken driving suspects who refuse to take a
breath test.
Premises: 1. This is just stating the background. The editor uses a
downplayer in putting quotes around "reasonable force."
2. I suppose tnis is true. It shows that someone other than the editors think
there's a problem. But so what?
3. Gives the other side. Counterargument.
4. Big deal. So one nut said that. Doesn't really contribute to the argument.
He'd have to show that a lot of people thought that. Otherwise it's probably a
strawman.
5. "Chip away" is a slanter. Dysphemism. Anyway, he hasn't shown that
this law goes against the Fourth Amendment. Apparently the lawmakers didn't
think so. If it does, it'll be declared unconstitutional, and that's that. Doesn't
really help his conclusion. Waving the flag, sort of.
6. Sets out his position. Sort of a counterargument to the supporters of the
bill. Shows he's not unreasonable. Giving a bit to the other side, I guess.
Doesn't seem to help get to his conclusion.
7. "Hard-won" is there without proof. Perhaps it was hard-won. Possibly
adds to the argument by adding a premise: "Whatever is hard-won should not be
given up." But that's false. "Flippantly squandered" is a dysphemism, and he
hasn't shown that they are flippantly squandered. But worst is when he talks
about rights, protections, etc. It's not clear what "right" he is talking about. If it's
the one in the Fourth Amendment, he's got to prove that this law is giving that
up, which he hasn't. Otherwise he's just waving the flag.
8. He's got to prove this. It's crucial to his argument.
9. This is supposedly support for 8, but it doesn't work. I think the answer is
"No." He's got to show it's "Yes." And 10 is just a question, not a claim.
11 - 1 5 . These are rhetorical questions, too. As premises they seem very
dubious. Altogether they're a slippery slope.
16. The first part is just there like "hard-won" was before. Quoting the
Fourth Amendment doesn't make it clear to me that this law violates it.
232 COMPLEX ARGUMENTS
17. "Slug it out in the courts" is a dysphemism. He hasn't shown that the
law is constitutionally questionable.
18. Another rhetorical question with a stupid comparison. My answer is
"Plenty." He's got to convince me that there's no difference. The old slippery
slope again.
19. Vague and unproved. Can't be support for the conclusion, and it's not
It's a bad argument. Too many slanters, and there's really no support for the
conclusion.
Very, very good. Only you need to expand on why it's a bad argument. What
exactly are the claims that have any vaCue in getting the conclusion?
First, in 1 it's not a downplayer. It's a quote. It might also show that he
doesn't believe the words have a clear meaning.
All that 2 elicits is "So?" We can't guess what the missing premise is that
could save this support. He doesn't knock off 3 (perhaps 4 is intended to do that,
sort of reducing to the absurd?). The support for 8 is a worthless slippery slope
(9-15), plus one person's comments that we'd have to take to be exemplary of lots of
people (there's a missing premise: "If one person said this on television, then lots of
people believe it," which is very dubious). Number l6 is crucial, but he hasn't
shown that 7 follows from it. That's the heart of the argument that he's left out (as
you noted): He's got to show that this law really violates the fourth Amendment
and, for 19, that it isn't a good trade-off of personal rights vs. society's rights. So
there's really no support for his conclusion. That's why it's bad. The use of slanters
is bad, but it doesn't make the argument bad. 'We can eliminate them and then see
what's wrong. I'dgive 13+/A- for this. Incorporate this discussion inyour
presentation to the class and you'll get an A.
Complex Arguments for Analysis 233
Complex Arguments for Analysis
1. Reply to Betsy Hart by Bonnie Erbe (from the same article on pp. 226-227 above)
Bonnie Erbe: Before my colleague takes off on such wild tangents, she needs to define
affirmative action. The term has come to mean different things to different people,
ranging from strict, unbending quotas to mild incentive programs.
My definition of affirmative action is as follows: institutions and corporations that
have extremely small percentages of women and/or minority group members among
their ranks should take gender and race into account, along with a panoply of other
factors (i.e., intelligence, job or grade performance, geographic distribution, economic
disadvantage) when recruiting new talent.
Using that definition, affirmative action will undoubtedly be outmoded in some
institutions, but decidedly necessary in others.
For example, there's clearly no need to pay special attention to admit more Chinese-
or Japanese-Americans to the University of California at Berkeley.
But blacks and Hispanics are still underrepresented on some campuses in the
University of California system.
Similarly, some federal agencies-most notably the FBI, the CIA and the State
Department-are woefully short on women agents and diplomats. Yet the Justice Depart-
ment's No. 1 and No. 2 lawyers (Janet Reno and Jamie Gorelick) are women. Hence,
affirmative action for women is unneeded in some federal agencies, while not in others.
Besides, if we are going to eliminate affirmative action entirely, we ought to
eliminate all preferences throughout society.
No more special admissions to Harvard for the young man with a B minus average
just because his grandfather's name is on a Harvard dorm.
Fathers should no longer be able to hire sons (or sons-in-law) to help run the family
company simply because they're related.
I'm being hyperbolic, but my point is this: Preferences (based on who you know and
how much money you have) are still rampant in society. If we eliminate one, in fairness
we should eliminate them all.
If we actually, really eliminated preferences—all forms of affirmative action—
upper-class white children would be much more thoroughly vitiated than lower-class
minority children.
2. Howard Stern's investment in tobacco/cigarette industry stocks
(brought in by a student who said he heard it on the Howard Stern show)
Caller: Howard, how can you invest in killing people?
Stern: What do you mean? I made a good business investment.
Caller: You invested in killing kids.
Stem: Listen, buddy, there are laws that say you have to be eighteen to buy cigarettes.
If store owners sell to underage kids, that's their own greedy fault; that's not
my fault or the fault of the tobacco company.
Caller: But you invested in the tobacco company that lies to the government, and
cigarettes kill.
234 COMPLEX ARGUMENTS
Stern: What's this lie to the government? . . . I don't care—everybody lies—you lie.
If someone is so stupid they want to smoke, that's their problem, we all know
it's bad to smoke. That's why I don't smoke, I'm not stupid. But if someone
else wants to smoke, that's his right, he has the right to be stupid, and I have
the right to invest my money in a company that will make me money.
Caller: Howard, it's not right, next thing you know you'll be investing in AIDS.
Stern: You idiot, you can't invest in disease. I invested in a company. You don't
know what you're talking about, get off my phone line, you jerk. (Hangs up)
3. Pascal's wager
(Pascal was a 17th Century mathematician and philosopher who had a religious
conversion late in his life. His argument is roughly as follows.)
We have the choice to believe in God or not to believe in God. If God does not exist,
you lose nothing by believing in Him. But if He exists, and you believe in Him, you
have the possibility of eternal life, joyous in the presence of God. If you don't believe in
Him, you are definitely precluded from having everlasting life. Therefore, a prudent
gambler will bet on God existing. That is, it is better to believe that God exists, since
you lose nothing by doing so, but could gain everlasting life.
4. Proof that God does not exist
(Several philosophers have become famous for their proofs that God exists. All those
proofs have been theoretical. Here is a practical proof supplied by Dr. E that God does
not exist. It can be repeated—try it yourself!)
I go into the Sahara Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. I go up to the Megabucks
slot machine at which you can win at least five million dollars on a $3 bet if you hit the
jackpot. I put in three $1 coins. I pull the handle. I win nothing, or just a little, and
when I continue, I lose that, too. Therefore, God does not exist.
5. On the plans being made to move some of the nearly extinct condors that have been
bred in captivity to a wild area in the south of Utah
Letter to the editor:
I do not know why we do not leave things alone. Probably environmentalists must have
something to show for their reason to exist; often as stupid as wilderness laws by
government to make us think they care, for what? Easy money? Now they intend to
move condors to Utah. Our over-taxed taxpayers should be getting weary of financing
so much for the amusement of idiots.
As long as I can remember, the wolves, elk and now the condor and other nonhuman
species have been pawns on the environmental checkerboard for no reason except the
whim of a loon to change the order of the universe. I would think all creatures have the
instinct to move if they so desired without any help. I am sure the place of their choice
would be better for them if not made by us. Let us grow up and leave the elk, wolves
and condors alone and mind our own business.
Kenneth S. Frandsen, The Spectrum, March, 1996
Complex Arguments for Analysis 235
6. Ban trapping in New Mexico
Eight states (Washington, California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Arizona, New Jersey,
Florida, and Rhode Island) have banned the use of leg-hold traps. It is unconscionable
that less than 1 percent of the population uses traps, and approximately 75 percent of the
population opposes trapping, yet this barbarism is still legal in New Mexico.
The only justification for trapping animals is to skin them, process the skin and them
make them into coats and stoles for narcissistic little twits to wear when they go out on
Saturday night. All of the fur coats in the world are not worth the bone-wrenching
screams of a single animal caught in these mindless traps. Many trappers admittedly
don't trap for the money because it isn't a money-making business. They do it for fun.
They capture, mangle, mutilate, kill and skin animals for fun!
The National Trappers Association is trying to defend the insidious activity of
trapping on public land and it is lobbying various state agencies to allow this to go on.
Trappers like to lump themselves in with hunters because they know that without the
hunters, they cannot win.
But hunting is fundamentally different from trapping. The hunter must be present
throughout the stalk. The trapper can be home drinking beer while the trap is destroying
the heart and soul of a helpless animal.
It is illegal for hunters to sell the meat of the animals they kill. The purpose of
trapping is the sale of the skin.
It is illegal for hunters to use a scent-attractant to get an unfair advantage over their
prey. Trappers use these to attract the animals to their traps.
Hunters have bag limits. Trappers can kill and kill and kill without a limit of any
kind on any species.
Hunters, if they are ethical, will identify their target and take careful aim to insure
[sic]a quick and clean death. Trapping is indiscriminate and anything but quick and
clean. A helpless animal, in excruciating pain will get his skull bashed in, usually with a
pipe or shovel. Then the trapper stands on his chest to be sure he is dead.
The New Mexico Department of Game and Fish thinks this is a suitable activity for
children and gives them a bargain on a license fee if they are between the ages of 12 and
17. If this is considered family values by our government agencies, we are in trouble.
In states where leg-hold traps are illegal, it became illegal because of ballot
initiatives. Unfortunately, in New Mexico we don't have ballot initiatives because our
legislators don't want the citizens to get in the way of the special issue groups that
parasitize us. If we had ballot initiatives, leg-hold traps would be banned as well as the
other anti-American, satanic sport, cockfighting, which is opposed by approximately 80
percent of New Mexicans.
However, we do have ballot initiatives. We vote on the first Tuesday in November
and we can choose to not elect politicians who are too cowardly to oppose trapping (and
cockfighting).
Ask the candidates
running for the legislature in your district whether or not they
support abject animal cruelty in the form of trapping or cockfighting. Make them go on
record. If they don't have the courage to declare how they stand, then vote for the other
person. Ask them if they would support a constitutional amendment to give the people
236 COMPLEX ARGUMENTS
of New Mexico the right to have ballot initiatives, as they should. We have to get rid of
these barbaric, anti-Christian and bloodthirsty activities in New Mexico.
Richard "Bugman" Fagerlund and Holly Kern, Corrales, El Defensor Chieftain,
August 25, 2004
7. No to ballot initiatives (reply to Argument 6 above)
I have to respond to the anti-trapping, anti-cockfighting, pro-California-ballot-initiative
letter sent by two residents of Corrales.
They described cockfighting and trapping as "barbaric, anti-Christian and
bloodthirsty." I know several people who participate in both activities and they are some
of the finest people there are and certainly are not "anti-American" or "satanic."
Holly and "Bugman's" idea of forcing ballot initiatives on us by threatening our
candidates is scary. In their letter, they list states that allow ballot initiatives, where if
you can get enough signatures you can force a vote on anything. Why have an elected
government at all? If ballot initiatives are such a good idea, why didn't Jefferson and
Mason include them in the U.S. Constitution?
The Corrales couple should just come out and say what they really want: a meatless,
petless, non-hunting, non-ranching society. A country where people like them make the
decisions as to how the rest of us live our lives.
Jim Nance, El Defensor Chieftain, August 28, 2004
8. Other side of trapping (reply to Argument 6 above)
Mr. Fagerlund and Ms. Kern, I admire your passion for wildlife, but do believe you're
only looking at half of the debated matter.
When I was a little boy, my grandfather, who was a trapper, told me that "there are
two sides to all matters." I would like to tell my side of this heavily debated matter.
Let us start with New Jersey, one of the eight states you mention that have banned
trapping. New Jersey was the first to ban the trapping of all fur-bearing animals and the
hunting of bears in 1994, which gave the bear population ample time to overpopulate.