choofnagle
Posts by this author
May 24, 2007
Okay, everyone, practice your sneer, because it's time for the 10 of Diamonds: Bureaucrats! Everyone hates "bureaucrats," whether they ever met one or not. So, the industry denialist often plays the bureaucrat card in order to denigrate proposals that would vest decisionmaking with those fat…
May 23, 2007
An industry lobbyist can buy time by becoming petulant. After throwing a temper tantrum, the next step is to play the 10 of Hearts. Play this card by saying that your industry is misunderstood. It is a sophisticated, nuanced entity that needs more understanding before any proposals advance.
May 23, 2007
The denialist is in serious trouble at this point. Whatever problem that didn't exist has continued to capture regulatory attention. It is time to devote serious resources to fighting the proposal being debated.
The denalist should have a fake consumer group or academic group at this point. It…
May 22, 2007
Some followup from the earlier post:
If Gonzalez thinks ID is science, and not religion, he may have an even harder time arguing that there is discrimination here. Professors, rightly so, have freedom of religion and can believe whatever they want in their personal lives. However, if he thinks…
May 22, 2007
First, a disclaimer: I don't know much of anything about this controversy surrounding Guillermo Gonzalez, but I do know a fair amount about academic freedom. I wrote an article several years ago on legal protection for professors' speech. Legally, professors have the same rights as ordinary…
May 22, 2007
At this point, the consumer advocate has proceeded far along the path of moving some type of proposal. It's time to sacrifice a high-value card--the joker. The denialist throws a temper tantrum. This may sound distasteful, but it actually works.
There is a certain tone that an industry lobbyist…
May 21, 2007
The 9 of Spades is different than previous confusion tactics. Remember that most legislative staffers handle many different issues, and often are not expert in any one of them. This tactic leverages incomplete information to promote confusion.
Here, the denialist simply does not offer…
May 19, 2007
You should all be familiar with this tactic--poisoning the well. You know the trick: provide derogatory information about your opponent to undermine her arguments.
And here's a great example: In defending Channel One, Jack Abramoff's lobbyist Dennis Stephens proposed that Peter Ferrara pen an oped…
May 19, 2007
Two more tactics for those of you who want to be an industry lobbyist, or for those who want to recognize their two-bit tactics.
With nit picking, the denialist finds one problem with a fact asserted or the proposal for reform, and then harps on the problem incessantly.
A variation on the 8 of…
May 18, 2007
"Duh!" is one of my favorite lobbyist tactics. I've seen it used many times.
With "Duh!," the denalist deliberately misunderstands, misinterprets, or plays dumb when presented with others' questions or proposals. One is sometimes amazed at how smart an industry lobbyist can be until they're…
May 18, 2007
Okay industry lobbyists in training, you've started just making up arguments to confuse everyone. That's a method of confusing issues. Now you should start confusing individuals' roles in the policy process. It's time to start playing government officials off each other.
If you don't like…
May 17, 2007
Next week's New Yorker makes a point that I hadn't considered, perhaps because there is so much religiosity in America. In a review of recently-published books on atheism, Anthony Gottlieb writes:
...one can venture conservative estimates of the number of unbelievers in the world today. Reviewing…
May 17, 2007
Now, the debate starts to get fun. This group of Denialists' cards are all about spreading confusion. The more that one muddies the waters, the harder it is for anyone to do anything.
And so, the place to start is with the Red Herring.
The "red herring" argument is a frequently-employed and…
May 16, 2007
This pair should sound familiar. Industry lobbyists love the idea of individual responsibility. And so they will argue that individuals should be responsible for addressing a problem (paired with the 4 of Clubs or the 6 of Clubs). But in other contexts, accountability goes out the window. They…
May 15, 2007
The trick to using the "Jobs" card is to totally over inflate the size of your industry and the number of employees it has. It's quite a compelling argument, and sometimes it's true. But I've seen many cases where a regulation creates new jobs and economic development.
A great recent example of…
May 14, 2007
Many cards in the Denialists' Deck allow one to make a bogus argument no matter the situation.
So, with the Six of Spades and the Seven of Clubs, you use one card if your industry is highly regulated, and the other if it isn't.
May 10, 2007
Competition is magic. But this argument must be amplified! How? Easy, appeal to "innovation."
The denalist will argue that the intervention will stifle innovation. Typical 6 of Hearts arguments include "this is just a tool," and "you're banning technology."
Next is the 6 of Diamonds, a…
May 9, 2007
I'm a real fan of the Wall Street Journal. I read it on the BART every morning, to the displeasure of my knee-jerk co-passengers.
Why is the Journal awesome? Because days like today, you find reporting showing how branding is often an illusion, how cheaper printer cartridges are actually more…
May 9, 2007
A denialist does not soft pedal competition. It is a religious term. It is frequently employed, because any market can be described as competitive, regardless of the facts or the myriad factors that practically limit choice.
Competition solves all problems. Period. If competition doesn't solve…
May 8, 2007
Allow me to jump ahead in the Denialists' Deck of Cards, in light of Verizon's claim that giving customer records to the National Security Agency is protected by the First Amendment:
"Communicating facts to the government is protected petitioning activity," says the response, even when the…
May 8, 2007
Delay always benefits the denalist. At this point, any number of delay tactics can be employed to wait and see whether consumer education will solve the problem that doesn't exist.
May 8, 2007
The spectacle manifests itself as an enormous positivity, out of reach and beyond dispute. All it says is: "Everything that appears is good; whatever is good will appear." - Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle
You've argued that consumer education can set individuals free. Now argue that…
May 7, 2007
Given that there is consumer education, any attempt to limit the practices in questions threaten consumer freedom. Denialists will assume that people are perfectly rational and in possession of all relevant information. Thus, individuals choose the problem being addressed, and to limit it…
May 6, 2007
Okay, you've tried denying that the problem exists, you've tried to trivialize the problem, and you've even argued that the problem causes so harm, so it isn't a problem. Obviously, this no harm thing begins to have diminishing returns. What's next?
Consumer Education Solves the Problem that…
May 4, 2007
At this point, the denalist engages in delay. The problem that doesn't exist, and the harms that do not occur will continue not occur in the future, if we just wait.
A great "wait and see" tactic is to "shift the goal posts." The denialist does by stating, "we don't know that there is a problem…
May 3, 2007
Okay, my industry lobbyists in training. You've said "no problem" over and over. You've dismissed problems as attributable to bad apples, or diminished the problem as a "mere inconvenience." But people still seem to think that the problem that doesn't exist still exists. You're getting more and…
May 2, 2007
Are you practicing the "no problem" hand? You know how it goes--"there's no problem" (damn persnickety do gooders)! And even if people sometimes think that there is a problem, the problem that isn't a problem is caused by bad apples. But it really isn't even a problem.
It's just a mere…
May 2, 2007
Okay, I'm going to open a can of worms, and I'll need the commentors to help me with this one.
Last week, Professor Richard Epstein of the University of Chicago School of Law published an oped in the Wall Street Journal. Epstein's a charming fellow, and I like him, but I wouldn't want to live in a…
May 1, 2007
I'm going to be less active for a few days. Going to Montreal (for the first time) for the 17th Conference on Computers, Freedom, and Privacy. I'll be moderating a panel on the new landscape of online advertising, featuring Microsoft's Kim Howell, the Center for Digital Democracy's Jeff Chester,…
May 1, 2007
Yesterday, I discussed how "no problem" is a chorus in denialist rhetoric. But sometimes, something bad has happened, and it's more or less impossible say "no problem" with a straight face. What can a denialist do?
The 2 of Hearts, Bad apples! Yes, to the extent that something bad may have…