Between the war in Iraq and the political season, the average quality of rhetoric in this country is at what seems to be an all-time low. Probably not, but there's a whole bunch of common logical fallacies which are worth highlighting and opposing vigorously. I've tried to make sure that these are pretty neutrally described, but I'm open to suggestions regarding variations, additions and corrections.

"It worked so it must have been necessary" is a particularly popular justification for the use of force, prominently featured in discussion of the removal of Saddam Hussein and the use of the atomic bomb at the end of WWII. Whether this is a fallacy or not depends mostly on how you feel about"the ends justify the means" argument and on the extent to which alternatives were explored or can be reasonably extrapolated.

Post hoc ergo propter hoc [After this, therefore because of this] is rampant (e.g., the atomic bombings, or the Libyan WMD reversal, or the Spanish elections). The media's analytical abilities rarely extend beyond the simply chronological. This is closely related to...

Bloch's "Single Cause Fetish":

"In history, the fetish of single cause is all too often only the insidious form of search for the responsible person -- hence a value judgment. The judge expresses it as: 'Who is right, and who is wrong?' The scholar is content to ask: 'Why?' and he accepts the fact that the answer may not be simple. Whether as a prejudice of common sense, a postulate of logicians, or a habit of prosecuting attorneys, the monism of cause can be, for history, only an impediment. History seeks for causal wave-trains and is not afraid, since life shows them to be so, to find them multiple." -- Marc Bloch, The Historian's Craft

"Opposition to methods equals opposition to ends" is common on both sides of the spectrum. It is particularly prominent in discussions of military and security affairs, including the Iraq war, Korean nuclear crisis, and the Israeli-Palestinian situation, but can also be seen in debates over affirmative action, public education and voucher programs, and budget-balancing. This is one that I just don't get, myself: people get so attached to particular methods and policies that they lose the ability to discuss alternative routes to the same goal in a rational fashion. Creativity, adaptability and flexibility are lost when this happens, and mistakes get made over and over again.

"If it's from them, it must be political, not worth consideration." Given a fair and respectful listening, and carefully constructed dialogue, sometimes"opponents" can discover immense areas of common ground and common goals and sometimes even agree on methods and policies. It's not easy, I admit, to grant that the"other side" might be motivated by equally high ideals and populated by reasonable people, but it's the only way that we'll rebuild some kind of political middle ground, and get past the manichean two-party/two-side fallacy (see below).

"They did it too, so it's OK." Hypocrisy is, perhaps, the most common human vice (OK, after sloth and gluttony), and it's fine to point that out when it arises, but responsible ideals and values have to preclude certain tactics or else they are meaningless. Or to put it another way: It's not easy, I admit, to grant that"our side" might be using equally objectionable tactics and include some truly despicable people.....

It's enough to want/say the right things, even if you don't do the right things, or even have a plan to do the right things, as long as you're on my side. Conversely, a goal without a fully functional compromise plan is always dismissable as"vague" or"unworkable" if it comes from the other side. We need to give each other a little more credit, and hold ourselves to equal, or higher, standards.

All attacks and counter-attacks, charges and rebuttals, arguments and opinions are of equal weight, and"both" sides must be afforded roughly equal attention. Journalistic"neutrality" has created a truly odd situtation, where mainstream journalists are trained against drawing even tentative conclusions (at least openly), against evaluating evidence independently of comment by opposing views, against including more than two views in an analysis. This tends to polarize the discussion, to ignore the (quiet) middle ground in favor of (loudly) opposed extremes. Right and Left, Liberal and Conservative, Religion and Science, Republican and Democrat, Pro and Anti, With or Against; none of these categories is absolute (in fact, they aren't even really polar opposites), but the reporting is unshaded and focuses on points of conflict rather than areas of consensus.

Changing your mind is a bad thing. Voltaire said that"Doubt is not a pleasant mental state, but certainty is a ridiculous one." John Kenneth Gailbraith said that"Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof." What can I add to that? People should get extra credit, not demerits, for changing their minds on important issues based on good information and arguments. Creative flexibility, responsive and relevant thinking, these are qualities we should be promoting in our political, economic, intellectual and social leadership, not to mention our voting electorate.

Logic=fact. Replacing the search for evidence with"logical" assumptions, then drawing conclusions based on those assumptions and making policy based on those conclusions.... If I've learned anything from history (aside from Hegels dictum"that nations and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.") it is that what makes logical sense often has no relationship to what happened. Oftentimes these"logical" arguments are really partial analyses which make sense only if you exclude a great many practical considerations.

This is a preliminary list, of course. But you have to start somewhere.