e i e i o!

one factor that makes da prez's speech thursday at the national endowment for democracy such effective rhetoric is that it's a real hodgepodge. so many ideas jump from his lips to your brain so fast you don't get a chance to see they don't follow logically.

you can look it up and see what i mean, but here's just one paragraph as an example:

Some have also argued that extremism has been strengthened by the actions of our coalition in Iraq, claiming that our presence in that country has somehow caused or triggered the rage of radicals. I would remind them that we were not in Iraq on September the 11th, 2001 -- and al Qaeda attacked us anyway. The hatred of the radicals existed before Iraq was an issue, and it will exist after Iraq is no longer an excuse. The government of Russia did not support Operation Iraqi Freedom, and yet the militants killed more than 180 Russian schoolchildren in Beslan.

notice his use of misdirection and the straw man fallacy: he misstates the criticism against the iraq war with an argument that's easy for him to shoot down. "caused or triggered" isn't the point at all. obviously nobody claims our invasion of iraq caused 9/11 or that beslan is related to it.

bush never actually refutes the first clause quoted above, but who has a chance to notice if they only listen?

fortunately we get to read it too.

ain't the internet wonderful?!