One thing I will give these guys credit for is their publishing (I'm assuming), a response en toto. They do start off their diatribe with arguments against his style, if not the substance. Nevertheless, they allow a publication of his response en toto, unusal for 'liberals'.
Now this doesn't mean they won't get 'personal': We'll restrain ourselves from ad hominem attacks on your character, Mr. Rabinovitch, but we feel called to point out that you have already insulted yourself. And then there's this, one assumes hoping no one is paying attention to Dean:
You explain the great volumes (yes, public examples of George W. Bush's verbal inadequacies actually do fill several books) of Bush's public gaffes as a manifestation of media bias against him.
This source extorts: Frankly, we're shocked that the Republican Party has condoned Bush's illegal drug use, as if it is no big deal. This is, after all, the same Republican Party that tried to remove a sitting President for the high crime of getting a blow job. We suppose it's the right of Republican Party operatives to argue that alcoholism, drunk driving, and drug abuse are acceptable behavior but that a blow job is an impeachable offense. We, however, will be clear: we believe that using illegal drugs, abusing alcohol and driving while intoxicated are stupid things to do.
Am I the only one to find this nonsensical? If there were indications that Bush was 'imbibing' and unable to handle it, I would be the first to see and acknowledge the comparison to Clinton's sex problems, but considering there are how many years of sobriety and no indications that he is drinking or if he was that he can't handle it...
The same tactic is used in your explanation of George W. Bush's failures in the educational system. You acknowledge that Bush was largely unsuccessful as an undergraduate student, but you attempt to distract from this failure by pointing out that other people have had similar failures. Once again, you are admitting an example of George W. Bush's stupidity, then excusing this stupidity by saying that other people are stupid too. Your heavy reliance on this technique undermines your attempt to prove that George W. Bush is not stupid. You can't admit that Bush has a history of demonstrations of stupidity, a history that continues to this day, and then argue in the same breath that Bush is, in fact, not stupid.
This argument defies the basic rules of logic. If you agree to the premise that George W. Bush has demonstrated stupidity, then you cannot use that premise in an argument to prove that George W. Bush is not stupid. Let's take a look at the form of logical argument that you're attempting to use:
Bush is X. X is a sign of stupidity. However, other people are also X. Therefore Bush is not stupid.
In this form, by admitting that Bush is X and that X is a sign of stupidity, you have actually proven our point, that Bush is stupid. Creating examples of other stupid people does not change this basic fact. In the course of human history, there have been many idiots. This challenge is not intended to address the stupidity of them all. Rather, it is intended, as you well know, to discuss the stupidity of George W. Bush, the one individual on the planet most capable of screwing the world up.
Once you have admitted that George W. Bush is stupid, then you must retreat (as you implicitly do) to the backup position that Bush's stupidity doesn't really matter. This sort of position doesn't inspire a lot of confidence, does it?
We could stop here, since through your use of ill-constructed arguments, you have actually proven our point. However, in the interest of showing respect to the effort you have put into your attempt to prove that George W. Bush is not an idiot, we will attend to your other arguments as well.
Don't really agree with the premise. I think many people in college, returning to college, coming to college years later, are very different from the people they were before. I know that the person I was in high school bore no relationship to the college person I became. That college person bore little resemblance to the returning to school person 12 years later. That person bore more of a resemblance, but not fixed, of the person now going for Master's.
