Right Analogy, Wrong Target

I happened to catch a brief video of Sen. Kit Bond, a Republican from Missouri, on one of the cable news channels. He was comparing the call by many for some kind of “truth commission” to investigate the Bush administration’s use of torture as something you’d see “in a banana republic,” basically trying to argue that it was a partisan witch hunt that wasn’t worth the effort. Several thoughts to share with you Mr. Bond:

- First, you are engaging in one of the oldest and most transparent anti-critical thinking techniques in the book, marginalizing what your opposition is proposing as a distraction from the seriousness of that proposal.

- Second, if you want to talk about “partisan witch hunts,” how about the way the Republicans gleefully went after Bill Clinton for having had sex with a consenting adult in the Oval Office? Questionable judgment for sure, but as far as I know not a federal crime.

- Finally, be careful with your analogies, Senator, because they might come back to bite you. Banana republics are usually run by petty dictators who hold themselves above the law, who spy on everyone for fear they are being plotted against and who torture people. Sounds rather like the George W. Bush administration to me.