The modern public political discourse provides ample examples of logical fallacies that have significance for the fate of critical thinking--not to say the fate of the republic. These examples are the subject of this research.
1. An improper appeal to authority may come in various guises, but a common one is the bias of an arguer who has a motive, such as a political motive, to lie or mislead (Bassham, 2000). The rationale presented to the public for the US government's incursion into Iraq in 2002/2003 was built around the premise that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (WMD) that were threatening the United States. Controversy has surrounded the fact that a career diplomat named Joseph Wilson investigated the premise that the African country of Niger had made a deal to sell uranium yellowcake, an ingredient necessary for production of nuclear weapons, to Iraq. The substance of Wilson's investigation was that the premise was wrong. Even so, the US invaded Iraq partly on the premise of Iraq's growing nuclear capability, and its executive-branch apparatus, as well as the political party apparatus of the group governing US federal law, proceeded to put about that Wilson had wrongly claimed that he had authority to speak for the US in respect of WMD and that his analysis was also wrong.
Specifically, the Republican National Committee stated that Wilson "insisted" that the vice president's office sent him to Niger, citing Wilson's own statement that he had been
informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. . . . The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office." (RNC, citing Joseph C. Wilson, 2003; ellipses in RNC original).
The foregoing may seem like a straightforward quotation, but it is really an illustration of an improper appe...