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H. L. Mencken once defined a cliche as something everybody believed that was inherently wrong. You’ve heard these kicked around before. A moment’s analysis tells you how stupid they really are.

“Dissent is the highest form of patriotism”

Like those phony dissertations by George Carlin / Bill Murray / Theodore Roosevelt that are passed around the Internet, this one has been assigned to a large number of folks, most often Thomas Jefferson. Its real author is lefty historian Howard Zinn, which should tell you how badly spun the rest of his stuff is.

The statement is absurd. Anybody who thought the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was really cool would’ve been one helluva dissenter on Dec 8, 1941. And also a traitor. Those who dissented from the original American Revolution, otherwise known as “tories,” would’ve been the patriots. The original revolutionaries, also the original patriots, would then be called — what?

“If it saves but one life, do it”

You usually hear this one when restricting a particular freedom such as gun ownership or not wearing bike helmets is being discussed. It is also absurd.

You could eliminate all potential airplane crashes by simply banning take-offs. Might put a slight glitch in “commerce,” but saving that one life is what counts, right? Likewise the elimination of all vehicular traffic would clearly eliminate automobile deaths.

“It’s for the children”

Why does that always mean I’m expected to pay money to some adult?

“Better a hundred /

thousand / any number of the guilty go free than punish

one innocent person”

That demands a totally perfect criminal justice system, which is clearly impossible. It is also self-defeating, as the number of innocent people who would then be mugged / robbed / raped / killed by all the guilty folk who got turned loose would be sacrificed to save one person from unjust punishment. A dumb concept. Worse, an immoral one.

“The public has a right to know”

Journalists love to throw this one around. Some of them actually believe it and would have told the whole world the exact time and place of the Normandy Landings in June of 1944 had they known. Which may have something to do with why reporters and journalists are somewhere around guys who sell aluminum siding door-to-door in public esteem.

Most journalists really don’t mean it. That’s indicated by the number of times we in the media decide there’s a whole lot you really don’t need to know because we get to decide what’s relevant — to us. The cop-out is “our readers / listeners / viewers really aren’t interested in that.” We just use it to guilt trip people into telling us stuff.

What all of these really dumb statements have in common is overstatement. Sometimes the dissenter is a patriot, other times banning or modifying something will save many lives at reasonable cost and minimal restriction. The criminal justice system should strive for accuracy and give the accused the advantage of the doubt — which it’s supposed to and usually does. There are even some things supposedly for the children that really are and not just a cover for personal gain. And the public has a right to know almost everything even when the media itself decides they wouldn’t care to.

There’s more — please feel free to send in your favorites.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

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