![]()
This is the original post by Mr. Renner, writing about Scott Walker's preemptive declaration, without any benefit of current foreign intelligence or even the final agreement, that he would abrogate the agreement with Iran if elected President. Walker had also recently claimed, as "proof" that he could solve incredibly complex problems like ISIS, that "If I can take on 100,000 protesters, I can do the same across the world."
![]()
Mr. Korda enters, pointing out that Sen. Schumer (an AIPAC member and pro-Israel Democrat) may want Congressional approval of the deal. This is a technique Mr. Korda likes: Here, he doesn't answer the point about Walker, but instead points to someone who happens to also disagree with Obama. Yet, Shumer has not said he would automatically reject it as Walker did (a key difference). Mr. Renner points out that Republicans may not ultimately have the support they need if they try to sabotage the agreement and Obama vetoes that. The U.S. President has long-recognized authority to negotiate "sole-executive" agreements with other countries (and yes, not everyone likes this). During his term he can veto an attempt to simply sabotage that type of agreement with legislation.
![]()
Mr. Renner explains why it does not matter what Republicans think, because it seems (e.g., after the "47 Senators" letter) they will automatically reject the agreement as Walker did. The true legislative issue is whether Democrats will ultimately support a veto override. Mr. Korda responds with a non sequitur about the military option (something that no one in the thread has questioned). Note: The reply to "John" is to a person not visible to me.
![]()
Here we begin to see the true George Korda begin to emerge, as he tries to claim that we believe something extreme about "people skeptical that Iran won't keep its word." No one has actually said anything about mere doubters, because everyone has reasonable doubts about Iran (note Mr. Renner's acknowledgement of the terrorism points). That is why intrusive inspections are a key element. Or to paraphrase the Great Leader Reagan, "[Don't] trust, but verify." However,
Reagan's own history with WMDs in the Middle east might make that less than credible to Iran.
![]()
Again Mr. Korda raises something, Iran's ties to terrorism, that no one questions, and then serves up some Klassic Korda®: A strawman argument in which he pretends that this is entirely about people thinking Obama cannot be wrong. Mr. Renner pulls the discussion back to the real topic: Blind rejection by Scott Walker of the beginnings of a deal, worked out with FOUR other strategic countries (Russia, China, France and the United Kingdom, plus Germany plus the European Union...and Iran. Mr. Korda does not seem to grasp this, ignores Mr. Renner's agreements with some of his points about Iran, and...
![]()
...now we get the full-blown polemical Korda that we all know so well from his Facebook comments. Apparently frustrated because people keep arguing with him, he manages to combine a strawman argument with a false choice fallacy. That is the cue for taunting from his self-liking acolyte, plus some additional color commentary. Fun!
![]()
The reference to Republican "sabotage" is to the by now well-established fact that Republican Congressional leaders met on January 20th, 2009 (just after Obama's inauguration ceremony) and agreed to do everything they could to make him fail. That is, instead of working with Democrats to address the nation's crashing economy while legitimately pushing their own priorities, they simply tried to make Obama and the Democrats FAIL in addressing those problems, thinking they could regain power in 2010. The recovery was much slower, but to their dismay, it still recovered thanks to Obama's stimulus efforts, which Republicans voted against unanimously. To this, Mr. Korda adds a double-helping of petulance.
![]()
Here we see another favorite Korda "gotcha" technique: the "what they said then and what they say now," also known as the Ad Hominem Tu Quoque fallacy, in which he pretends that Obama has somehow completely reversed his position about Iran having a bomb, even while he is obviously working towards an agreement that significantly hampers those ambitions.
![]()
Here, Mr. Korda is simply digging deeper into a position he has established in sand. Mr. Renner ends by asking the "Ok, what would YOU do?" type of question that we have posed to Mr. Korda in various contexts. He rarely answers this type of question, often with the excuse that he is not on that committee, task force, etc.
![]()
Mr. Korda attempts to simply "declare victory and go home"; believing that anyone who keeps arguing with him is irrational. Also we see a mild form of Mr. Korda's now tiresome "Why don't you call in to the radio show and say that" challenge. Somehow, he seems to think this passes for an actual argument, especially since he then often restates "that" (other people's arguments) as extremist straw men that do not resemble what is on the thread in any significant way. Meanwhile, what was actually written may seem perfectly reasonable to anyone familiar with facts, so his non-response is revealing.
![]()
Now we have Korda technique #4: "Tell it to [insert someone else here], your disagreement is with them." Instead of answering Mr. Renner's points about being rational, he simply dodges the issue, and follows with another straw man. ("They don't seem to share your stance that the President knows best."). Mr. Korda oftens defends his posting of links by simply pointing to the link and challenging you to refute the author. This is fine, except it makes you question whether he actually understands what he has linked or whether he is simply acting as a "merchant of doubt."
![]()
The reference to destabilizing the Middle East: The unjustified invasion of Iraq by George W. Bush inflamed Muslim anti-American extremism, strengthened the position of Iran in Middle East politics, replaced an anti-Shiite dictator with an anti-Sunni prime minister and ultimately created the environment that made ISIS advances possible. Here is also Mr. Korda's request to read the thread, which he promises to do without comment. He ignored that promise in his announcement of the segment, in a post-commercial break rant on his show the week prior to that.
![]()
Here, Mr. Korda does not accept an offer to fully document the contents of this thread, giving his listeners access to everything that was written, and gives an example of how he might approach a "negotiation."
![]()
Again, Mr. Korda has a problem with giving people access to the entire thread. Meanwhile, he introduces a new problem with the agreement, coming from conservative Iranian leaders, who are the counterparts to our right-wingiest Republicans. This is still irrelevant to Scott Walker's intention to undo any agreement without ever seeing it.
![]()
In this segment, Korda eventually resorts to Korda technique #5, "You hate me! You hate me!!"
![]()
To his credit, Korda finally writes an detailed statement of position instead of just posting what he thinks is a "gotcha" link and calling people haters of conservatives or worshippers of Obama. Unfortunately, he falls into a common trap...
![]()
Conservatives often make one singular mistake about Iran: Not admitting to our checkered history, including our toppling of its democratically elected leader to prevent British Petroleum from losing its oil profits there. That installed our puppet, the Shah and that led to the Iranian Revolution and the Ayatollah Khomeini. Another open question: Does Iran simply want to "have" a nuclear weapon (for defense) instead of actually using one? Many conservatives do not know that, despite the U.S.
helping Saddam target WMD attacks and supplying raw materials for them., the Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against WMD in 1984 during the Iran-Iraq war. Does the current Iranian leadership honor that? That is clearly a valid question, but consider the importance: Iran's supreme Islamic leader ISSUED A FATWA against using them.
![]()
Here, Mr. Korda explains why he could not read the thread on that day's show. His astonishing Nazi reference occured earlier in the show while ranting about the push to give gays the same rights to service that other minorities have. A suggestion had been made on another thread that if right-wing Christians put signs in their shop windows stating they did not serve gays, the "free market" would respond to their discriminatory policies. He then "warns" that he will promote reading this thread for the following week after the commercial break. More about this to come...
![]()
Mr. Korda's comment here is typical of how he invites people on FaceBook to call into his show: There is a hint of a threat in his phrasing, that he plans to misuse the comments. This despite there being nothing by others in this thread that isn't simply spirited back and forth — and his own sometimes reactionary answers.
![]()
Mr. Korda makes his announcement about reading this thread, using a histrionic description that seems to be about some completely different FaceBook page he dreamed about. But decide for yourself: Here's the link to that audio clip. Feel free to compare what he says to what is actually in this thread. Also note how he seems perplexed that people keep arguing with him.
![]()
Next, we have this very odd exchange, in which Mr. Korda seems to have forgotten his reluctance to post a link to a full reproduction of the thread contents, or simply did not read the replies about it.
![]()
Actually, Mr. Korda claimed we wrote "Korda sucks!" not "you suck, Korda!" We want to be as accurate as possible.
![]()
Mr. Korda's comments here suggest a lack of self-awareness that drives many of his comments.
![]()
So, Korda's implied threats continue, here with an attempt to set up what I call a "reverse" Appeal to Authority fallacy. In it, Person A attempts to discredit Person B's argument by simply claiming that they are not an "authority." This has no bearing on the argument itself, it's just a credentials war. If Person B's argument is actually based on EVIDENCE or the conclusions of multiple true authorities, then the argument DOES carry weight. Ultimately, all arguments are carried by logic and adherence to facts, not by who presents them. According to George's own logic, since Barack Obama has much more foreign policy experience than George, George obviously should accept Obama's foreign policy decisions without question.
![]()
More badgering. Mr. Korda inadvertently confirms his intention to use "gotchas" about credentials instead of logic to support his arguments (and actually does this at a later point, trying to shut down the discussion).
![]()
The "Poisoning the Well" fallacy is an attempt to discredit a future argument by preemptively discredting the source of the argument, typically about something unrelated to the argument. Here, there is a clear suggestion that Mr. Korda will use "lack of public policy expeience" as a false measure, as opposed to the logic, accuracy or factual groundedness (or lack thereof) of the arguments in this thread.
![]()
OHH. Mr. Korda finds a way to perhaps avoid giving out the link. Maybe he will, maybe he won't. To fully understand this segment, you need to have heard the previously mentioned audio clip.