Krokodil,
The technique of creating characters to effectively express, or to satirize, political or philosophical POVs in ways that serve the agenda of the writer/artist is no “cheat”; it a standard operating procedure.
It works, or does not work, depending on whether or not it is funny and/or believable.
Exactly right that the character BD would not have been open to the ideas expressed unless they came out of the mouth of someone who he could identify with. Of course we all should judge ideas based on their merits (or lack thereof), and not on who says them, but BD would not be capable of that; if a perceived liberal “surrender monkey” said those thoughts, he’d not have considered them on their merits. BD has grown, but not that far. Having BD be open to considering those ideas coming out of a liberal’s mouth would not be believable.
Are there intellectual conservatives and veterans who are of the same mind as that professor? Yes. Given what the facts are, and the character presents unimpeachable facts, it is shocking that some do not. The character is believable.
Trudeau gets to do more than to just argue that an intellectual philosophically consistent conservative would be disgusted with how so called conservatives have failed to be accountable for the results of this war and would honestly judge it to be a neocon blunder; he gets to illustrate one of his creation. Some may be like BD, and be open to considering the ideas only because they come out of the mouth of a character who is portrayed as conservative and a veteran, and otherwise would not consider them on their own merits (or lack of). Some, like you, can’t look at the ideas because they are, in reality, coming out of Trudeau’s mouth. Fine. But he fairly gets to use the tool.
The technique of creating a character unlike yourself to “sell” a POV is as old as fiction and is no “cheat”, even if it does not always come off as believable. (In this case I think it does.)
