“U.S. corn exports to Saudi Arabia rose 25 percent in value from 1996 to 1998. The United States accounts for nearly 95 percent of imported corn, and the market is expected to increase as small to medium size farms also increase production.”
Farmers in the Midwest USA grow corn.
American grown corn feeds people in Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabians eat food to live.
Some people in Saudi Arabia support terrorists.
Stop terrorism.
Imprison all farmers in the Midwest USA!
I think some people are still missing the point. The connection is silly. But, the U.S Office of National Drug Control Policy, part of our government (if you’re in the US), used your tax money to develop the theory and produce commercials that said, if you buy drugs, you support terrorism. If you believe this, then an equal, if not stronger claim can be made that if you drive a gas guzzler, you support terrorism. Remember, that’s if you believe the first theory…which our government does. So when they ask you to take responsibility for your actions when smoking weed, they tend to skip over similar responsibilities regarding environmental issues.
I tend to take it as more of a jab at the Bush administration and big oil. Fortunately there’s no connection between the two. 
With all due respect, I disagree. From the Arianna link provided above:
While she admits to using the administrations flawed reasoning, she’s doing so to put the administration in a corner in order to promote her goal–fuel efficiency–and not to ridicule the administration. She may know that her logic is flawed, but it is still a powerful rhetorical tool, which she is using to good effect. If her goal were to ridicule, there are much better ways to do it than with an irony that very few would pick up on–sarcasm would be far more effective.
By ‘jab’ I didn’t mean ridicule. The Bush administration should have counted on someone using their drug/terrorism logic against them. It’s like, if you say A is true, then here’s reasoning that shows B is true, and that’s what they did.
If our Drug Policy Center never produced their ads, then the Detroit Project ads would be baseless and stupid. However, they did produce them, and the SUV ads are basing their logic by what our government has already claimed to be “true.”
Again, I think the connection is silly and not very credible…but I will agree that the oil connection is more credible than the drug connection.
Then she could nail your head to a coffee table.
Be fair! We had it coming! She had to!
Favorite quote from 5th grade social studies: “Oh, that Nick-o-lie Lennin! He’s a dirty-bird!”
Oops.
Their baseless stupidity in not dependent on any extant ads. Both campaigns are baseless and stupid. The latter merely utilizes baseless stupidity against itself, which isn’t very clever.
Would you make that argument, please? I’d like to read it.
You’re confusing Arianna with Dinsdale, she’s alot more like Doug. She “used… sarcasm. [S]he knew all the tricks, dramatic irony, metaphor, bathos, puns, parody, litotes and… satire. [S]he was vicious.”
About as much as me and my bong are.
Not neccessarily true. Throw a little gasoline on the fire and it burns hotter and faster… oh, wait…:smack:
Maybe your bong and my Jeep could hang out some time, conquer a few planets, blow some stuff up…
The NPR program noted that Afghanistan is, or was, a major producer of honey. While you’re unlikely to see much Afghanistani honey in the markets these days, it was (and still is, as I understand) very popular in the Middle East. The NPR program claimed that Al Qaida was laundering money through the (legitimate) sale of honey, as it was during the Taliban rule one of the few exports that was actually making any hard cash.
The program also claimed, without the same degree of certainity, that caviar was being poached in Russia, smuggled and falsely labeled in Afghanistan, and sold to fund Al Qaida.
NPR’s sources were a bit sketchy, but it’s always stuck in my mind how even relatively innocuous substances were alleged to have funded terrorism.
Like chocolate & slavery. It can be an ugly world indeed.
Thanks, Duke!
Is anyone keeping a list of things we’re supposed to boycott?
So far:
SUVs
Honey
Caviar
Diamonds
Are we still doing lettuce?
Oh yeah, I forgot… drugs!
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by js_africanus *
**Oops.
Their baseless stupidity in not dependent on any extant ads. Both campaigns are baseless and stupid. **
Sorry, when our government makes a statement, we can call them on it. If they go on national television and make the argument that drugs=terrorism, then someone can base a response off of that argument, no matter how baseless the original argument is. This isn’t an individual spouting this nonsense, it’s one of the most powerful governments in the world.
** The latter merely utilizes baseless stupidity against itself, which isn’t very clever.**
Really? Although I don’t agree with the commercial, I found it very clever. I apologize for being wrong. They are basing an argument off the statements of the people who make our policies. If they make a silly statement, it’s a good idea to play your idea off that statement.
Would you make that argument, please? I’d like to read it.
You mean that most drugs come from Mexico, Central/South America and even from within the US, but the most troublesome terrorists seem to come from the middle east where we send oil money?
http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/intel/01020/
I’m still must point out that I don’t buy the gas=terrorism connection, but we’re not too troubled by Columbian hit squads anymore. All I’m saying is that a crap load of money goes to the middle east for oil, where many of our terrorist problems come from, but not much drug money goes there. The main drug that reaches the US from the mid-east is heroin, but most of our supplies are from the south. So if one is going to buy the drugs=terrorism idea, then the fact that little drug money goes to the mideast compared to oil money should give more credibility to the oil=terrorism idea.
It’s the lesser of two stupid comparisons.
Lieu ( who is rapidly becoming one of my favorite posters) wrote
And kittens aren’t wearing eyeglasses yet 
I don’t understand why so many Americans see no connection between their behavior and our foreign policy. To me, it is obvious that America’s car culture is a major contributing factor in shaping our policy in the Middle East.
In my opinion curtailing wasteful gas consumption is a matter of putting the overall good of the nation over the individual good. Why should we, as a people be asked to sacrifice our pristine wilderness areas, our shorelines and perhaps our sons and daughters in war, without first asking people to make smaller, personal sacrifices.
If people consumed less gas, explored alternatives to large inefficient vehicles, and took some personal responsibility for how their behavior affected national foreign policy, we might have more leverage in our dealings with the Middle East.
Why is that message considered so nutty and on the fringe?
So if I drove down the highway in my SUV smoking a doobie, would I have doubled my terrorist helping activities or do they somehow cancel each other out?
What if it were a PCP laced crack bong with an exctasy chaser? Would that make a difference?
What if I stuck a brick of hash right into my tailpipe of my humvee and drove through a park letting people inhale the fumes? While I’m sure the public would think I’m funding terrorists then, after a few deep breaths they probably wouldn’t care.
Because THAT is not the message they’re conveying. Your message is logical and worthy of some debate. The message they convey is only worthy of my ridicule because either they’re insulting my intelligence by thinking I won’t see that they’re presenting the most simplistic overhyped under thought out piece of scare mongering garbage, or they truly believe that SUV = terrorist in which case there’s really no convincing them of anything.
I agree that their spots are a bit over the top, but I think that is their intent. They want to shock viewers and spark a debate, which is inmho not a bad thing. And it seems clear that they have sparked a debate, at least here.
But mostly I just want to thank ENDERW for saying my argument was logical. Usually I just come by and kill a thread. Gonna go put this day in my diary.
Apology accepted.
We can, and should, call them on it. I’ve already acknowledged that using a stupid argument against its creator is a powerful rhetorical tool. But the act of doing so does not give the latter argument credibility. If someone uses the ontological argument to prove the existence of god, I can respond by using the ontological argument to prove the existence of the perfect ham sandwich. Yet my proof of the perfect ham sandwich is still ridiculous and stupid–it’s stupidity illustrates the stupidity of the argument to which it replies. Indeed, it seems much closer to an appeal to ridicule than an argument from contradiction. And even if it were an argument from contradiction, it would merely disprove the original argument and not lend credibility to itself.
As I quoted before, Arianna is using a flawed argument to further her goal of greater fuel efficiency. But her argument is still flawed, no matter who used it first. Actually her argument is non-existant, since she never seems to have made one. Her goal is not to get stupid drugs ads off the air, her goal is to get SUVs off the road. Those goals are completely different. This quite literally is a case of two logical fallacies don’t make a proof, as someone noted before.
Then the grain=terrorism argument made above is more credible as well? The facts that much of our oil comes from the Middle East and our current terrorist problem comes from a nasty branch of Islamic extremism do not imply that absent oil, anti-U.S. terrorism would not exist. Nor do they prove that absent SUVs, anti-U.S. terrorism would not exist. Nor do either of those suggest that the SUVs=terrorism connection is more credible than the drugs=terrorism connection. Terrorism in the '60s & '70s showed beyond shadow of doubt that terrorist organizations with no ideological connection may still be connected operationally. If drug money funds Colombian terrorists, for example, it may be true that drug money indirectly helps Islamists. Oil money, however, goes through above-the-board connections whose assets can be frozen and seized at will. Funding terrorism is a pretty big risk for Exxon to undertake–I wouldn’t be suprised to find out that they have forensic accountants ensuring that their assets do not suddenly become the property of the U.S. gov’t. But the fact remains that neither of the two original arguments are prima facie, thus neither argument should have ever seen the light of day.
This thread is hilarious…It’s even funnier than the similar thread in GD. I mean “prima facie”?!?
Come on folks! As I said in that other thread 9and similar to what madmonk28 says here), I really think that people are taking these commercials too literally. Yes, they are hyberbole but that is because (1) the ads that they parody so well are hyperbole [and, God, do they ever parody them well!] and (2) they are put out there to raise a lot consciousness. In order to do that, they really on a certain amount of shock value. They are trying to get people to see things in new ways…to realize that their personal decisions, writ large, can have dramatic global consequences. You guys are deconstructing the argument as if they were a PhD dissertation on the connection between SUV fuel consumption and terrorism by radical Islamic fundamentalists (or whoever).
I’ve never heard any economist argue that the price decrease caused by a decrease in demand causes the total use to end up as high or higher than it was before. But, hey, if you want to believe that in order to feel better, go ahead.
You seem to be wanting to have your cake and eat it too. Raise consciousness of what? A fact that does not exist? If they are to raise consciousness, then the must be to raise consciousness of something, right? Just what are they raising consciousness of, if not what the ads address? As I’ve argued before, the SUV ads do not exist to mock the drug ads, they exist to get SUVs off the roads. I’ve also remarked that the ads are McCarthyite trash.
While one has the right (I guess) to put silly, empty arguments on tv, the fact of that right does not imply that it is a harmless activity. ** Accusing SUV owners and pot smokers of supporting terrorism is pretty fucking serious.** First because it is an outrageous calumny. Second because it is the sort of fascist-speak that seems a good first step to a witch hunt. You’re turning McCarthy from an anti-American villian into a hero; instead of communism, we have terrorism. These ads are exactly the sort of thing that should be squashed and replaced with rational debate.
U.S. demand for oil decreases, so price drops. LDCs can afford more, which drives up the price some. Two things happen: first, LDCs get wealthier and can pay a higher price, thus using more oil, thus getting wealthier, etc. Second, oil producers, seeing the potential market and having excess plant & capacity, and being rational, decide that offering cut rate oil for now is worth it for greater world usage in the future. Despite a short-term dip, constant, or even growing, world petroleum usage seems reasonable. Gosh, and I didn’t even have to be patronizing. See how nice that is? You should give it a try.