Don't Be Deceived

Across the pond, Samizdata poster Paul Marks deconstructs the “nobody denies” line, as in “Nobody denies that the insecurity in America has been sharpened by the absence of a comprehensive health-care system.” utilized by universal health care proponents, which caught his eye in a piece from the Economist titled The cross of gold.

From Marks’ comments regarding the “nobody denies” fallacy.

It was the words “nobody denies” that interested me. A very obvious obvious lie, as a great many people deny this, but I had heard this sort of lie somewhere before. In another article it was said that some Conservatives wished to “do nothing” about health care - good ‘conservatives’, like Mitt Romney, of course wished to go along with the demands supported by the Economist for ‘universal health care’ (see above)... I had seen that lie someone before as well. And then I remembered - these are the methods of John Stuart Mill.

In, for example, Principles of Political Economy (1848) whenever J.S. Mill comes out with a demand for more statism, whether it be for police, or for government supply of water or other things, he tends to say something like “nobody denies” that the government should provide X, Y, Z. It was a lie as Mill knew perfectly well at the time as many of his contemporaries did indeed deny these things - but it was a useful lie in that it meant that he did not have to refute their arguments because he pretended that opponents of his statist views did not exist.

Marks’ post is titled The use of two very old methods of deception by the Economist

Posted by on 07/24 at 04:25 AM

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