The Decline in America's Reputation: Why?

[snapperhead]

J Wolfsberger quoted:

"Not all uses of tu quoque arguments involve logical fallacy. They can be properly used to bring about awareness of inconsistency, to indirectly repeal a criticism by narrowing its scope or challenging its criteria, or to call into question the credibility of a source of knowledge."

Let us say the following claim:

(p1) "A's reputation is declining."
(p2) The counter claim is "well B, C, D, and so on are worse."

How does p2 make us aware of an inconsistency or contradiction? The original claim, and issue on the thread, was P1. P2 is irrelevant to refuting anything inherent to P1's claim. For it to show us "an awareness of inconsistency" it would need to show that P1 and P2 couldn't both be true and couldn't both be false, which is clearly wrong as they both are true. America's reputation is declining (p1) according to that report. There are also countries far, far worse than America (p2), as other posters here have pointed out. But that doesn't refute the truth of P1.

You might be able to argue that P2 narrows the scope and criteria of P1. Which I would agree with. However, that doesn't refute the original claim. It only calls into question the crappy measurements to which P1, or the report, used.

patmc said:

Snapperhead, when people run out of facts, they resort to name calling, so thanks for showing your cards.

Respectfully,
A psuedo-intellectual juggernaut

Touche. It was an ad hominem on my behalf. It won't happen again and I will strike out the offending sentence. However, I haven't run out of facts. I was calling into question the irrelevant arguments that were being presented. Facts don't win arguments when the individuals use them fallaciously.

Ken White said:

To include Fuchs' (but not snapperhead who has contributed nothing other than pseudointellectual bon mots).

Incorrect. I pointed out a species of red herring fallacy many of the posters have displayed. Refute his claims (as you have done) not address the irrelevant claim of whether or not other countries are worse than the U.S. The issue on the thread are claims about America's reputation yes? Not the reputation of other countries.

EDIT: It appears I'm either clueless at editing on this particular forum, or you can't edit old posts. Either way my preceding post, which include the ad hominem, stands for all to see as a signpost of my idiocy.