Can’t have it both ways, Bro. At least not without resembling a pretzel.

We are obviously talking past each other at this point, and your obscenities indicate that you are beyond reasonable discussion now.

Moving on….

And this is where I stopped reading your comment because you just admitted what my point was.

This. Is. What. McCain. Said. That is the crux of the matter. You can talk about town hall meetings all you want, but what McCain said here is that past gas prices do not matter. They do, especially when they’ve doubled in the past three years and gone up nearly 150% since Bush took office. OK? Got it? If you don’t, I couldn’t give two shits and a flying fuck because your skull is so thick that I’ve already wasted too much time trying to talk with you.

Even if you take the S-word out of it, the point is, a question was asked about the last time McCain pumped his own gas and what the price of gas was then, McCain did not recall when that was or what the price was, but he said that that specific past information doesn’t matter today. He added that he has communicated with voters over hundreds of townhall meetings settings, and that the ovbvious inference within the context of the answer was that he is fully aware of such pocketbook issues as gas prices through such open forums.

You created a posting to proclaim that this exchange meant that McCain doesn’t know the price of gas today. The question and answer had NOTHING to do with today’s gas prices (just because you linked to a Huffington Post artlice that used a headline stating that McCain doesn’t know today’s gas prices, doesn’t mean the headline is accurate!!). That is most definitely misrepresenting McCain’s own words!! Your fellow poster, Kathy, posted an entry on the same day that contained a quote from McCain days before the infamous interview, in which he specifically mentioned the price of gas today and what the price of oil may yet rise to.

This is what he said, Tas. On the record. It’s ironic that you would proclaim your disgust at dealing with the parsing of words.

As I said before, this is what political debate has devolved to, especially in the blogosphere. You said you only have the time/energy to devote to small battles. That shouldn’t mean irrelevant or manufactured ones. Lest you feel picked on, you are hardly the only one settling for such things. It happens across the whole political spectrum, sad to say.

So, if you get your feelings hurt when “random internet guy” disagrees with the particular logic being used one time, regarding a single issue, to the point where you have to attribute blanket character flaws on them and then dismiss them as being immature, then I’ll consider myself forwarned as to your sensitivity toward challenged opinion.

A strawman argument is one which completely misrepresents a situation. For example, suppose a family values fundie pointed to the ACLU’s legal defense of organizations like, say, NAMBLA, and used this as a justification for the ACLU supporting and loving child molesters. That’s a strawman argument since it obviously, completely, and totally misrepresents the ACLU.

You’ve tried applying this to my opinions. See the difference?

The fact that I harbor an opinion that you disagree with does not mean that I’m using strawman arguments. When you prove that I’ve completely and totally misrepresented John McCain’s words then you have an argument, but Craig.. He said it. McCain said it. It’s on the record. And I’m sick of the parsing. It reminds of of arguing with wingnuts about whether or not Bush said “Mission Accomplished” when he didn’t use the words, but stood in front of the worlds largest banner that said “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED”. It’s ridiculous to even discuss at this point.

Opinions are not strawmen. If you don’t understand this, then I suggest you step back and get a little maturity before partaking in another political argument.

What tidy word can I use to sum up that argumentive trick?