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"Actually, when placing a piece in greater context, mentioning the source and the tendencies of a source, is not an ad hominem fallacy. (It is ad hominem, just

"Actually, when placing a piece in greater context, mentioning the source and the tendencies of a source, is not an ad hominem fallacy. (It is ad hominem, just not fallaciously so)." I hope you will agree with me that saying false things about the source of a piece is a fallacy, whether or not context would be relevant. The claims that Cato is a "Cato is a Koch Bros. group" or that it has a "very very far right bent" are pretty clearly false, and only a person who doesn't know much about Cato could make such claims. Context from someone who is either not very knowledgable or willfully misrepresenting the situation is not actually something anyone should pay attention to. If such statements have value, it is only by accident.

sophacles 14y ago
I agree that saying false things is bad. I have heard and seen "Cato is a Koch Bros. group" many times, and thought it was a truth. I have not seen a primary source either way though, so I am willing to be shown wrong on this. I do agree with the statement that Cato is a very, very right leaning organization. I have never seen anything from them that does not promote laissez faire style economics, and libertarian or conservative social policy (albeit more libertarian). This is to me a far right position, and generally falls in to the far-right on most political scales I have seen. Further, many of the pieces from Cato tend to support liberties for corporations and big business rather than individuals when there are questions of balancing rights - this to me also supports the classification of far right. I'm sure there are pieces that don't fit the above pattern (I've seen them), but IMO, they are much like the "balance" parts of Fox News or MSNBC, where they are almost comical, and only seem to further highlight the main bias, by over simplifying or strawmanning the other point of view.
- othermaciej 14y ago
  Cato isn't right wing, it is libertarian, which to a first order approximation means conservative on economic issues and liberal on social issues. Among other things, they took a strongly anti-war stance during the Bush administration and have long been in favor of drug legalization and gay marriage, and against abusive police tactics. I don't think anyone would typically call these positions "far right". I think you may not have a clear picture of what libertarianism (Cato's motivating political philosophy) is. One starting point for learning more is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

sophacles 14y ago

I agree that saying false things is bad. I have heard and seen "Cato is a Koch Bros. group" many times, and thought it was a truth. I have not seen a primary source either way though, so I am willing to be shown wrong on this. I do agree with the statement that Cato is a very, very right leaning organization. I have never seen anything from them that does not promote laissez faire style economics, and libertarian or conservative social policy (albeit more libertarian). This is to me a far right position, and generally falls in to the far-right on most political scales I have seen. Further, many of the pieces from Cato tend to support liberties for corporations and big business rather than individuals when there are questions of balancing rights - this to me also supports the classification of far right. I'm sure there are pieces that don't fit the above pattern (I've seen them), but IMO, they are much like the "balance" parts of Fox News or MSNBC, where they are almost comical, and only seem to further highlight the main bias, by over simplifying or strawmanning the other point of view.

othermaciej 14y ago
Cato isn't right wing, it is libertarian, which to a first order approximation means conservative on economic issues and liberal on social issues. Among other things, they took a strongly anti-war stance during the Bush administration and have long been in favor of drug legalization and gay marriage, and against abusive police tactics. I don't think anyone would typically call these positions "far right". I think you may not have a clear picture of what libertarianism (Cato's motivating political philosophy) is. One starting point for learning more is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism