Fallacies Against President Obama

Introduction

Now that the Democrats have a presumptive nominee and Senator Clinton has conceded Senator Obama's victory, the focus shifts to the all election. Over the past few days, my friends who are Clinton supporters have flooded their Facebook and Myspace status updates with declarations like “Clinton deserves to be VP,” “Obama must choose Clinton to win,” or “Obama/Clinton is the winning ticket.” The problem is that all of these people are dead wrong. Even the political talking heads on the cable networks refer to a Clinton/Obama slate as the “Dream Team.” Their argument goes a little something like this:

Analysis

Obama is great for the Democratic ticket for President; and Clinton is great for the Democratic ticket for President; therefore An Obama/Clinton ticket is the best Democratic ticket for President. Sounds pretty simple and compelling right? Well, before we let this simplicity wash over us, I invite everyone to take a breath, think, and make sure that our logic for pairing Obama and Clinton together for the general election is sound and not based on a fallacy of composition. Hilary may not be good as we hope for an Obama's ticket.

Essentially, a Fallacy of Composition occurs when a person mistakenly believes that by combining two great things together the outcome will also be great. We do this all the time. For instance, when the owner of our local sports team signs two top established players to the team, we mistakenly believe that the overall team will be better and will win the championship that year. However, what often happens is that by season's end our team has the worst record in the league and the players are not getting along. (Most people recall the latest incarnation of the USA Men's Basketball Dream Team's embarrassing losses in the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, ending American dominance in that sport.) To avoid the fallacy of composition, Democrats should be careful not to assume that Sen. Clinton would be a good running-mate just because she finished second or lots of people voted for her during the primary season. Those reasons are not enough to serve as justification of putting Clinton on the ticket if the goal is to win in November.

To be clear, I am not advocating against having Sen. Clinton on the ticket. She is strong politician who, on a personal note, because of her concession speech showed the grace and political temperament that made me a fan of hers since high school. She energizes many women to vote for her. She has an unyielding allegiance from the gay and lesbian communities and her blue-collar ties are thick. All-in-all, her scouting report looks good for the position of Vice President. But the issue is whether her baggage will hurt the campaign more than her positive attributes could help. Much like the owner of your local sports team we have to look at the prospect's personality, teamwork, and coachablility, and not just their raw talent before signing them up for the ...