Ad Hominem Attacks: Sometimes Helpful

An interesting way to take a guru off his high horse is to throw an ad hominem attack at him. Sure, attacking someone's past behavior isn't a way of refuting his current argument. But it is a nice way to say to the audience, "Wait a second. This guy is brilliant at making himself seem like a guru who should get airtime. But he's actually not. He's actually got a long record of screwing things up. So before you go along with his half-brained ideas like he's the wise old Grandpa in Gremlins and end up with a trashed movie theater whose screen is ripped and there's popcorn all over the floor, let's take a look at the man who is making the statements, and then we'll get to the argument at hand."

TPM points out Matt Yglesias doing that to one such guru -- Newt Gingrich, who recently called for Nanci Pelosi to step down as Speaker of the House:

You know, Newt Gingrich knows a lot about saying stupid things and being forced out of the job as Speaker. ... But one way or the other -- I mean, I wasn't in the room, you weren't in the room, Newt Gingrich wasn't in the room. None of us know exactly what happened there. But whatever it is Nancy Pelosi knew about, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, John Yoo, Jay Bybee, they knew more. And ultimately, when we have a thorough investigation of what happened, the bulk of the blame has to lie with the architects of the policy, not with a member of the opposition party.

Now, the fact that Gingrich is a failed and disgraced former Speaker of the House doesn't really impact his argument, to be fair. But it does raise the interesting question of "why are we listening to this guy other than the fact that he insists on himself and probably takes every possible offer to get his face on TV?"

Surely there must be some reason why he is an expert. Was he Speaker during a period where a lot got done in Washington, or a speaker during a period of bitter partisan infighting and gridlock that led to a government shut down? (The latter.) Was he Speaker for more than five years? (No.) Was he the most recent Speaker of the House, before Pelosi? (No.) Recently run for President? (No.) Ever run for President? (Nope.) On the ticket? (Not even close.) Elected to any statewide office? (No. Note that Rod Blogojevich can put this on his resume but Gingrich can't.) Has he written several books that few people have read about the Civil War? Why, yes. Yes he has. (By the way, how much more can Amazon discount your book below $7.99 before it becomes more economical for them to burn the books for heat than to have them take up storage space?)

The lesson: sometimes you can get to be in the argument and get quoted because you have the confidence to insist on yourself as a guru. And sometimes if you do that, someone will question why you're even invited to the party by lobbing a sort of unfair but helpful ad hominem attack at you.