So a law professor writes to argue that Canada is blindly following in the footsteps of an imperialist United States with regard to Venezuela. However, said law professor conveniently neglects to mention that more than 50聽countries have condemned the current Venezuelan government as illegitimate. Are all 50-plus countries blindly following American imperialist policy?
The law professor criticizes Elliott Abrams, John Bolton and other American imperialists. I agree with him. I moved to Canada 11 years ago because of George W. Bush鈥檚 invasion of Iraq, Ronald Reagan鈥檚 imperialism, extreme inequality, government by plutocracy, an absurd health-care system, etc.
However, the law professor commits the common cognitive mistake of over-generalization. If some things in a given category are bad, then all things in the category are bad. If some Muslims are terrorists, then all Muslims are bad (so say the racists). If some American foreign policy is imperialist, then all American policy is imperialist.
Another common cognitive mistake is to ignore facts that oppose your beliefs. The law professor neglected to mention the extreme suffering of the Venezuelan people, the rigging of the recent presidential election, the corruption and enrichment of the armed forces, which maintain the current government in power, and so on.
Finally, if I were teaching a class and a student turned in a paper as weakly argued as the one written by the law professor, I would award a failing grade.
Edward Feher, PhD
Retired neuropsychologist
