Here's Nancy Keenan's NARAL press release
And here's Pollak's critique: Pollak's response to Keenan's press release
You should treat this as if it were a mathematics problem. There is a right answer, and you have to figure it out before you start writing down your answer. If a teacher asks you "what is two-plus-two" and you feel very strongly that the answer is "seven," you would still be wrong to give "seven" as your answer to "what is two-plus-two." Similarly, there is a right answer to the question posed above, this answer can be determined by examining Keenan's writing, Pollak's writing and any other relevant evidence. If you base your answer on what you feel to be true instead of the evidence, you will very probably get it wrong and get zero points for this assignment.
2. Don't let Pollak (or Keenan) do your thinking for you. Think
independently. If Pollak says that Keenan implies, suggests,
or makes it seem that something that some false thing
that she did not say is true, you should go to Keenan's
article and see if there is actually anything
there that, in and of itself makes it seem that this
false thing that keenan didn't say is true. Remember that the
answer to this question is not determined by what Pollak
thinks. You have to look at the things Keenan
says.
3. Don't try to protect Keenan. If you're sympathetic to Keenan's
side of the argument, don't let that sway you.
4. Don't try to protect Pollak. If you're sympathetic to Pollak's
side of the argument, don't let that sway you.
5. Do not hold Keenan responsible for any mistake that Pollak
might have made while reading Keenan's article. If Pollak says
that Keenan says something she doesn't say, or that she
implies something that her words don't actually imply,
then he is responsible for misreading Keenan's
article.
6. Support all your claims about Keenan with evidence taken from Keenan's article. If you say Keenan says some particular thing, you should in your paper provide an actual quote from Keenan's paper where she actually says what you say she says. If you can't provide such a quote, don't say that Keenan says that particular thing.
The relevant part of Pollak reads: "In a NARAL press release being circulated by Democrats and women’s groups, the Catholic, pro-life Ryan is accused of “extreme” anti-abortion views. NARAL isn’t simply content to disagree with Ryan’s views; it resorts to lying about Ryan." This seems to say several things:
If you think I've misinterpreted Pollak here, please discuss this in your paper. Provide textual evidence and reasoning to support your interpretation of Pollak, and be sure to discuss what this means for the specific issue we're focussing on here.
If you think Pollak is not at least implicitly accusing Keenan of dishonesty in the way that she characterizes Ryan's record as "extreme," please provide textual support or other reasoning to support the claim that Pollak accepts Keenan's characterization as reasonable, or at least as honestly mistaken.
The relevant part of Keenan reads "Rep. Paul Ryan's extreme anti-choice record shows just how serious a threat Mitt Romney's presidency would be for women," . . . "He has cast 59 votes on reproductive rights while in Congress and not one has been pro-choice. Rep. Ryan has also repeatedly voted to defund family-planning programs and supported the "Let Women Die Bill," which would allow hospitals to refuse to provide a woman emergency, lifesaving abortion care, even if she could die without it. . . . Rep. Ryan's anti-choice record includes: Repeatedly voting to deny women in the military, who defend our freedom overseas, the right to use their own, private funds for abortion care at military hospitals. Repeatedly voting to defund Planned Parenthood, which would deny millions of women access to comprehensive reproductive-health care and preventive services. Cosponsoring and repeatedly voting for the Federal Abortion Ban, a law that criminalizes some abortion services, endangers women's health, and carries a two-year prison sentence for doctors. Voting for an appropriations bill that defunded Planned Parenthood, eliminated the Title X family-planning program, and reinstated the D.C. abortion ban." (Complete text at Nancy Keenan's NARAL press release)
And here's Pollak's critique: Pollak's response to Keenan's press release
Questions to think about in your notes before you start your paper.
Suppose Senator Liberace has stated that is he is "as pro-choice as you can get," and that he has consistently voted to allow women, including minors, unrestricted access to abortion under almost all circumstances. Would an abortion opponent be lying if she said that Senator Liberace held extreme pro-abortion-rights views? Would it constitute a smear if she said this? Explain your answers.
Suppose a Democratic presidential candidate who originally supported some gun rights has in recent years switched to making harsh anti-gun statements, and saying that if he were in power he would favor laws and constitutional amendments making it extremely hard for people in the USA to own firearms, and would only allow private gun ownership in certain very, very restrictive circumstances. Suppose also that this candidate actually voted many times to restrict gun ownership, and had never voted against any gun control measure. Would a gun-rights advocate be lying (rather than, say, merely exaggerating or speaking loosely) if he said that this candidate held "extreme" anti-gun views.
I want to emphasize that this is not a "matter of opinion" in the sense that different people can have different opinions about this. This question is a matter of cold, hard fact. Either Keenan did something dishonest or she did not. If you have a feeling that Keenan is dishonest, that is not a basis for a rational judgement. If you have a feeling that Pollak isn't thinking clearly, that is not a basis for a rational judgement. You have to look at what Keenan actually says, and at what Pollak says to back up his claim that "In a NARAL press release being circulated by Democrats and women’s groups, the Catholic, pro-life Ryan is accused of “extreme” anti-abortion views. NARAL isn’t simply content to disagree with Ryan’s views; it resorts to lying about Ryan"
Remember, you are required to write a paper that states a thesis and then sets out the reasoning by which you support that thesis. You will be graded on how well you do this, so doing other things instead will hurt your grade.
Remember to follow the important rules:
Remember that I am not asking you to preserve any previously expressed or privately held opinions. You can change your mind about anything at any time. If you previously thought that the evidence supported one side, but now see that the evidence supports the other side, you are supposed to go with what you see the evidence saying right now. Your most important cognitive faculty is your ability to change your mind. If you think you have to stick with some previously expressed thesis, you are not exercising free will, and you are not thinking for yourself.
If you want to know more about Ryan's views as expressed after the election, you might want to read on or more of the following articles:
When you've finished your analysis, write up your results in a paper that states and explains the facts and reasoning that led you to the conclusion that as far as you can tell, is best supported by the totality of the available evidence. Your paper can start off in one of three ways:
