Investigating Argument

According to the A.D. 1992 edition of O’Connor’s Texas Rules Civil Trial, Texas courts recognized kinds of hearings: 1) evidentiary; and 2) argument.  Neither kind of hearing was favored over the other.  However, according to the A.D. 2005 edition of O’Connor’s same book, those two kinds of hearings are still recognized, but “evidentiary hearings are [now] disfavored”.

In other words, the modern court system prefers to reach decisions based on argument hearings wherein litigants advance premises (beliefs) rather than evidentiary hearings where litigants introduce facts (objective truths) into the record.  As a result, someone skilled in the art of argument (like an attorney) could theoretically win in a hearing even when the facts (truth) were against him.  More, it appears that the courts prefer that hearings be decided by argument rather than by factual evidence (truth).

 

Riding the Debt Tiger

I’m a long ways from being the first to observe that the total American debt has grown to dangerous proportions.  But I may have been the first (July A.D. 2008) to note that the total American debt has now grown so great that it can’t ever be repaid and therefore won’t be repaid.  (“What can’t be paid, won’t be paid.”)  In fact, according to my guesstimates, at least 80% and perhaps 90% of existing debt instruments cannot—and therefore will not—be repaid.

 

Owing It To Ourselves?

An A.D. 2006 article entitled “The Lost Decade—Per Capita Net Worth and Living Standards,” declared in part that “as citizens of the U.S. we own the national debt.”

Technically, that’s correct.  Whee duh pee-pul do “own” the National Debt.  But 40 years ago, when gov-co was first going hugely into debt, it was borrowing from the American people and justified increasing the national debt by saying it was OK since we “owed it to ourselves”.