[Janice D. Soderling]

Don't feel obliged to commit to a definition on my behalf, nor certainly my interpretation of Bill Carpenter's attempt, but he alludes to this as possibly being one of your 'first principles':

"It seems that a certain peaceful just, transnational order is the highest desideratum. This should be achievable on a democratic basis, but not until populations are sufficiently enlightened to know that this is best."

Whomever the proponents of this might be, it reads to me like a whopper of an until. How do we prove our deservingness after self-determination has been relinquished to this transnational order? What precedents are there of bloodless reverse-devolutions of power at the first signs of popular maturation? The problem of course is that the vanguard never self-dissolves --without coaxing. And given the perfecting of surveillance technology, dissolution seems even less likely in the years ahead. If globalism truly succeeds at becoming global, where will the exogenous counterforce march from should things veer dystopian?

Norman, the first criterion for critical thinking is to go to the first source to verify the veracity when a second, third, etc. source or hearsay claims that X has said Y, or believes Z, or supports A, or is a fan of B. Do not believe it until you hear it emerging from the horse's mouth.

The first guideline for rebuttal is to be aware of the straw man trick. Straw man is a common form of argument and is an informal fallacy based on giving the impression of refuting an opponent's argument, while actually refuting an argument which was not advanced by that opponent.

Sorry.