l33tminion: fig. 1. America. (AMERICA!)
Sam ([personal profile] l33tminion) wrote2012-10-12 06:32 pm
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The Art of Persuasion

At the bus stop yesterday, I was approached by a drunk who asked me to call him an ambulance. There was nothing obviously wrong with him (aside from being a drunk), and he says this in a tone that doesn't indicate he's alarmed in the slightest. So I ask him, why's he need an ambulance? And he tells me I should call him an ambulance because "[he] can't get where [he's] going". So I say, "It's not a taxi service!" which prompts a tirade of slurred and extremely boring insults. (Though, again, not insults that try to convince me in any way that this guy is in some sort of legitimate distress.) I wonder what that guy's scheme was. If getting me to call an ambulance was really his objective, he could have told me any number of plausible-but-unverifiable things that would have had me calling an ambulance immediately (even something as non-descript as "I'm having a medical emergency" might do in a pinch).

The VP debates last night were much more interesting than the first round or Presidential Debates. Martha Raddatz did great as moderator, I thought (though this counter-point by Glenn Greenwald is worth a read). Full debate is here, fact-checking can be found here.