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Saturday, February 16, 2013

Pleading in the Alternative

There is a practice in the legal profession called pleading in the alternative.  What it means is that one side in a lawsuit can take contradictory positions and rely on both as alternatives.  For example, if I were to sue you because you borrowed my car and returned it to me with a big dent on the driver's door, you could answer that 1) you never borrowed the car, and 2) in the alternative, the dent was there when you borrowed it.  This is the kind of thing that usually gives lawyers a bad reputation.

Well now, the head of Iran is pleading in the alternative.  The Ayatollah has announced to the world that Iran has no intention of building nuclear weapons.  Then he goes on to say that if Iran were building nuclear weapons, the USA could not stop Iran.  This kind of double talk may be appropriate in a courtroom, but it is sort of crazy when it is said by the head of a country.  Of course, no one ever said that sanity is Iran's strong suit.



 

 

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