[Homer_J_Simpson]

Continued from February 1 (reply #3).

The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas

[BroJoeK]

"...full of misrepresentation, unfair inference and vague ad captandum insinuation..."

"In rhetoric an argumentum ad captandum, "for capturing" the gullibility of the naïve among the listeners or readers, is an unsound, specious argument designed to appeal to the emotions rather than to the mind.
It is used to describe 'claptrap or meretricious attempts to catch popular favor or applause.' "

Can you even believe how primitive those people were back then, to use such crude arguments, even in cases of law!
Aren't you glad we today are so, so advanced, nobody would ever stoop to such tricks, right? </sarc>

;-)

[colorado tanker]

This story will transfix New York for months. Even in 1857, you could count on a lurid murder with a healthy dose of sex to get peoples attention!

I suppose it was a relaxing diversion from the endless debate over slavery.

[Homer_J_Simpson]

[Continued from February 4 (reply #10).]

February 5. Thaw and slop omnipresent and omnipotent. Broadway is a “Grand Canal” of snow broth, and furnishes a splendid opportunity to naturalize the hippopotamus in this hemisphere, as the camel has been introduced into Texas. Nothing very novel today. The Coroner is still stupidly accumulating evidence utterly irrelevant and immaterial about the Burdell case.

The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas