Brian McLaren’s Bad Logic

"How can I win with just one voter?"

Some subpar reasoning from one of the prominent leaders of Emergent and progressive evangelicalism:

“I’ve only met one person in my travels in recent months who has said he is voting for McCain, and that was because he was an admittedly single-issue voter,” Mr. McLaren said. “Nearly all the vocal people I’ve met are enthusiastic about Obama. Based on the people I’m in front of as a speaker, I’d never guess the poll numbers are as close as they are.”

This is a pretty limited perspective. It would be like me saying, “I’ve only met two people in all my travels who were actually born in China.  Based on the people I talk to, I’d never guess there were a billion Chinese people walkin’ around.” Unfortunately for me, there are, in fact, a billion Chinese people.  And unfortunately for Mr. McLaren:

While national polls show Mr. McCain to be neck and neck with Mr. Obama, a survey from the authoritative Barna Group shows that Mr. McCain holds a commanding lead among evangelicals, with 61 percent to Mr. Obama’s 17 percent.

I find it hard to believe that he thinks he’s speaking in front of a representative sample of evangelicals.

Washington Times via Between Two Worlds