Non Sequitur … or Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle

http://jazzroc.wordpress.com/tag/uninformed

Professor Alan Robson was quoted a few weeks back as saying: "You only need to look at places like Auckland and Vancouver to know that large local governments do work". This was a masterful piece of sleight of hand (or voice), disguising what is known as the fallacy of the undistributed middle.

In essence, he was saying:
(a) Auckland and Vancouver are large local governments;
(b) Auckland and Vancouver 'work'; therefore
(c) (All) large local governments work.

We could equally well find examples of small local governments that work (even, or perhaps especially, in Perth), but I doubt that Robson (or Barnett) would want us to draw the analogous conclusion that (all) small local governments work.

Now, if he'd said "large local governments can work", he would have been correct in his use of evidence and logic - but that would leave open the fact that "small local governments can work", as well, which doesn't fit the prevailing political ideology of the Premier.