That’s a fair point but in my experience it’s not nearly as self-aware a form of deception because when I’ve gotten into the weeds with them, they actually can’t make the connection most of the time. I can usually detect the reddit-tier smuglords straight away because they almost always tip their hand by presuming they’re the smartest person in the room and they’ll use big words to try and impress their superior intellect and shit like that. And those ones are definitely capable of playing rhetorical tricks like you’ve described (I generally don’t bother with this group of people because they just want to “win”, they don’t actually care about anything beyond that and I’d prefer if they stay a lib because if it’s a choice between having them acting corrosively in the discourse as a radical or doing the same as a liberal, it’s worth more for my efforts if they stay right where they are and poison their own liberal political discourse. Not that it’s really worth the effort trying to rehabilitate someone who is deep in that mentality anyway.)

With this other group it’s characterized by this underdeveloped position. If I can get them to engage long enough, then for example they will justify Israel’s actions and I’ll say that everything they’re saying can be used to justify the genocide of native Americans by the US and they’ll reject it. Then I’ll quote their arguments either word for word in “defence” of the genocide of native Americans or I’ll slightly adapt the wording. They respond by telling me why that’s wrong and it’s not okay. Then I will use their counterargument to say that what Israel is doing is also wrong and they’ll refute it, at which point I’ll take their refutation and use it to justify the genocide of native Americans. It can go round and round like that for quite a while. Sometimes they even get angry at me because they think I’m genuinely defending the genocide of native Americans rather than trying to highlight the contradictions in their own beliefs, even when I’ve been explicit about doing as much. And the thing is, at least in my experience, they just don’t get it. Like I can see them not connecting what I’m telling them because they aren’t able to engage with the meta level of the argument, they just argue from the place of their beliefs being right and not actually being able/willing to see where they are inconsistent.

(Caveat to say that I don’t like doing this and I’d much rather argue principles or facts but if it gets down to it, I’ll do it if it’s necessary. I find it tedious as fuck and honestly I do anything to avoid it getting to that place if I can because I loathe it so much.)