Except You. You’re Wrong.

Quote:  "Everyone is right: isn't that always the way in America?" David Thomson, reviewing Jerry Lewis's new memoir in the New Republic Online

Figure of Speech:  erotesis (air oh TEE sis), the rhetorical question.

America is the land of inconsistency and the home of contradiction.  Or it used to be, before we got all judgmental on each other.

The erotesis (Greek for "question") may be the most common figure of all, and not just because it's easy to use.  (You, like, just put a question mark? After a sentence?).  It's also extraordinarily effective.  Unless a listener stays alert, he unconsciously answers the rhetorical question the way the speaker wants him to.

(I've got another great erotesis on the Homerisms page.)

Snappy Answer:  "To quote Tom DeLay,  ‘That's just wrong.'"