Tetlock (1998) also provided me with the two funniest-sounding sentences that I've read in a while (though that doesn't make them incorrect). Commenting on the "concede the counterfactual, but insist that it does not matter for the overall theory" defense:

This defense, which is the most popular of the three, is designated a second-order counterfactual inasmuch as it undoes the undoing of the original close-call counterfactual. Second-order counterfactuals allow for deviations from reality but minimize the significance of the deviations by invoking additional causal forces that soon bring events in the simulated counterfactual world back toward the observed historical path.