I love that prestige quote, but I think it's more in favour of my argument than yours.
Imagine you're walking along the street and you see a street magician
In scenario 1, he asks a random person to pick a card, and then he reveals it inside his shoe. Amazing.
In scenario 2, he asks 3 different people to THINK of 3 different cards, and reveals 1 card in his shoe- amazingly, not only have al the spectators thought of the same card, but it is also the card in his shoe.
Now the effect in the second scenario is more impressive BY FAR, yet the method is just to have 3 stooges. Yet you as the bystander watching the show don't realize that- which do you think would affect you more strongly, the first or the second? Which do you think is the better EFFECT?
With stooges you can do magic that no sleight of hand can ever do- and I'm not saying that stooges are always a better approach than sleight of hand, but in some situations, they absolutely are, and we as magicians would be fool to reject that option.