ponderingturtle
Orthogonal Vector
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But only for now not the past 47 years to make the presidents statement true.
#alternativefacts
- Thread starter C_Felix
- Start date
But only for now not the past 47 years to make the presidents statement true.
If the law were written differently, it would be a fact. Which is kind of my point - all this business about alternative facts boils down to social agreement. When we agree, there's no difficulty at all.
pgwenthold
Penultimate Amazing
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How about this one?
It's complete, idiotic nonsense. I mean, total, total ******** in all ways.
1. It hasn't even been three weeks. We aren't even to the point where we are on the list of the longest waits for confirmation. See this list here
https://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab...onfirmations-than-any-other-recent-president/
Obama didn't have his FIRST appointment confirmed (Robert McDonald of the VA) until 22 days into his presidency. Jeez, even St Reagan didn't have his cabinet complete until 41 days in.
Trump is just totally making **** up with nothing behind it. Unfortunately, too many people are responding with justifications for why it is taking as long as it is, instead of just calling him out on his false premise.
2) He blames democratic obstruction? Dude, the GOP holds the majority in the senate.
I'd like to hear anyone try to defend this nonsense.
Are you ok with the President just making stuff up?
It's complete, idiotic nonsense. I mean, total, total ******** in all ways.
1. It hasn't even been three weeks. We aren't even to the point where we are on the list of the longest waits for confirmation. See this list here
https://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab...onfirmations-than-any-other-recent-president/
Obama didn't have his FIRST appointment confirmed (Robert McDonald of the VA) until 22 days into his presidency. Jeez, even St Reagan didn't have his cabinet complete until 41 days in.
Trump is just totally making **** up with nothing behind it. Unfortunately, too many people are responding with justifications for why it is taking as long as it is, instead of just calling him out on his false premise.
2) He blames democratic obstruction? Dude, the GOP holds the majority in the senate.
I'd like to hear anyone try to defend this nonsense.
Are you ok with the President just making stuff up?
pgwenthold
Penultimate Amazing
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More "alternative facts" being suppressed by the media:
https://reason.com/blog/2017/02/07/trump-says-crime-is-at-highest-level-in
"I’d say that in a speech and everybody was surprised." Gee, why would that be?
Like "The Bowling Green Massacre", why doesn't the press report these things that aren't true or never happened?
I love how both Trump and Conway not only make these ridiculous claims, but then complain that the media doesn't cover them.
While what Trump said is clearly wrong, what he has done is to have taken something that is true and distorted it.
The original assertion, and one that he has made before, is that the increase in murder rate recently is the highest in 47 years. And that is actually true. In the very last year of the data we have, there was an uptick in the murder rate, from something like 4.5 to 4.8. And, in fact, that 0.3 increase in murder rate is the largest increase there has been in more than 45 years. Of course, that is because for 40 or so of those 45 years, the murder rate decreased, and so there haven't been a lot of years where it increased.
But the problem was, this grain of truth wasn't memorable, and he turned it in his head from "the largest increase in murder rate" to "the highest murder rate."
Actually, of all the moronic things he says, I am less likely to jump on this, assuming, of course, that he corrects himself.
THIS is the kind of thing that is a "I misremembered." I will note he did actually say it correctly in the past (during a debate, I think). This is a lot easier to understand as a mistaken statement than KellyAnne's nonsense about the Bowling Green Massacre.
Spindrift
Time Person of the Year, 2006
Trump doesn't back down on misstatements or lies. He doubles down on them.
I'll give it a shot. One of the appeals of Trump is that he is "plain spoken" - meaning something akin to unedited, off-the-cuff and authentically speaking his mind. This is a stark contrast to the polished rhetoric we are used to from politicians, many of whom are lawyers by training - careful when choosing their words.
What are the consequences? One is that we aren't supposed to treat Trump's missives as we would news reporting. He's expressing his feelings. When my wife remarks, "That was the worst party ever" I'm not going to do a statistical analysis of all the events we've ever attended.
I think everyone already knows this, we just don't like it. If you asked a Trump supporter, I think they'd give you a version of: "It's not what he says, it's what he means."
pgwenthold
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True that. If he corrects himself, and that is a big if.
Spindrift
Time Person of the Year, 2006
Sorry, he's the *********** president of the United States of America. Every thing he says matters and will be taken seriously because of the office he holds. People may think it's great that he acts like our idiot uncle, but unfortunately this idiot is the president and everything he says is going to be dissected. It comes with the job. If he doesn't like it he has options.
He was duly elected doing the same shtick. Arguably, it would be wrong for him to change tactics now. Requiring him to be something other than he presented - idiot uncle or not - is just wishful thinking in service of some ideal about what the president is supposed to be.
Do Ma and Pa Kettle give a hoot about Trump's misstatement during a meeting with a sheriffs' organization? Doubtful. Do they care that he's a braggart? Probably not. For good or ill, they think Trump believes the slogan "Make America Great Again" - and that slogan resonates with them.
pgwenthold
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It's not what he says, it's what he means?
What does he mean by claiming that the time it is taking to approve his cabinet is due to democratic obstruction?
If you ask a Trump supporter, I think they'd give you a version of "It doesn't matter what he says because he is blaming democrats."
That's it. Despite the fact that the democrats aren't doing much of anything to stall it.
But who cares about reality?
What does he mean by claiming that the time it is taking to approve his cabinet is due to democratic obstruction?
If you ask a Trump supporter, I think they'd give you a version of "It doesn't matter what he says because he is blaming democrats."
That's it. Despite the fact that the democrats aren't doing much of anything to stall it.
But who cares about reality?
sunmaster14
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Wow, you are really embarrassing yourself. Talk about alternative facts. Or maybe it's just a reading comprehension problem.
Let's see if you are willing to post a retraction on the crap you just made up.
sunmaster14
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There's some of that. There's also the problem that he's a bit muddled. I think his claim about the murder rate is really about the percentage rise in the murder rate in consecutive years. Not sure if it's really true that the rise from 2015 to 2016 was the largest percentage increase in 45 years, but I think it's plausible.
phiwum
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Totally with you until the last and least quote.
I don't tend to be anti-abortion, but I can sure as heck understand that sentiment. Tain't silly from where I sit, but it is obviously controversial.
Spindrift
Time Person of the Year, 2006
He's not playing on the vaudeville circuit anymore. Whether he or his supporters care about what he says doesn't change the fact that the words of the President of the United States have meaning, even if he doesn't want them to. He can accept that and act like a president or he can not accept it and continue with the fool act that got him elected but either way many, many people are going to take his words at face value.
phiwum
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Sorry, how is it silly?
Look, I will defend abortion rights, but not because it's obviously the right stance. It isn't obviously so. I think it is the right stance, but decent folk might well disagree, and I haven't a decisive argument that they are wrong. A being who has the same expectations of a decent life, a future of value, is being deprived of those experiences. Not too easy to dismiss this fact, I think.
(I refer, of course, to Marquis's argument here and I don't want to pretend that it is original with me.)
Beelzebuddy
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Because it's wrong. Murder is a specific thing, and abortion is not that thing. You can argue that it should be murder, and I'd much rather pro-lifers do that than try to pull an end-run around the law by imposing onerous regulations meant to shut down abortion clinics, but the fact of the matter is, it is not currently murder and to insist otherwise is just a silly opinion.
Total red herring because, as stated above, abortion rates are down.
The fact is that the murder rate is not at its highest, it is in fact significantly down on previous years (even if you include abortion, which would be an odd thing to do, but I'm nothing if not accommodating)
The 'rate of increase' was particularly high for one year. That's not what Trump said, but even if he clarified (which he hasn't) and stated the figure correctly (which he hasn't), it would still be way too early to draw firm conclusions. You don't start making significant and long-lasting policy changes because of one data point.
The fact is that the murder rate is not at its highest, it is in fact significantly down on previous years (even if you include abortion, which would be an odd thing to do, but I'm nothing if not accommodating)
The 'rate of increase' was particularly high for one year. That's not what Trump said, but even if he clarified (which he hasn't) and stated the figure correctly (which he hasn't), it would still be way too early to draw firm conclusions. You don't start making significant and long-lasting policy changes because of one data point.
quadraginta
Becoming Beth
"All" of them? That's a rather broad generalization. (Perhaps even an "alternate fact".)
Some may amount to a matter of opinion, yes, but others seem to boil down to whether or not something actually happened, or is actually true.
That there was no Bowling Green Massacre is not a matter of opinion. It is a simple, verifiable fact.
That we don't have the highest murder rate in 47 years is not a matter of opinion. It is a simple, verifiable fact.
These are the kinds of "alternative facts" under discussion.
Skeptic Ginger
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More like ignorant, with a limited vocabulary.
quadraginta
Becoming Beth
How is anyone supposed to know what he means when what he says bears no relationship to what he does or (often) even to reality.
If he can't say what he means he shouldn't say anything at all. He's the President of the United States, not some dude at a cocktail party. What he says has real consequences for the entire world.