# 47% video source interviewed Wednesday **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [March 13, 2013, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780 "2013-03-13T01:47:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2013, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/101 "2013-03-19T15:16:57Z")
Watergate was already impractical, and already illegal. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2013, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/102 "2013-03-19T16:08:34Z")
And, yet, Watergate still happened. Thus, campaigns will still happen. Q.E.D. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2013, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/103 "2013-03-19T17:08:57Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > I am not a clever man, **RNATB**. My clarity is more a result of being somewhat simple-minded rather than a virtue. So, when you allude to threats and horrors without specifying, you leave me straining my eyes to see the frightful shapes in the fog, like the pilot who says “Hey, is that a mountain? Oh, sh…” > > For many years now, I have seen the results of too _little_ information, perhaps it is a failure of my imagination that I can’t dread too _much_ information. Since you do not suffer such limitations, perhaps you’ll help me out with that? Without wanting to play **Bricker** , there are two separate issues here: one, whether the recording was legal, and two, whether it should be. I don’t really have a position on the latter. On balance, I am inclined to think it’s a bad idea to make everything a candidate does or says public fodder, but I can’t point to the iceberg you’re looking for, grandpa. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2013, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/104 "2013-03-19T18:55:43Z")
Well, no, I didn’t think you could. Rather my point, puppy. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2013, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/105 "2013-03-19T19:01:35Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Without wanting to play **Bricker** , there are two separate issues here: one, whether the recording was legal, and two, whether it should be. I don’t really have a position on the latter. On balance, I am inclined to think it’s a bad idea to make everything a candidate does or says public fodder, but I can’t point to the iceberg you’re looking for, grandpa. It seems there should be a third issue at hand, which pertains to the recording itself by a third party who was present but not the target of the information. Going back to your other question, whether all “…campaign strategy meetings, security briefings, or speechwriting sessions” should be accessible, no, I don’t think they should. However, if a third party records and disseminates them, then I think that should be legal. We can envision any figure, public or private, withholding information they don’t want made available to the knuckleheaded masses like us, that power is theirs to exercise and protect, but should the unthinkable happen and information is leaked, no prosecution of the whistleblower should be legally valid. In this case, Romney had the right to try to keep his speech secret, even if he’s a presidential candidate, and he had the right to try to limit access to the event, but he has no right, or should have no right (in my view), to punish Prouty who flaunted his desires and posted the video for all to see. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2013, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/106 "2013-03-20T07:15:53Z")
Where do conservatives get their nutty ideas? In this case, the culprit might be AEI. Which is a shame: back during the 1980s, they aspired to be the conservative version of Brookings. Their hackery grew as time went on. Keynes said that “Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist.” In this case the economist is Nicholas Eberstadt author of _A Nation of Takers_. He is concerned that entitlement spending has grown by 9.5% for the past 50 years. Woah! That _is_ a large number. Except that it doesn’t take into account economic growth or the population growth that backs it up. It doesn’t take into account inflation. And it doesn’t take into account the ballooning of payouts during our recent downturn. Factor all that stuff in and you get a much different number, something like 1.2%. Now 1.2% annually can add up over many years. So maybe that’s a concern - or perhaps not. At any rate _anybody who peddles economic numbers over the long term without taking into account inflation is pulling wool over your eyes_. Every economist knows this and every MBA _should_ know this. If a member of my team did this I would shake my head. And if it was clear they knew better, I would ID them as a hack. It is unfortunate that conservatives lack this sort of self-policing in policy circles. Sure it can cause them to lose national elections now and then. But it also warps their policy commentary. The nation deserves better. > **[Shrugging off Atlas](https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/28/shrugging-off-atlas/)** > > Exactly how did once-respectable conservative economists get swept up in moocher class mania? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2013, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/107 "2013-03-20T13:17:44Z")
… is that post in the right thread? ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2013, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/108 "2013-03-20T21:07:28Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > … is that post in the right thread? Heh. Yeah, it was actually. Let me summarize. Romney didn’t just make up that 47% number. It came from the modern conservative echo-chamber who pick things up from obvious hacks like the Heritage Foundation, but also places with a patina of respectability like AEI. One of the original researchers that reassures their funders that the US has become a nation of moochers is Nicholas Eberstadt, a man nobody has heard of. That’s the way echo chambers work. Conservatives have converted their policy apparatus into a propaganda machine. That has its advantages. But it also makes them effectively delusional. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2013, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/109 "2013-03-21T03:01:12Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Heh. Yeah, it was actually. Let me summarize. Romney didn’t just make up that 47% number. It came from the modern conservative echo-chamber who pick things up from obvious hacks like the Heritage Foundation, but also places with a patina of respectability like AEI. It sounded to me as though he were speaking of something his audience already knew. Perhaps they were just agreeable to his message. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2013, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/110 "2013-03-21T03:13:22Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > It sounded to me as though he were speaking of something his audience already knew. Perhaps they were just agreeable to his message. Nah, I think they’d already heard it from the same echo chamber. Minus the exact percentage, I’d heard the exact same thing from Republicans before. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2013, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780/111 "2013-03-21T06:37:50Z")
Must be something to it. Read several autobio’s of business tycoon guys, and all of them got there through discipline, hard work, virtue, and a bold, innovative vision. Ever damn one. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/47-video-source-interviewed-wednesday/652780.md?page=5)