# Ben Carson for President thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [August 31, 2015, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554 "2015-08-31T22:58:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 27
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/521 "2015-11-10T15:26:14Z")
As I just read in a TPM article about the Carson prank story: “…reporting by TPM and Buzzfeed has unearthed new details which make Carson seem both potentially more honest and more ridiculous than we ever could have imagined.” ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/522 "2015-11-10T15:26:42Z")
I actually placed a bet on a slight uptick, although not 42%. He only needs to be 22% on Nov. 30. As of today he’s 24%, so I figure my chances are pretty good. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/523 "2015-11-10T15:29:02Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > I hate to take the other side of a bet from Nate Silver, but if there are any polls for the period between late last week when all that stuff came out about Carson, and tonight’s debate, I bet they have him under 20%. I’m not sure if Silver really was making a prediction with the 42% thing – I think it may have been humorous hyperbole (for stat nerds), a reference to how unpredictable the polling has been so far, or a combination. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/524 "2015-11-10T15:39:56Z")
I wonder if he even realizes it’s a prank now? I could see him believing that he really did take a real makeup test and everyone really left because it was too hard and he really got $10 for being honest. He might agree that the prank test did happen, but he wasn’t in it. To him, he was in a real class. The reality is that everyone else left because they realized it was a joke. The fact that he didn’t realize it (and may still not) is disconcerting in a potential world leader. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/525 "2015-11-10T15:42:23Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > No, anyone can get pranked. > > But bringing this incident to mind repeatedly over the years, without getting a clue that this wasn’t the real deal, yes, as a matter of fact, that IS disqualifying. Or, if he did come to realize that he’d been pranked (either at the time, or years later), respinning the details of being pranked into a story that somehow painted him as the hero and the “one honest man”. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/526 "2015-11-10T15:47:32Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > Or, if he did come to realize that he’d been pranked (either at the time, or years later), respinning the details of being pranked into a story that somehow painted him as the hero and the “one honest man”. I figured I’d start with the (for Carson) best-case scenario, i.e. that he wasn’t lying or embellishing or any of that. Since he looks bad enough in that case, there’s nothing left. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/527 "2015-11-10T16:07:44Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Yeah, but I don’t think any candidate wants their college years investigated too closely. Even Bernie Sanders gave a defense similar to the one he gave for Clinton’s emails. > > [http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/11/08/ben-carson-has-an-unlikely-ally-when-it-comes-to-media-scrutiny-were-not-talking-about-the-real-issues-impacting-real-people/](http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/11/08/ben-carson-has-an-unlikely-ally-when-it-comes-to-media-scrutiny-were-not-talking-about-the-real-issues-impacting-real-people/) As I pointed before to me is not the past that is the trouble, it is how he is reacting now when confronted with contradictory evidence. The buck does not stop with him. But I also agree with others, we have only scratched the unreality that Carson is living in: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/mtpvHyE-Uws/hqdefault.jpg "Debunking Creationists - Dr. Ben Carson") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtpvHyE-Uws) (a bit long debunking of creationist and other beliefs of Carson (with cites and Young Frankenstein clips 🆒 )) When one does realize that Bush the lesser was into end of times ideas that tipped him to invade Iraq I do not think that we should give the power of the biggest military in the world to an even worse follower of ideas like that. ---
**Author:** ![Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Barkis_is_Willin)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/528 "2015-11-10T16:07:47Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > natesilver: I think whoever set the campfire did so sloppily. So maybe there are a few embers, but it looks bad. (This metaphor is rapidly going to hell.) > > [Does Trump, Cruz Or Rubio Have the Best Pre-Debate Chance? | FiveThirtyEight](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/does-trump-cruz-or-rubio-have-the-best-pre-debate-chance/) Yes, I wonder who did set that campfire. Are you telling me that Trump has no skeletons worth digging up? He’s never made a dubious statement in any of the half dozen or so books he’s authored? No scandal worth mentioning? ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/529 "2015-11-10T16:11:47Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Yeah, but I don’t think any candidate wants their college years investigated too closely. Even Bernie Sanders gave a defense similar to the one he gave for Clinton’s emails. > > [http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/11/08/ben-carson-has-an-unlikely-ally-when-it-comes-to-media-scrutiny-were-not-talking-about-the-real-issues-impacting-real-people/](http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/11/08/ben-carson-has-an-unlikely-ally-when-it-comes-to-media-scrutiny-were-not-talking-about-the-real-issues-impacting-real-people/) Seriously, The Blaze? It will be interesting to see if the other clowns poke at Carson. Or will Carson make up some new claims, like he shot a man just for snoring, or that he scared off a UFO, or that he and Bigfoot are buddies? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/530 "2015-11-10T16:22:09Z")
> [@Barkis\_is\_Willin](#): > > Yes, I wonder who did set that campfire. Are you telling me that Trump has no skeletons worth digging up? He’s never made a dubious statement in any of the half dozen or so books he’s authored? No scandal worth mentioning? IMHO the corporate press is currently kowtowing to him, but it is for mercenary reasons, once the media gets its share of the big money that is out there for this election the skeletons (that what I have seen in previous discussions are not hidden away, they only happen to be not mentioned much) will be displayed prominently. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/531 "2015-11-10T16:23:21Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > No, anyone can get pranked. > > But bringing this incident to mind repeatedly over the years, without getting a clue that this wasn’t the real deal, yes, as a matter of fact, that IS disqualifying. Yeah, this. People do stupid things when they’re young. No one is saying that he shouldn’t be President because he fell for a prank when he was 18. The problem is that in the decades since it NEVER dawned on him that he was punked. Instead, he worked the event into his personal mythology. It’s his clueless as an adult and his tendency toward confabulation that is disqualifying. ---
**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:** [November 10, 2015, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/532 "2015-11-10T16:27:45Z")
Eh, I don’t think you need to go that far. Carson himself seems to think he should be president because he was a violent felon at 18 (or before). So in his case his youthful indiscretions are apparently relevant to his campaign anyway. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/533 "2015-11-10T16:41:07Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > … like he shot a man just for snoring… That was famed frontier neurosurgeon John Wesley Harding, and the treatment was a total success. The patient no longer snored, nor did anyone else within a two mile radius! ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/534 "2015-11-10T17:22:01Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As I pointed before to me is not the past that is the trouble, it is how he is reacting now when confronted with contradictory evidence. The buck does not stop with him. Bingo! His reaction to the stories is damaging. I’ve never felt it’s very productive to go to war with the media. The way to handle the media(as well as the opposition) is with sly jokes. For him to go full on “Carson SMASH!” wasn’t very useful. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/535 "2015-11-10T17:47:45Z")
Carson’s favorables are now 49%, with only 25% unfavorable: [http://pollingreport.com/c.htm#Carson](http://pollingreport.com/c.htm#Carson) Even if every person who doesn’t know Carson now didn’t like him, he would have a better favorable rating than any candidate in either party. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/536 "2015-11-10T17:50:24Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Carson’s favorables are now 49%, with only 25% unfavorable: > > [Political Figures: C](http://pollingreport.com/c.htm#Carson) > > Even if every person who doesn’t know Carson now didn’t like him, he would have a better favorable rating than any candidate in either party. As he continues to be exposed as the most inaccurate professional autobiographer in history, those numbers will drop. He’s the clown car flavor of the month, nothing more. He doesn’t even want to be president, he just thought he’d boost his book sales by running, not expecting the rubes to take him seriously. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/537 "2015-11-10T17:50:34Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Eh, I don’t think you need to go that far. Carson himself seems to think he should be president because he was a violent felon at 18 (or before). So in his case his youthful indiscretions are apparently relevant to his campaign anyway. Except that he may not have been. You have to wonder how we got to a place where a candidate for President of the USA is actively trying to convince people he tried to murder someone as a child. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/538 "2015-11-10T17:56:25Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > As he continues to be exposed as the most inaccurate professional autobiographer in history, those numbers will drop. He’s the clown car flavor of the month, nothing more. He doesn’t even want to be president, he just thought he’d boost his book sales by running, not expecting the rubes to take him seriously. The stories on his biography are just not going to stick. There’s no evidence that he lied, and no, finding inconsistencies in small details written down from memory is not evidence of dishonesty. You are right that his numbers SHOULD drop as he exposes himself as completely unready for the job, but what is he going to say over the next year that’s worse than what he’s already said? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/539 "2015-11-10T18:01:38Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The stories on his biography are just not going to stick. There’s no evidence that he lied, and no, finding inconsistencies in small details written down from memory is not evidence of dishonesty. > > You are right that his numbers SHOULD drop as he exposes himself as completely unready for the job, but what is he going to say over the next year that’s worse than what he’s already said? I highly doubt that 74% of the US public is paying much attention at all to the primary in general, much less the details of Carson’s silliness. Such polling is pretty much meaningless this early, again. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554/540 "2015-11-10T18:03:24Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The stories on his biography are just not going to stick. There’s no evidence that he lied, and no, finding inconsistencies in small details written down from memory is not evidence of dishonesty. Let’s see- “I got a full scholarship offer from West Point” later turns out to be that he neither applied nor was accepted. “I saved white guys during MLK riots” turns out to have zero evidence. “I had a gun pointed at me at Popeye’s” does not appear on the police report. “I stabbed somebody and hit a belt buckle” but nobody else remembers And…so…on. When your full time occupation is telling your own story and you consistently lie, your poll standing is not going to stay up. And the media has just begun to dig into it. (Lucky for Carson, they’re buying his books for research). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554.md?page=26) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ben-carson-for-president-thread/729554.md?page=28)