# New McCain Doctrine: Preemptive lying **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 20, 2008, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405 "2008-09-20T05:06:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/41 "2008-09-20T06:42:44Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > And yes, the next time I’m around when someone says Obama lied about something with the same level of proof you have, I’m going to do this same routine again. Please don’t. Your performance in this thread has been embarrassing enough to read once. We’d really prefer not to have to sit through it a second time. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/42 "2008-09-20T06:42:52Z")
This is fuckin’ hilarious. McCain is fucking up royally, and all you have to defend him is the technicality of what a lie is. We’re right back to “Bush didn’t _know_ he was giving us false information.” It lets you defend your boy while not having to acknowledge the fact that he has fucked up royally in a way that should not be overlooked by a decent person. I find it despicable. It’s hard to say that it was a lie, true. What it was was McCain putting words in Obama’s mouth. It’s a falsehood, it’s a pre-emptive strawman, and damn near teeters on slander. Can you at least acknowledge that at best this was a gaffe and at worst it was a real and true fuck-up? I’m so goddamned sick of the _bullshit_. I can abide by twisting words, although it’s still wrong, but making shit up out of whole cloth is fucked UP. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/43 "2008-09-20T06:53:49Z")
If he extends this preemptive strike policy to things Obama might legitimately latch onto about Sarah “My foreign policy philosophy, ooh I’m glad you asked… you know I was a cheerleader, and if you’ve ever read Little House on the Prairie, so have I, and I’d like to say I just love kittens, especially Calico ones, and if there’s any food better than sausage and pineapple pizza I’ve never tasted it, because you know John McCain won’t tell you this but he knows where bin Laden is, and what’s more my daughter Piper is probably going to play Chava in Wasilla Middle School’s production of FIDDLER! God willing… and I feel the same way about foreign policy! Thanks for your question! [cue riotous applause]” Palin’s foul-ups, bleeps and blunders then his campaign won’t have time to do anything else. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/44 "2008-09-20T06:55:18Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > What it was was McCain putting words in Obama’s mouth. Yes, but it should be remembered that Obama chooses the words McCain puts in his mouth very carefully. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/45 "2008-09-20T08:10:01Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > You’ve regressed . . . And yes, it is that debate over again, because we’re still waiting for the “Bush lied, people died” idiots to pony up the goods. I know where the goods are. They’re in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat. ---
**Author:** ![Martiju](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@Martiju](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martiju)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/46 "2008-09-20T08:22:13Z")
I think what \*\*Rand \*\*is trying to say is that it depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is…I’ve heard that he supported that position way back with equal vehemence. ---
**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:** [September 20, 2008, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/47 "2008-09-20T08:42:22Z")
Let’s see. Lie: "a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood. " I’d say that saying “We’ve heard that X”, when in fact you’ve just pulled X out of your posterior, constitutes deliberate deception. Assuming you don’t follow it up with, “Then again, we make shit up all the time”. But it’s not a “false statement”, (strictly speaking), so I guess there’s a narrow point somewhere. Is McCain bearing False witness? Of course. Is the campaign being intentionally deceptive? Sure. Are they full of horsepucky? Well, yeah. But are they lying in this instance? That’s an open question. It’s depends how you define your terms. There’s also: Lie: “Something meant to deceive or give a wrong impression.” (American Heritage Dictionary) I think the McCain campaign has embraced the latter approach, as a matter of standard operating procedure. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 8:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/48 "2008-09-20T08:52:47Z")
Or maybe McCain _wasn’t_ lying–maybe it was all a trick by the wily Obama! Every week, they get some staffer to call up the McCain campaign and “leak” some outrageous thing Obama is supposedly about to say (“Really…Obama’s gonna call for changing the National Anthem to the theme song from _Shaft_? :eek:”), then Team Obama just sits back and waits for McCain to make himself look like a total idiot. ---
**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:** [September 20, 2008, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/49 "2008-09-20T09:08:33Z")
OBTW: Liberal first drew my attention to the 2nd, more expansive, definition of lying in a thread devoted to Bill Clinton’s usage of the word “sex”. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Svinlesha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/22d042/32.png) [@Mr.Svinlesha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Svinlesha)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/50 "2008-09-20T09:45:04Z")
**Rand Rover:** > [@](#): > > _You’ve regressed . . . And yes, it is that debate over again, because we’re still waiting for the “Bush lied, people died” idiots to pony up the goods. I guess saying “Bush caused America to engage in acts of aggression for reasons I do not support, and people died” doesn’t fit on a sign, but it’s factually accurate._ Okay, let’s try this; **[George W. Bush, March 17, 2003](http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030317-7.html)**: > [@](#): > > _Intelligence gathered by this and other governments **leaves no doubt** that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised._ The lie here is the assertion that there exists “no doubt” that Iraq possesses and conceals WMDs. It is quite well know, and was well known at the time, that significant doubt about Iraq’s WMD capacities existed in all the major intelligence agencies – doubts the Bush government had actively worked to suppress, by the way. Paul Wolfowitz, one of major architects of the invasion, conceded this blindingly obvious fact shortly after the invasion. When it was pointed out that claims of absolute certainty by the Bush administration prior to the war had turned out to be empty rhetoric after, Wolfowitz replied: [**“The nature of terrorism intelligence is intrinsically murky,”**](http://www.pubrecord.org/nationworld/106-wolfowitz-rumsfeld-used-unreliable-iraqi-dissidents-to-gather-intelligence-in-building-case-for-war.html) essentially conceding that there had been a modicum of doubt all along. Compelled to testify before congress after the invasion of Iraq failed to uncover any such lethal weapons, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld later [explained](http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/07/09/iraq/main562451.shtml): > [@](#): > > **“The coalition did not act in Iraq because we had discovered dramatic new evidence of Iraq’s pursuit of weapons of mass murder. We acted because we saw the existing evidence in a new light through the prism of our experience on Sept. 11.”** In other words, _there was no evidence gathered,_ by this or any other nation, which “left no doubt” about Iraq’s possession of WMDs. The Senate Intelligence Committee’s [Phase II](http://intelligence.senate.gov/) report, released in June of this year, concluded that Bush and other members of his administration knew that many of their claims regarding Iraq, prior to the invasion, were false: > [@](#): > > \*\*The committee found that the administration’s warnings that former dictator Saddam Hussein was in league with Osama bin Laden, a highly inflammatory assertion in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, al Qaida attacks, weren’t substantiated by U.S. intelligence reports. In fact, it said, U.S. intelligence agencies were telling the White House that while there’d been sporadic contacts over a decade, there was no operational cooperation between Iraq and al Qaida, the report said. > > The administration’s repeated statements “suggesting that Iraq and al Qaida had a partnership, or that Iraq had provided al Qaida with weapons training, were not substantiated by intelligence,” it said. > > Contentions by Bush and Cheney that Saddam had to be removed because he could give terrorists weapons of mass destruction to strike the United States were “contradicted by available intelligence information” that found that the late Iraqi dictator was unlikely to make such transfers, the report said. > > Cheney’s assertions that Mohammad Atta, the chief Sept. 11 hijacker, had met months before the attack with an Iraqi intelligence officer in the Czech capital, Prague, were also unsubstantiated, the inquiry found. > > The committee said that Bush and Cheney “failed to reflect concerns and uncertainties” expressed in intelligence analyses that questioned administration assertions that Iraqis would welcome U.S. troops as liberators and warned that American forces could face violent resistance.\*\* This last quote if from [McClatchy](http://www.mcclatchydc.com/244/story/39963.html). ---
**Author:** ![Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4da419/32.png) [@Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gala_Matrix_Fire)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/51 "2008-09-20T10:26:15Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > So I guess we can just stick “I heard that” in front of any statement we make, and it automatically protects us against charges of lying, eh? > > I’ve heard that you are a necrophiliac serial adulterer who is plotting to put poison in the Great Lakes. > > No lie that. I heard it. Somewhere. And you can’t prove that I didn’t. So I didn’t lie. Yes! It’s the latest thing, since putting a question mark on the end has become too well known. Old days: John Sidney McCain. Planning to poison the Great Lakes? Today: We heard that John Sidney McCain is going to plan to poison the Great Lakes. ---
**Author:** ![11811](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/1/9d8465/32.png) [@11811](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/11811)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/52 "2008-09-20T11:07:51Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > Actually, I think the pressure is getting to JM. He’s misspeaking just about every day now. He apparently realized his mistake in the “firing” statement, and responded today that he’d call for the resignation of the chairman of the **F** EC. Watching Rachel Maddow mock JM for his dimwitted mistakes is the best part of this election. He fired his brain. Actually, he requested that his brain resign. The brain saw the writing on the wall and decided that a resignation was in its best interests. ---
**Author:** ![Terrifel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c68b51/32.png) [@Terrifel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terrifel)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/53 "2008-09-20T12:07:40Z")
> [@Mr.Svinlesha](#): > > Okay, let’s try this; **[George W. Bush, March 17, 2003](http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030317-7.html)**: > > > [@](#): > > > > Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. > > The lie here is the assertion that there exists “no doubt” that Iraq possesses and conceals WMDs. It is quite well know, and was well known at the time, that significant doubt about Iraq’s WMD capacities existed in all the major intelligence agencies – doubts the Bush government had actively worked to suppress, by the way. Oh nonsense. Even I, a non-weasel, can see the obvious loophole there. He never specified _who_ had “no doubt.” Yes, the major intelligence agencies had doubts-- but he wasn’t talking about them. He was just talking about himself personally, or possibly about his imaginary friend that gives him advice sometimes. If the American public assumed that he was claiming the intelligence agencies shared his lack of doubt-- well, you know what they say about ‘assuming’ things. I should also point out that if someone claims there’s “no doubt” whether something is true, technically they haven’t actually said that it is true. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/54 "2008-09-20T12:30:17Z")
Calm down. I’m only here to help end this silly discussion and save everyone some time. McCain didn’t lie and here’s why their statement was "we’ve heard at his event in New Mexico " etc. that’s a true statement. What they left out was that they had heard this from their own staff. Still, they did indeed hear it. See, no lie involved. No thanks necessary. :)Carry on. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/55 "2008-09-20T12:48:40Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > … "we’ve heard at his event in New Mexico " … New Mexico, that’s over in Europe or something … right? CMC +fnord! ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/56 "2008-09-20T12:58:42Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Also, on the merits of Obama’s statement, it’s convenient how he forgets the Democratic Congress that apparently hasn’t done anything either. I tend to agree that it’s not necessary to cry liar liar and then spend time arguing the details to define lie. I also agree with the poster who declared the intent to deceive can be said to something awfully close to lying. If people purposely leave out crucial information or insist on interpreting information in way to create a false impression that’s an obvious intent to deceive. That’s what I need to know about their character. After McCain’s sex ed add several people called McCain on it to his face. It’s obvious the intent of the bill wasn’t to teach sex ed to kindergarten kids. He defended the ad with, “Look at the language of the bill” Trying to skate by on a forced interpretation of a few lines doesn’t change the intent to deceive and defame. The same goes for Bush. The tragic and morally reprehensible difference being that his deceit killed a bunch of people and he knew it was going to happen all the while he was telling us how he wanted to save the Iraqi’s and us from Saddam. On the above statement. There’s no indication that Obama isn’t aware or isn’t willing to hold a democratic congress accountable. More importantly, I hope we will hold them accountable and throw out the old do nothings from both parties. Maybe a rush of independents into congress will send a message. It is reasonable to blame our situation at least in part on the party that’s been in control for the majority of the last 8 years wouldn’t you say? ---
**Author:** ![askeptic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb9ed0/32.png) [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/57 "2008-09-20T13:04:17Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > Maybe a rush of independents into congress will send a message. Yeah because Lieberman is such a breath of fresh air… ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/58 "2008-09-20T13:05:34Z")
> [@MEBuckner](#): > > Or maybe McCain _wasn’t_ lying–maybe it was all a trick by the wily Obama! > > Every week, they get some staffer to call up the McCain campaign and “leak” some outrageous thing Obama is supposedly about to say (“Really…Obama’s gonna call for changing the National Anthem to the theme song from _Shaft_? :eek:”), then Team Obama just sits back and waits for McCain to make himself look like a total idiot. Next week, it’s that Obama will make inner-city drug dealers eligible for small-business loans. The week after that, he’ll put the Black Panther logo in the upper left corner of the American flag. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![TVeblen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4bbf92/32.png) [@TVeblen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TVeblen)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/59 "2008-09-20T13:11:12Z")
[QUOTE=crowmanyclouds] New Mexico, that’s over in Europe or something … right? [/QUOTE] Yep, next to Spain. They’re enemies now but Maverick Johnny Mac is willing to normalize them. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2008, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405/60 "2008-09-20T13:45:14Z")
You don’t get it. McCain HAD to lie, for 5-1/2 years, to our enemies while he was a POW! Sometimes, when brutally attacked by the left, or when he thinks the left is about to brutally attack him, or when he makes an error that would be a slam dunk for a brutal attack from the left, he reverts to POW mode and lies. Please go about your day – nothing to see here. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-mccain-doctrine-preemptive-lying/464405.md?page=4)