So, he was against the invasion of Iraq after it was clear to everyone what a fiasco it was, and now brags about it? Just the sort of bold leadership we’ve come to expect from Trump.
If every Trump utterance was evaluated with such a strict standard, and it lead to 50% of them being identified as “ambiguous lies” vs. 50% remaining “unambiguous lies”, would giving Trump the benefit of the doubt in half the cases make him qualifiably less of a liar?
Would you be justified in giving someone the benefit of the doubt if you knew that only 50% of his evaluated claims were “unambiguous lies”? What would be the rational for granting such benefit of the doubt and what useful outcome would it serve to conclude that such a person conclusively lies only half as much as you can reliably prove?
Those same people you’re saying won’t give Trump a fair shake can lay out their views, and others can decide if they agree with them or not.
Holding out for certain posters I shall not name to become fair judges makes about as much sense as those posters holding out with the hope that their right wing counterparts, who shall also go nameless, will relent and suddenly agree that Trump is terrible.
The rest of us can simply sit and watch the spectacle without getting bothered that our political adversaries aren’t being fair, boo-hoo.
You’ve, of course, heard about the boy who cried wolf too many times? That’s how most oif us are seeing Trump’s veracity. We assume he’s lying, because, well, he’s earned that.
Isn’t there a jury instruction that reads something like this; If you find the witness lied about anything, you may assume he lied about everything? Are we really out of line here?
He made the statement that he supported invasion before we invaded. Unless he can show that he changed his mind before we invaded, the second part of his statement is an unambiguous lie, right? You can’t be for invasion and then be against going in after we’ve already gone in, right?
Yup. Or he took contrary positions so he could point to whichever one panned out. If Iraq had turned out well, he’d be pointing to his Howard Stern commentary to show how he supported it.
Right, but he didn’t take that contrary position, at least not publicly, prior to the invasion. Not that I can find, anyway. Let’s suppose he didn’t take that contrary position publicly – would you agree that the NY Times’ first example is an unambiguous lie?
No, the problem is that Trump has lied so much that when he says something, the first assumption is that he is lying. Even if he magically started speaking only 100 % truths from tomorrow, we still would be suspicious about everything he says as long as he lives. Apparently he’s up to some HUGE lie that he really wants us to believe and is just smoothing the ground.
In fact for some the situation is so bad that even confirming something a lie by research would feel embarrassing at this moment. Because checking out means you got half-fooled and with Trump there’s no more that half, you got totally fooled for believing one second that guy.
I won’t berate Trump for something that’s not confirmed, but you’ll be damned if you think that I AM doing any research. Let the others do it for me and possibly be fools.
What a nice Prez you have…
[ Edit. damn this moves fast, this was in 65 or something when I started… ]
I was a little surprised you’d suggest that a contest that judged ambiguous vs. non-ambiguous lies would be in any way useful in the case of the Liar in Chief. I guess it was the fact that you noted that Trump wouldn’t get the benefit of the doubt around here.; As though agent orange was deserving of such latitude.
That’s true but there are still actual facts to be learned that give the complete picture.
As an example, look at his claims for the size of his inauguration crowds. Those pictures, transit ridership numbers and crowd estimates give a much better picture than just the fact he lied.
Yes, some of it matters. If he says no-one is going to lose coverage, it’s probably a lie. It’s still good to know does it mean 1 Mil will lose or 20 Mil and who exactly are those people.
But as I am not American, these nuances don’t really matter to me that much anymore. I read the headlines and some of the articles from the links you provide, but that’s pretty much it. Not fact checking, one link is enough, you be the fools on my behalf. And if I get fooled by the fake news ? Well, big deal on this stage, he asked for it.
