I never said I believed it (although personally I do, because it seems so much in character of the President 
).
So again, you believe it regardless of whether its true because its something you want to believe is true. Almost the definition of how to write propaganda. Make it something the audience wants to believe or is afraid is true.
When a man tells a lie, then another lie, then some pathetic lie, then another...and someone says that he lied about something, is it so surprising that I actually believe that man has lied again? The man, of course, is Trump.
It is well within his character--his egotism, his ignorance and/or disdain for the law, his immorality, his belief he is above the law--that he very well might say something like that.
When it comes between believing a writer whose livelihood depends on his accuracy, and a President whose disdain for accuracy is well-known, I tend to side with the former.
. . .
This is a classic false dichotomy. The most you can say is that it is unproven, and ask that we give Trump the benefit of the doubt.
What's funny is that what you are saying is more like a false dichotomy. Effectively, because an unproven statement was reported, our options are to believe its true or "give Trump the benefit of the doubt." When in fact, the option I'm taking is to ask for evidence - which of course doesn't exist.
Are you not the same person that claimed there was no proof that Obama's administration lied about Benghazi? There's a 100X the proof there, including actual emails, yet you don't believe it. But here, because an anonymous person said they heard something, you are all in.
So I'm going to point that you guys are living jokes on this. There's no standards you're following other than tribal loyalty.
You're straw-manning me. I didn't say it was proven. I didn't say anyone had to believe it. I just said no one can call it an outright lie.
In fact, I am pretty much taking exactly the same position you are, but on the opposite side. I'm asking for evidence to show that the statement is untrue.
And review what "evidence" means. Not for a court of law, but in general. Just because evidence is not admissible in a court of law does not mean it isn't evidence.
Finally, I do not believe I ever stated that "there was no proof that Obama's administration lied about Benghazi," in the sense that they told an untruth. They certainly did. What I disputed is that they told a
purposeful untruth and never corrected it.
I assume you are referring to them saying the attack was motivated by the Quran-burning tape. They did say that, and it was false. But they based this on an initial report from the CIA, which the agency later retracted. And once the CIA stopped saying that was the reason, they stopped saying it.
Don't you wish the current Administration was that forthright?
Saying it is proven to be a lie is at least as bad as saying it is proven to be true. That is also "fake news."
Would be, did I say it was "proven to be a lie"? Is the only way to deal with malicious rumors and gossips to prove they couldn't possibly be true, and failing that means they are true? Is every girl that's ever been called a slut, really a slut if they can't provide video evidence that they aren't one? Is every person really guilty of every crime anyone else says they're guilty of, or just the people that look like child molesters? After all they should know better than to look that way if they are innocent.
I'm getting depressed just reading you guys. No belief whatsoever in any concepts related to justice, no understanding of why accusers have to be credible, why our legal system MANDATES the right to confront an accuser.
Heck, you guys are literally the people on the Salem witch trials who burned innocent women because the allegations sounded like they could be true.
Wake up, funny how you can be "woke" and totally asleep at the same time.
Once again, you are straw-manning me. I didn't say it had to be true if it couldn't be proven to be a lie. I just said one can't call it a lie unless one has proof.
It is a subtle distinction, but an important one, one that Conservatives need to learn. Often in the climate debate, a denier will supposedly "disprove" some scientific experiment or indication that AGW is occurring. Since he has cast doubt on the science, he declares that he has "disproven" AGW and that it is all a lie.
Of course, he has done nothing of the sort. Even assuming he has actually "disproven" a piece of evidence for AGW, he has not shown that AGW is not happening. It could still be happening, even it there was no scientific evidence of it occurring. Just because we can't detect something doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
Similarly, just because someone finds the evidence of this report weak doesn't not disprove that it is true. If no one had reported it at all, it could still be true.
When I hear "fake news," I assume you mean that it isn't true, that is it a lie, and it is a completely made-up story with no basis in fact. Well, we don't know that. The reporter very well have made it up. Or the reporter could be relating a completely true account. We just don't know, based on the evidence we have. But saying the evidence is not sufficient to conclude the story is absolutely true does not mean it is sufficient to conclude it is completely false. That's the point I'm trying to make.
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) coordinating with a single purpose. We have a variety of actors, some good, some bad, some lazy, some indifferent. So we will never have a media that is always truthful. Conversely, we will never have a media that always lies, or even coordinates its lies in order to maximize its ability to fool the public (unless the state or something similar takes it over). So we all have to deal with an uncertain media, which we can never completely trust (and will never earn our complete trust), but which we can never completely distrust, either.
