Misleading or false claims by the media

[Crunch]

Given the focus so many here have on exposing falsehoods, I’m sure this will be interesting (the coming logical fallacies in the replies will be fun to see).

2018’s worst examples of fake news. There are 32 in their list, all great ones. The ones denying Obama doing the exact same things Trump did are particularly delicious but I’d have to say #7 was the most egregious dishonesty.

CNN accused Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz of being “scared” to come on their programs in the wake of the February school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

Sen. Ted Cruz blasted CNN for the falsehood, explaining on Twitter that he had done a 15-minute interview on the network the day prior.

“CNN has aired NONE of it,” Cruz complained. “Why not air the (entire) interview?

It really demonstrates the rank dishonesty of CNN and exposes the network for the DNC propaganda machine it is.

[Seriati]

One of my favorites in the last week is not exactly fake news, but an example of the media reporting things in an absurd manner.

https://www.cnn.com/videos/entertainment/2018/12/21/ryan-reynolds-pranked-christmas-sweater-jackman-gyllenhaal-mxp-vpx.hln

Sorry for linking to a video, but in what way is telling someone a party is a sweater party, an Epic prank? 

[Pete at Home]

Cruz should sue them in the UK where libel laws have more teeeth.

[velcro]

I agree, the accusation about Cruz is ridiculous.*

It also has no real effect on the country, compared to the accusation that Obama tapped Trump's phones, or that 3 million illegal votes were cast. And it lists 28 stories for the year spread over several news outlets that produce many thousands of stories in a year combined.  Some of these sources may be biased.  You can choose to stop reading them.

Compare to 7,644 false or misleading statements from one person, the person responsible for speaking truthfully to the country, over two years.  We can't choose to stop having him as our president.

But I don't deny the obvious truth that some media stories are false.  I just put it in context.

*Of course, the original quote referred to Gov. Rick Scott, Marco Rubio, and Ted Cruz.  Only Cruz responded, so they were 2/3 right

[Crunch]

Do you think the listed stories are a full account of all the false stories over the year? Everything the media did in 2018 was true, honest reporting except for 28 stories. Really? That’s really what you’re gonna go with?

[Seriati]

I agree, the accusation about Cruz is ridiculous.*

It also has no real effect on the country, compared to the accusation that Obama tapped Trump's phones,

Thanks for reminding us about another place Trump's "lies" turned out to be true.  Or did you miss, among other things, that the FBI had transcripts of Flynn's conversations from inside the transition headquarters before they ever interviewed him?

It's funny non-sensical parsing to claim that's not the Obama administration wiretapping the Trump campaign.  They also have recordings of others, like Page, apparently from inside Trump tower.

So thanks for reminding us about the misdeeds of the Obama admin.  That certainly was a giant media lie and cover up.

...or that 3 million illegal votes were cast.

I've never seen any proof of his one, so glad to hear you verified all the voters in the country and eliminated the possibility - mind citing us to that proof again?

Compare to 7,644 false or misleading statements from one person, the person responsible for speaking truthfully to the country, over two years.

I agree, most of the 7,644 statements represent multiple lies by the media.  You are being super helpful today.  You know like repeatedly and falsely claiming that their political disagreements are "lies".

We can't choose to stop having him as our president.

Wow that's just false, we can elect someone else.

But I don't deny the obvious truth that some media stories are false.  I just put it in context.

Sort of.  You have only one context.  No matter what lie gets told about Trump it's still his fault, no matter what statement he makes it's a lie, no matter what decision he makes it's wrong.

[scifibum]

I've never seen any proof of his one, so glad to hear you verified all the voters in the country and eliminated the possibility - mind citing us to that proof again?

Do you have a sincere belief that the burden of proof falls to disproving a wild, unsubstantiated (despite efforts by Kobach and others) claim like the one that Trump would have won the popular vote if not for millions of illegal votes?

If so, you are overdue for some reflection.

[velcro]

Seriati,

You keep talking about Trump lies.  Could you tell me who calls them lies?  With very few exceptions, I call them false and misleading statements.  Your terminology is very sloppy.

Obama wiretapping Trump's phones:
I have gone through this. Anyone who cares can find out what the FBI said about this, and can look at fact checking from a variety of sources.  Obviously there are some people who don't believe the facts, or choose to spin this hard enough to make it look like it might be true.  (Wiretapping Russian agents and overhearing conversations withTrump campaign members is not wiretapping Trump's phone. Monitoring communications from Trump Tower to Russian banks is not wiretapping Trump's phone.)

I'm not sure what you are talking about with the 3 million illegal votes.  Trump claimed it. I can only say that if it were true, there would likely be evidence.  None has been forthcoming, and people have spent a lot of time looking.  Therefore I say it is false.

I could claim that Trump unquestionably shot someone on 5th Ave last week on live TV.  I produce no evidence, and a search of the internet provides none.  Would you say my claim is false? If not, then I do not think that word means what you think it means.

I agree, most of the 7,644 statements represent multiple lies by the media.

Sources?

We can't choose to stop having him as our president.

Wow that's just false, we can elect someone else.

I will assume you are serious, instead of trolling.  You can stop watching CNN today.  We can't stop having Trump as President today.  That means the country has to deal with his false and misleading statements for two years.

No matter what lie gets told about Trump it's still his fault, no matter what statement he makes it's a lie, no matter what decision he makes it's wrong.

I understand that your feeling is that is how some people treat Trump.  By all means continue to tell us your feelings.

In the meantime, I will go someplace else to talk about facts and reality.

[Seriati]

I've never seen any proof of his one, so glad to hear you verified all the voters in the country and eliminated the possibility - mind citing us to that proof again?

Do you have a sincere belief that the burden of proof falls to disproving a wild, unsubstantiated (despite efforts by Kobach and others) claim like the one that Trump would have won the popular vote if not for millions of illegal votes?

If so, you are overdue for some reflection.

Should I have sarcasmed off?  Let's be honest, it's systemically impossible to determine if illegal votes were cast in our system at scale (you can only catch them on the margins).  There's no way that you can vet - after the fact - whether a vote cast was cast by the person that was supposed to cast it, or that it correctly vetted the voters choice.  There's next to no way you can vet it - at the time - if you have a poll worker colluding with you.

We've deliberately set up our system so that it's virtually impossible to prove election tampering - even it were blatant.

I think we all know that Trump got his number by repeating something he heard from an activist, who in turn was doing some kind of ballparking where he assumed the worst case on every possible fact (no matter how realistic).  Like for example, assuming that every illegal with a state issued driver's license illegally voted, or assuming that some percentage of deliberate warm body fraud was occurring, maybe they even included estimates for fraudulent mail in votes.  But it's impossible to verify what actually happened because we deliberately made our system secret and impossible to validate.

Why do you find "estimates" in this field so troubling, when it doesn't seem to cause agita in other fields?  I grant you they are all politically motivate, but that's true whether you believe the lie that it never happens, as if you believe the lie that it always happens.  The only "fact" here is that we have no way to catch it as a routine matter and no way to create a credible estimate.  It would not shock me to find out there were 3 million plus fraudulent votes in the last election, it would shock to find out there were none.

Just yesterday someone repeated the old 1 in 5 women is assaulted meme (used to be 1 in 6), which itself involves a huge amount of guesswork and a ton of assumptions and definitional changes that may not be realistic assumptions.  Is that a lie?  What about the old 70 cents on a dollar, which has been debunked for decades (even though there's a plausible if narrow use case in which its almost true).  Or we  could run with the entire concept of systemic racism, which must be true even though no one can actually explain the racist vector that it entails (or even how to treat that vector).  Or how about the claim that there is no election fraud because it can't be proven (even though the systems are set to make it impossible to prove).

Or to put it another way, the only thing that I find less credible than a claim that we can prove 3 million people didn't vote illegally is a claim that they didn't do so, both claim's asserting certainty from ignorance, and really just relying on the listeners built in bias (you find it impossible that there could have been 3 million illegal votes). 

Do I think there were 3 million?  I really doubt it, but there's way to know.

[Seriati]

You keep talking about Trump lies.  Could you tell me who calls them lies?  With very few exceptions, I call them false and misleading statements.  Your terminology is very sloppy.

Well you took the statement from the WP site, which itself is designed, in my view, as propaganda.  "false" with intent equals lie, otherwise it's an error, at least in any "non-sloppy" formulation of the concept, and it seems repeatedly like you have asserted intent with respect to Trump's statements - which makes it fair to claim you are calling them lies.  "Misleading," is just a motte and bailey argument, when a claim is disproven as a lie, you can claim it's misleading as a fall back.

More to the point though, this thread was always kind of giant troll.  It's not about the materiality of the statements, or looking for impact of specific claims, or even about discussing the claims, it's just about building out a meme pack that "Trump lies."

Obama wiretapping Trump's phones:
I have gone through this. Anyone who cares can find out what the FBI said about this, and can look at fact checking from a variety of sources.

Check what?  You can 'splain it all you want, this is adequately debunked in any non-manipulated media environment.

While we don't know for sure, the most likely thing Gowdy showed Trump that led him to say he was wiretapped, was the actual transcripts from the phone calls of his staff.

We now know for a fact that those transcripts exist.

Ergo, Trump's statement is factual, correct and pretty much unassailable.

All you're doing at this point is quibbling.  There's no reasonable usage of the concept that you can listen in on, record and create transcripts from Trump's staff, including in Trump tower, and what he said not be true.

I'm not sure what you are talking about with the 3 million illegal votes.  Trump claimed it. I can only say that if it were true, there would likely be evidence.  None has been forthcoming, and people have spent a lot of time looking.  Therefore I say it is false.

Scifibum, this is why I phrased it that way.  He said it's false - that's a statement of fact.  If he's expressing his opinion, he's free to point out that it's "only his opinion" as he's repeatedly demanded from me, but the truth is, all the claim really is is "unproven and unlikely."  I don't have to think it's true, or even shown or likely to be true, to know that it hasn't been shown false.

I could claim that Trump unquestionably shot someone on 5th Ave last week on live TV.  I produce no evidence, and a search of the internet provides none.  Would you say my claim is false? If not, then I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Sort of, it's a better point than you think you are making.  I'm not in any position to know what Trump did or didn't do last week, certainly possible there could be an event that was covered up (even it it's unlikely).

However, also a terrible example, as much pretty all TV signals are recorded, and most of 5th avenue is recorded.  That example could be falsified quite easily (by someone with the time and resources).

I agree, most of the 7,644 statements represent multiple lies by the media.

Sources?

Lol.  Every time I've read the site, multiple on the front page have been political disagreements that the media is claiming are lies solely because they disagree with him.  I don't have a media organization at my command to dig through and create a site about it.  I get you don't recognize that your source is biased (because you agree with the bias) but it's still a credibility point for the claims it makes (specifically for the total numbers, but also for the places where the media bias is itself revealed). 

I mean you didn't even try to explain the most recent example I cited, but it won't stop you from using the total number in the future.

Pretty sure I've referenced at least 5-6 different examples (out of less than 20 reviewed items - where others were off kilter as well) - that's more than enough to establish the source has a serious bias and/or problem with the truth.

Better question, since you like the source, how many of them have you verified?

I will assume you are serious, instead of trolling.  You can stop watching CNN today.  We can't stop having Trump as President today.  That means the country has to deal with his false and misleading statements for two years.

Lol.  The country has been dealing with false and misleading statements for decades, and will be doing so long after Trump is gone.  So long as the media believes that it's okay to spin and mislead, we're going to be living under that threat.

I mean have you noticed the hundreds of media articles on the lies of the Demorats who oppose the wall (based on their prior support for the same or similar concepts)?  What gives, surely exposing liars is their duty - or at least so they imply with their fixation on Trump?  Yet on this one, not only do they fail to call out the left they actively support them in the deception?

[TheDeamon]

I think this one deserves a mention:

https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2019/01/03/nancy-pelosi-reagan-quote-dreamers-gop-vpx.cnn

Pelosi quotes Reagan, calls out GOP for not clapping
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) spoke about the DREAMers after being elected Speaker of the House and quoted former President Reagan. She then called out GOP lawmakers for not applauding the sentiment.

Where context matters. Pelosi was talking about "Dreamers" while Reagan was presumably talking about Legal Immigrants. But the soundbite media has lost all conception of the idea that context matters, unless it suits their interests of course.

[DonaldD]

Are you suggesting that CNN did not accurately report Pelosi's actually statement?  Or are you taking exception with them for not fact checking her rhetoric?

If the latter, well, in Reagan's farewell address he said the following (my bold):

But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it, and see it still.

Nothing there about having the proper paperwork and the pre-approval of the current administration.  Disagree with Reagan's sentiment or not, but it is unlikely that, in that address, he was talking exclusively about legal immigrants.

I suppose you can disagree with what Reagan's words actually meant, or what he was possibly leaving unstated, but to take this as an unequivocal example of a misleading claim by CNN?  Not really.  At best you can say there is ambiguity, but a straight reading of what CNN reported shows them to have been pretty spot-on, here.

[TheDeamon]

Are you suggesting that CNN did not accurately report Pelosi's actually statement?  Or are you taking exception with them for not fact checking her rhetoric?

If the latter, well, in Reagan's farewell address he said the following (my bold):

But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it, and see it still.

Nothing there about having the proper paperwork and the pre-approval of the current administration.  Disagree with Reagan's sentiment or not, but it is unlikely that, in that address, he was talking exclusively about legal immigrants.

I suppose you can disagree with what Reagan's words actually meant, or what he was possibly leaving unstated, but to take this as an unequivocal example of a misleading claim by CNN?  Not really.  At best you can say there is ambiguity, but a straight reading of what CNN reported shows them to have been pretty spot-on, here.

There is the ideal, and then there is the reality. He was speaking of the ideal, not the reality, he knew that even then, or maybe he didn't, as he allegedly was in early stages of Alzheimer's by then.

There is the whole matter of America being a nation of laws, and holding to the rule of law. Which means you follow the legal process for getting in.

There also is the whole thing about swamping the lifeboat. Or the concept of that shining city getting swarmed by the masses at a rate even it is unable to handle and the city quickly loses its shine and descends quickly into squalor and filth instead.

Again, we're talking about the ideal, as opposed to the reality. Reality sucks, but its what we have to deal with. Since the 1990's one of our largest exports has been jobs and Automation has been further shrinking the number of jobs available. Meaning there aren't many jobs which those incoming masses could fill, not anymore at least.

1988 was a VERY different point in time in a LOT of ways, many of which we're even now having a hard time wrapping our heads around. So even if his desire was to be more literal in realization of that ideal. Reality has thrown a spanner wrench into that process. We have problems taking care of our own at this time, and the long-term prospects aren't pleasant to contemplate where further automation is concerned.

[DonaldD]

No, what we are talking about is your claim of misleading or false reporting by CNN - and clearly, Pelosi paraphrased Reagan pretty accurately, and CNN accurately reported on her speech. 

Sure, you can suggest that, in a straight-up reporting piece, CNN should have given a history lesson on the 1980s and the 2010s, on Reagan's deteriorating health, on the possibility that the address was written by Reagan's team and probably not by the man himself, or that Reagan should no longer be revered as he has been by conservatives for the past 40 years, but now you are getting out of the realm of reporting and into the realm of analysis and even punditry.

CNN has a slew of opinion and editorial writers whose responsibility is to deconstruct such speeches, and yes, on CNN they skew anti-Trump, but those are clearly labelled as opinion pieces.

[Crunch]

Let’s talk about false claims. Here’s Ocasio-Cortez:

There's a lot of people more concerned about being precisely, factually, and semantically correct than about being morally right.

So you see, stop focusing on facts. Factual correctness is not important. Everyone needs to get on the AOC  socialism train where facts don’t matter. It’s all about what’s morally right.

[rightleft22]

I thought we already agreed that for today's leadership Facts don't matter.  - The ends justify the means.

[DonaldD]

Crunch believes Ocasio-Cortez is a member of the media, it would seem...

[TheDrake]

The first problem here is that Ocasio-Cortez is really minimizing her falsehoods. Four Pinocchios is not a claim that Glenn Kessler and The Post’s Fact Checker team give out for bungling the “semantics” of something. It’s when something is a blatant falsehood. It’s the worst rating you can get for a singular claim.

In the case of the $21 trillion, Ocasio-Cortez was suggesting that this was all Pentagon waste and that cleaning it up could pay for two-thirds of the estimated $32 trillion price tag for single-payer health care, which she and others are referring to as Medicare-for-all.

In this case the supposed "liberal media" in the form of the Washington Post had slammed her hard for being ridiculous, not to mention comparing a number based on 17 years to a number based on 10 years. It wasn't the first time. She plays as fast and loose with facts as Trump, and could have her own thread detailing her false and misleading statements.

[yossarian22c]

In this case the supposed "liberal media" in the form of the Washington Post had slammed her hard for being ridiculous, not to mention comparing a number based on 17 years to a number based on 10 years. It wasn't the first time. She plays as fast and loose with facts as Trump, and could have her own thread detailing her false and misleading statements.

I looked up this quote hoping it was taken out of context but it wasn't. I really hope this isn't the future of the democratic party. 

[rightleft22]

I really hope this isn't the future of the democratic party.

My feeling that the GOP will keep focus on her with the intention that people do view her as the scary face of the democratic party.  Good strategic move as she is very Idealistic and that is scary.

[yossarian22c]

My feeling that the GOP will keep focus on her with the intention that people do view her as the scary face of the democratic party.  Good strategic move as she is very Idealistic and that is scary.

She should use the Al Franken strategy of keeping a very low media profile while doing her job as a legislature, at least until she manages to learn how to speak factually and convincingly to a broader audience.

[Seriati]

Here's a darn good example of media misrepresentation.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-dance-video-media-claims

The media creates a controversy by attributing a negative to "conservatives" that they can then rail against as the news item - without any actual conservatives apparently involved.  Total smear job and full on propaganda.

President Obama was the master of this tactic, broadcasting a national "response" to a controversy that no one ever heard of until he gave it the soap box treatment.

[TheDrake]

This is the Washington Post:

“Here is America’s favorite commie know-it-all acting like the clueless nitwit she is,” tweeted AnonymousQ1776. (The Twitter account apparently has been deleted.)

To which the rest of the sentient world responded: Wow, she did a thing.

Hardly seems like they were trying to claim conservatives were outraged.

The one fox calls out as the "most overblown example" merely talks about that particular twitter user only, which clearly did think that it would show her in a negative light. I don't see anything in the actual article that suggests there was a major reaction by conservatives to the existence of the video, only that "several conservative twitter feeds" shared it.

The headline is indeed misleading and inflammatory, "CONSERVATIVES MOCK ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ FOR COLLEGE DANCING VIDEO, EVERYONE ELSE THINKS IT’S ADORABLE". Unfortunately that's what's happened to headlines across the board. I won't defend that practice.

Maybe this is just a sign that people never delve behind the headline or the soundbite teaser or the news scroll at the bottom of the TV broadcast.

[TheDeamon]

I though we had already established most people only pay attention to the headline and maybe the byline. They don't have the attention span for much else.

[rightleft22]

President Obama was the master of this tactic, broadcasting a national "response" to a controversy that no one ever heard of until he gave it the soap box treatment.

I was not aware of this trait. Do you have examples?

[TheDeamon]

Well, there was this one YouTube video that had about 50,000 views shortly after his admin claimed it caused a major incident....

[yossarian22c]

Well, there was this one YouTube video that had about 50,000 views shortly after his admin claimed it caused a major incident....

It did cause the protests that shut down the embassy in Egypt, just not the attack on the consulate that killed an Ambassador in Libya. So it caused one incident but not the major one and as I remember that claim was corrected within about 10 days of being made.

[rightleft22]

I remember the claim being corrected in a few days as well.

[Fenring]

In this case the supposed "liberal media" in the form of the Washington Post had slammed her hard for being ridiculous, not to mention comparing a number based on 17 years to a number based on 10 years. It wasn't the first time. She plays as fast and loose with facts as Trump, and could have her own thread detailing her false and misleading statements.

I looked up this quote hoping it was taken out of context but it wasn't. I really hope this isn't the future of the democratic party. 

Just to make sure I'm not misunderstanding the course of the thread, do you mean you hope the future of the Democratic party isn't to make statements like that moral rightness is more important that factual, detail-oriented rightness?

[Seriati]

President Obama was the master of this tactic, broadcasting a national "response" to a controversy that no one ever heard of until he gave it the soap box treatment.

I was not aware of this trait. Do you have examples?

As far as it being a regular trick, here's an article from early in his Presidency about him tending to respond to strawmen.  https://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/24/us/politics/24straw.html. 

I also seem to remember making the argument a couple times (real time on the old board).  Here's a link to the thread about Ahmed Mohammed (clock boy).  I didn't get involved until page 5, where I do make the accusation (and then walk back that it's the only reason the story went national).  http://www.ornery.org/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi/topic/6/16833.html  I can't remember the other times I put that out there, where it more directly applied that the national story broke with Obama refuting an otherwise local story.

[rightleft22]

"Here’s the trick: Take your opponent’s argument to a ridiculous extreme, and then attack the extremists,”

That does seem to be the go to for most politicians. I will have to pay closer attention.

[TheDeamon]

Just to make sure I'm not misunderstanding the course of the thread, do you mean you hope the future of the Democratic party isn't to make statements like that moral rightness is more important that factual, detail-oriented rightness?

Claiming the moral high ground when the facts actually say anything but that tends to be a problem.

You want to make sure the facts are there before you do that. Otherwise you'll come off as a hypocrite, a fool, or an *censored*. If not all three.

[LetterRip]

Seriati,

As far as it being a regular trick, here's an article from early in his Presidency about him tending to respond to strawmen.  https://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/24/us/politics/24straw.html. 

It is bizarre that the article suggests a straw man, he clarified exact topics which the article quoted.

Obama stated his opponents think we shouldn't deal with climate change or health care.

I’d prefer not having to deal with climate change right now. And if you could just hold on, even though you don’t have health care, just please wait, because I’ve got other things to do.”

It is a wide spread Republican belief that climate change isn't happening, and even if it is happening we didn't cause it, but even if we did cause it, it won't be that bad, and besides it would be too costly to address.  Similarly Republicans argue that the government shouldn't be involved in trying to reduce health care costs.  So the claimed strawman, wasn't a strawman at all.  Anyone with even a slight knowledge about US politics knows who suggests we should ignore those specific challenges.

[TheDrake]

I think it is probably a bit much for him to characterize Republicans as shying away from solving healthcare because it is "too hard". Republicans have made it clear that they don't really think that everyone should have access to healthcare, and that insurance companies should be free to manage their plans to accomplish that goal. Republican states don't avoid medicaid expansions because it is difficult, they avoid it because they don't give a hoot if poor people have to choose between medication and basic needs like food and shelter.

After all, if you can't find a good full time job, you deserve hepatitis.

[Crunch]

Crunch believes Ocasio-Cortez is a member of the media, it would seem...

Hahahaha, yeah. You got me, genius.

[Crunch]

In this case the supposed "liberal media" in the form of the Washington Post had slammed her hard for being ridiculous, not to mention comparing a number based on 17 years to a number based on 10 years. It wasn't the first time. She plays as fast and loose with facts as Trump, and could have her own thread detailing her false and misleading statements.

I looked up this quote hoping it was taken out of context but it wasn't. I really hope this isn't the future of the democratic party. 

I hope so too, socialism is  horror show. But, sadly, I think she is. There are even articles  in some media that propose repealing the age limit for president so she can be appointed in 2020. The media, and thus the democrat party, love her. You’ve seen people here in this forum champion her and want to defend her:

AOC is energetic, smart, and already pointing out aspects of the the "swamp" that need to be corrected, like a supposed orientation for members of Congress that was heavily attended by lobbyists and CEOs. She scares conservatives, which is why they are so desperate to come up with a narrative that she's dumb or wears fancy clothes or something.

I think she can keep dominating the Democrats and the national conversation. The media is really delivering here ... for Trump.

[rightleft22]

Saw the interview with Ocasio-Cortez. I think the quote Crunch posted was concerned about was taken out of context. 

Anderson Cooper: One of the criticisms of you is that— that your math is fuzzy. The Washington Post recently awarded you four Pinocchios—

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: Oh my goodness—

Anderson Cooper: —for misstating some statistics about Pentagon spending?

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: If people want to really blow up one figure here or one word there, I would argue that they're missing the forest for the trees. I think that there's a lot of people more concerned about being precisely, factually, and semantically correct than about being morally right.

Anderson Cooper: But being factually correct is important—

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: It's absolutely important. And whenever I make a mistake. I say, "Okay, this was clumsy." and then I restate what my point was. But it's— it's not the same thing as— as the president lying about immigrants. It's not the same thing, at all.

I thought we agreed that Trump might exaggerate but does not lie as there is usually a sliver of truth in his “facts” that support the point he is trying to make. Focus on the point snot the facts is the argument. It doesn’t matter if what Trump says about the immigrants is true or not what matters is that he promised a wall and we want to feel secure even if it’s an illusion.

Now I find this type of logic troubling however I see the point that nit picking everything a politician says might prevent someone from seeing the forest for the trees.  (Though for politicians like Trump it works in there favor.) Would this be what we call a Slippery slope? 

IMO saying yes to Trumps communication and leadership style pretty much means that those that said yes to him have no right to be concerned when other mess up on the facts.

[Fenring]

Her point was clearly that someone attempting to be honest and making some kind of numerical errors is not the same thing as using fake figures to deceive and spin your agenda. The idea of nitpicking every soundbite to look for weakness is indeed a problem, but then the game devolves into who can create the best propaganda using snippets out of context, rather than who has the better vision for the country. How can this not be clear?

[yossarian22c]

IMO saying yes to Trumps communication and leadership style pretty much means that those that said yes to him have no right to be concerned when other mess up on the facts.

I didn't say yes to him and I refuse to hold people in esteem who either speak to me like I'm an idiot or as if they are an idiot. She didn't just mistake the numbers by a little, she was off by close to an order of magnitude.

I can agree with many of her policy goals but if you want to govern you have to get the facts right. You shouldn't be off by an order of magnitude for costs (or in this case potential savings). You don't need to get every number exactly right every time you speak but making claims that are off by orders of magnitude is not acceptable.

[Seriati]

LR,

First that was just one place, from early on that listed some of his straw man arguments out.  There are many others that picked up on the trick over the years.  Politicians have always used the strawman trick, but what struck me in the Obama era with his large number of media water carriers was how often you never actually heard about the original facts until Obama weighed in with his response. 

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2016/01/barack-obama-and-the-hall-of-fame-of-straw-men.php
https://www.theblaze.com/news/2013/01/21/can-you-guess-how-many-straw-man-arguments-were-in-obamas-speech
https://freebeacon.com/politics/triple-whammy-obama-makes-straw-man-argument-rips-fox-news-and-jokes-about-his-coolness-in-one-breath/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/michael-gerson-obamas-global-war-on-straw-men/2014/06/02/534c58ce-ea78-11e3-9f5c-9075d5508f0a_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.c36374c5fc78

Interestingly, one of the sources also led to this, which if you think the Trump admin reaching out to non-US parties prior to his swearing in (as some here have asserted) was illegal, ought to have you saying a few mea culpas.  It's also very interesting in the context that what we got was a terrible Iran deal.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/03/how-barack-obama-undercut-bush-administrations-nuclear-negotiations-with-iran.php

Obama stated his opponents think we shouldn't deal with climate change or health care.

That in itself is a complete strawman, not sure what you are objecting to.

It is a wide spread Republican belief that climate change isn't happening, and even if it is happening we didn't cause it, but even if we did cause it, it won't be that bad, and besides it would be too costly to address.

Is there?  https://www.psychologicalscience.org/publications/observer/obsonline/republicans-and-democrats-generally-agree-on-climate-change-but-not-with-each-other.html  https://www.futurity.org/politics-climate-change-opinions-beliefs/

Or are you just repeating a talking point?   The primary disagreements are over what should be done, and how important it is relevant to other issues not on the science itself.

Similarly Republicans argue that the government shouldn't be involved in trying to reduce health care costs.

So to defend against Obama's strawman you make your own?  There's no part of the Republican platform, that makes that claim.  There's ample evidence that Republicans are just as concerned about abusive medical costs and go after them just as much, and a clear history of Republicans establishing and supporting health care programs to reduce costs and protect the poor.  Claiming otherwise is a lie about history itself.

What there's a difference about is how to best accomplish those results.  The Republicans strongly favor the private market with its proven history of efficiency and innovation and the fact that it's caused medical technology that once only the rich could have afforded to become common place. 

And you know what?  The Democrats expressly refuse to support real efforts to curtail litigation abuse which has systematically forced the entire wasteful practice of defense medicine, excessive insurance and single handedly ensured that good doctors face life altering consequences not just for mistakes but also for outcomes that someone doesn't like.   And they have stood directly in the way of reforms to that system that would trim a huge number off of the costs of healthcare, primarily for political gain.

So the claimed strawman, wasn't a strawman at all.  Anyone with even a slight knowledge about US politics knows who suggests we should ignore those specific challenges.

The claimed strawman was in fact a strawman, you just doubled down on asserting untrue statements that no one is making (ie, straw man arguments).

[TheDrake]

Her point was clearly that someone attempting to be honest and making some kind of numerical errors is not the same thing as using fake figures to deceive and spin your agenda.

So you think she was making an honest mistake when making her claim that you could pay for medicare for all with pentagon waste? 

This is one of a few signature issues for her. You really think she hasn't seen calculations on this? You really think she didn't know that discrepancies in accounting are not the same thing as wasteful spending that translates into available money?

"How are you going to pay for it?" is a legitimate question for any major policy. An advocate should have an answer that is not false or grossly misleading.

If you can't remember the numbers, have your office publish them for you and refer people to them. I suffer from this myself - I can hardly ever remember a raw number. In engineering you don't throw out a guess when asked in a meeting. You bring it with you, or you promise to get back to someone with the right number. I think we should demand the same from our politicians when it comes to spending our money.

This isn't just a quantitative error on her part, it is qualitative. There is no way that this source of funding is even significant in terms of paying for her program.

Her quote is revealing though. I think she honestly doesn't care how much the program costs, because to her it is a moral issue that we'll just have to find the money somewhere because this is a fundamental thing that we HAVE to do.

[Fenring]

Her point was clearly that someone attempting to be honest and making some kind of numerical errors is not the same thing as using fake figures to deceive and spin your agenda.

So you think she was making an honest mistake when making her claim that you could pay for medicare for all with pentagon waste? 

I'm not saying anything about whether she did, in fact, make up facts or made a stupid mistake. But it's her quote above I was referring to, which people are interpreting as meaning "facts don't matter! only morals!" which is not what she meant. I attempted just above to explain what I believe she meant. Now, it's fair to argue that while her point is valid it's also irrelevant to a situation where she didn't just make an innocent error. So the argument would then have to be that her rebuttal is a smokescreen; but to argue that she's implying that facts and details don't matter (i.e. that she's espoused Trump's 'beliefs') doesn't seem supported by what she said.

[TheDrake]

<sidebar> The Iran-Obama thing is a conspiracy theory manufactured out of whole cloth by Michael Ledeen, published by the usual conservative conspiracy outlets. </sidebar>

[NobleHunter]

To be fair, conservatives are quite fond of declaring that cutting government waste will pay for all sorts of things. The biggest difference that I can see is that Ocasio-Cortez actually quoted numbers which could be refuted.

[Seriati]

TheDrake what's interesting about her quote is the implication that any thing false she says in morally correct, and anything false the "other side" says is pure evil lying done with intent.  Fen, I don't think you can have it both ways, I put her Pentagon quote in about the same category as Trump's 3 million illegal votes quote, or his quote on seeing American Muslims celebrating after 9/11. 

They all represent a politician "remembering" facts in a way that's convenient to their argument and not caring at all about whether they are precisely correct or even mostly correct because they are each convinced that the intent behind them is correct (i.e., that we can pay for universal healthcare, that illegal voting is a deliberate goal of and supporting results of one party, or that Muslims everywhere were secretly celebrating the attack). 

It's true believer thinking.

[Seriati]

<sidebar> The Iran-Obama thing is a conspiracy theory manufactured out of whole cloth by Michael Ledeen, published by the usual conservative conspiracy outlets. </sidebar>

Lol, it quite may be, however, I'm also of the opinion that the Trump conspiracy theory is pretty much a manufactured conspiracy as well, so that doesn't take them out of the same boat in my eyes.

[Fenring]

It's true believer thinking.

She may (or may not) be guilty of true believer thinking. But the contention above is that she's vocally advocating true believer thinking, which I believe was not her intent. She was trying to say that people will pick at things to strawman an issue. This may have been a deceptive thing to say after having been grossly in error about something, but as an isolated comment I don't see it as valid to imply she was actually claiming that facts don't matter. She might secretly believe it, but she was not claiming that.

And it is surely non-controversial to suggest that the main use of political media these days is to strawman issues and people. If indeed she did something wrong (like deliberately misleading with data) then the issue is hypocrisy; saying a true thing about strawmanning while doing something contrary to it by strawmanning for her own gain. But what she said in the quote above is not in itself objectionable as far as I can tell.

[Seriati]

She may (or may not) be guilty of true believer thinking. But the contention above is that she's vocally advocating true believer thinking, which I believe was not her intent.

Fen, her intent could not be plainer.  She is saying she is good people so it should be let slide when she's grossly wrong because her larger point is correct.  She is saying the "other side" is bad people and that's where this kind of fact checking should be focused.

There's no basis to hold that inconsistent position other than a faulty position that defines the other side as evil.  I'm still not impressed with her, at all, though she's definitely charasmatic.

[TheDrake]

The other thing is that her "nitpicking" doesn't seem to apply to Bernie Sanders who supports a lot of the same policies. I don't remember anybody ripping him a new one on his numbers.

[yossarian22c]

The other thing is that her "nitpicking" doesn't seem to apply to Bernie Sanders who supports a lot of the same policies. I don't remember anybody ripping him a new one on his numbers.

Did he ever provide estimates that were off by an order of magnitude? I think being the more experienced politician that he is that he stayed away from actual numbers and it was one of the things Clinton criticized him for.