- Joined
- May 20, 2016
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This will inevitably come off as unnecessarily flattering to posters who I enjoy reading, but I think it's a very important topic of discussion.
Some of the posters that I most respect on this forum - @Rod1 and @Quipling come to mind - routinely acknowledge when they are wrong, or spoke off the cuff without properly vetting their words, or need to further consult information, or are speaking about an issue that has veered into territory with which they are unfamiliar.
This is, in no uncertain terms, a mark of intelligence and trustworthiness: being able to admit when you're not immediately the winner. And this also happens to be an area where, I believe, Donald Trump excelled - but in the contrary direction. Despite being factually, inarguably, and verifiably wrong or inaccurate about his claims or beliefs, he would dig in and just resort to insults or obfuscation.
So, when Clinton brings up his comments on Putin? Nope, "wrong." How about when there is video evidence of him supporting the Iraq War? Nope, that's lies. When there are screen shots of him supporting intervention in Libya? Nope, FAKE NEWS. When there is video of him claiming wiretaps? Nope, that never happened.
And this goes on for days (and on much more substantive issues): Trump is shown to not know what the hell he's talking about (NATO, Hezbollah, crime rates, IMF, etc.), but instead of conceding that he was wrong and trying to form a better response, he plows ahead like a retarded bull spearing a red wall.
Would past politicians have been better off if they insisted that they were right and that their gaffes were correct or "fake news"? Could Rick Perry have insisted that his "three agencies of commerce" were actually only two?
Why? Why is stubbornly standing beside a falsehood more admirable than being right?
Some of the posters that I most respect on this forum - @Rod1 and @Quipling come to mind - routinely acknowledge when they are wrong, or spoke off the cuff without properly vetting their words, or need to further consult information, or are speaking about an issue that has veered into territory with which they are unfamiliar.
This is, in no uncertain terms, a mark of intelligence and trustworthiness: being able to admit when you're not immediately the winner. And this also happens to be an area where, I believe, Donald Trump excelled - but in the contrary direction. Despite being factually, inarguably, and verifiably wrong or inaccurate about his claims or beliefs, he would dig in and just resort to insults or obfuscation.
So, when Clinton brings up his comments on Putin? Nope, "wrong." How about when there is video evidence of him supporting the Iraq War? Nope, that's lies. When there are screen shots of him supporting intervention in Libya? Nope, FAKE NEWS. When there is video of him claiming wiretaps? Nope, that never happened.
And this goes on for days (and on much more substantive issues): Trump is shown to not know what the hell he's talking about (NATO, Hezbollah, crime rates, IMF, etc.), but instead of conceding that he was wrong and trying to form a better response, he plows ahead like a retarded bull spearing a red wall.
Would past politicians have been better off if they insisted that they were right and that their gaffes were correct or "fake news"? Could Rick Perry have insisted that his "three agencies of commerce" were actually only two?
Why? Why is stubbornly standing beside a falsehood more admirable than being right?
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