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Bigly Truthiness

truthiness, Trump, propaganda, lies, truth, journalism, journalist, The Economist, rhetoric

“Journalists should be tough when powerful people say untrue things,” writes the Books and Arts columnist for The Economist.

I’m with “Johnson,” that pseudonymous author, except for one thing. In calling President Trump a Big League liar, he himself seems to miss the whole truth, nothing but the truth.

At the very least, The Economist scrivener proves himself rather obtuse … especially for a column de plume tipping the hat to the great Samuel Johnson. Many of the Trumpian falsehoods he mentions are indeed whoppers. No doubt. But a few cry out for a more subtle reading.

After distinguishing between falsity, lying, and fantasizing, “Johnson” speculates that Trump may actually believe “his own guff.”

But then, about Trump’s murder rate statements, Johnson quickly runs off the rails: “Mr. Trump said something wildly wrong about something easily checkable, leaving an adviser, Kellyanne Conway, flailing to cover for him.…” But Conway did suggest that Trump may have been speaking about certain cities wherein the murder rate has gone up.

Trump often speaks as hyperbolist: murder has gone up in a few major cities; he relates the fact as if murder had gone up generally. This annoys sticklers. Me, included. But Trump’s been using the rhetoric of exaggeration. 

You could call it the rhetoric of inexactitude.

It’s how he trolls.

Trump could also be charged with “truthiness,” comedian Stephen Colbert’s signature 2005 coinage about confidence in factoids for intuitive reasons, sans evidence.

But so might this “Johnson.” When subtle men miss homespun subtleties, one has to wonder whether they might miss it for … intuitive reasons.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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folly ideological culture media and media people

Deep Dark Truthful Mirror

hollywood, oscars, politics, scold, pay gap, equal pay, Trump, lecturing

At my advancing age, I couldn’t stay up late enough to watch Hollywood’s winners grab their Oscars and punctuate their rambling, teary-​eyed acceptance speeches by hurling brickbats at President Trump.

The Donald will have to defend himself for perverse statements such as heard on the Access Hollywood tape: “[W]hen you’re a star … You can do anything.” Live by the stars, die by the stars.

Still, consider: how much more effective would those Hollywood (snoozed-​through) scoldings be had these cultural “icons” voiced similar disfavor against President Bill Clinton’s similar actions.

Regardless of the precise Clintonian “is”-ness of “is,” clearly “hypocrisy” is up in lights in Tinseltown.

Another seeming Hollywood double-​standard strolls down the red carpet unimpeded: the gender pay gap. “Compared to men, in most professions, women make 80 cents to the dollar,” actress Natalie Portman said last month. “In Hollywood, we are making 30 cents to the dollar.”

Much ballyhooed and largely erroneous, the national gender wage gap compares the median male income against the median female income out of hundreds of millions of workers, without regard to jobs done, hours worked, or levels of experience. Conversely, leading roles in a movie can more fairly be compared.

The North Korean hack of Sony Pictures revealed numerous cases where female stars were paid far less than their male counterparts. For instance, in the film No Strings Attached, Ashton Kutcher, Portman’s male co-​star, received compensation three times greater.

Yesterday, at Townhall, I asked a simple question: Wouldn’t it better serve the interests of fairness and equality were actors to muster whatever truth to be had directly at the Hollywood power structure … sitting before them in the ballroom?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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folly ideological culture media and media people national politics & policies

Stockholm Syndrome?

Ami Horowitz, Sweden, Tucker Carlson, terrorism, terrorist, violence, immigrants

Can we handle the truth? Governments and media professionals don’t always think so.

Journalist Ami Horowitz, whose interview with Tucker Carlson caught President Trump’s attention last week, noted that, despite what he learned (and recorded) at street level in Sweden, Swedes in general and government personnel in particular* seem resistant to acknowledging the levels of violence in Muslim migrant communities.

The media firestorm that followed Trump’s off-​the-​cuff comments seemed more evidence of the same, as did the Washington Post coverage of yesterday’s riots in Stockholm, in the 89 percent immigrant suburb of Rinkeby.

“Multiple criminologists in Sweden … said the notion that immigrants were responsible for a large proportion of crime in the country was highly exaggerated,” the Post report explained. “Nevertheless, the integration of immigrants into Swedish society is a problem that the government has been struggling to address.”

Yet, in the wake of a 2013 riot by migrants, David Frum noted that, “Sweden does not report data on crimes by foreign-​born people, only by foreign passport holders — meaning that an immigrant who has been naturalized will be counted as a Swede for statistical purposes.”

The media, like the Swedes, seem protective. Not of native-​born Swedes, but of the immigrant populations.

Swedes really are well meaning. But good intentions are not enough. In Sweden, as throughout Europe, Muslim immigrants have been let in but not assimilated. Unskilled, most émigrés cannot find jobs … and you know what they say about “idle hands.”

Bending over backwards to downplay problems, though, isn’t the answer. It prevents Swedes and others from coming to the correct conclusion: the best way to help others is not to put them on the dole in your (foreign!) land, but to aid them close to home.

And stop bombing and destabilizing their countries, too.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.  

 

* The policemen interviewed in Horowitz’s video have claimed they were taken out of context. Horowitz denies that charge here.

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folly ideological culture media and media people national politics & policies

No-​Go Zones

Trump, Sweden, terrorism, attack, immigrant, refuge, terror attack

“We’ve got to keep our country safe,” President Donald Trump said last week at a rally in Melbourne, Florida. Hardly objectionable.

It was what he said next that baffled … some.

“You look at what’s happening in Germany, you look at what’s happening last night in Sweden — Sweden, who would believe this?”

Many news outlets ran with the official Swedish response: puzzlement. What happened the night before in Sweden? Was he suggesting a terror attack? There was no terror attack. Ah, President Trump: lying again!

Social media erupted with the usual anti-​Trump mockery.

Swedes were understandably confused. As Tucker Carlson noted, “The president ought to be precise in what he says.” But Carlson added that the “analysis” of numerous network news programs was “so stupid that it’s hard to believe it made it on television.”

One key job of professional journalists is interpretation.

When Trump uttered “last night,” he wasn’t referring to what happened, he was referring to what he saw the night before on Tucker Carlson’s show: an interview with Ami Horowitz, who recently produced an exposé on the violence in Sweden’s “no-​go zones,” enclaves of immigrants from Muslim-​majority countries.

Where even Sweden’s police fear to tread.

“Sweden — they took in large numbers,” Trump went on. “They’re having problems like they never thought possible. You look at what’s happening in Brussels. You look at what’s happening all over the world.”*

The mass refugee surge into Europe is a huge problem.

But the American press assuming the worst regarding President Trump and reporting it?

It’s a problem, too.

Could reasonable interpretation itself be morphing into a “no-​go zone”?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* Trump went on to say, “Take a look at Nice. Take a look at Paris.” He is referring to terrorist attacks in those cities. He may also be referring to “no-​go” communities where police and non-​Muslims appear to be unwelcome, as reported in Germany, Britain, France and Belgium.

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Accountability folly ideological culture moral hazard nannyism national politics & policies responsibility too much government U.S. Constitution

Tough Luck, Chumps

Obamacare, Affordable Care Act, Obama, Trump, Sanders, debate, CNN

Advertised as a big deal ahead of time, the debate didn’t get much play afterwards.

Especially from the Left blogosphere.

Why?

Billed as about the “future of ObamaCare,” it was really about what should replace ObamaCare.

The CNN debate pitted Sen. Ted Cruz, well-​known Republican opponent of the Affordable Care Act*, against Sen. Bernie Sanders, well-​known “independent” proponent of what he likes to call the “Medicare for All single-​payer program.”

Upshot? While either Bernie or Ted may possibly be construed to have won, there was indeed one certain loser, ObamaCare itself.

Sen. Sanders conceded nearly every charge Sen. Cruz lobbed at the program. He merely countered with his support for treating health care “as a right, not a privilege” (a leftist farrago from days of yore) and moving on to single-​payer medicine.

That’s how bad ObamaCare really is. Its chosen champion refused to champion it.

The basic tension was best summed up between “town hall” questioners Carol, suffering from multiple sclerosis, who asked Cruz to promise continued coverage for cases like hers, and LaRonda, a woman with a chain of hair care shops who cannot afford insurance for herself or her employees and also cannot expand her company because at 50 employees the ACA would force her to provide insurance.

Cruz expressed his sympathy for Carol, but seemed to meander around her request for a guarantee. He also evaded** a straightforward answer re: “healthcare as a right.”

Sanders was a tad more honest, in effect giving the “tough luck” answer that the entrepreneur just “should” pay*** for her employees’ medical insurance.

Well, we sure are all “paying” for ObamaCare, one way or another.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* Which is the same thing as ObamaCare. Some folks purportedly hate ObamaCare but love the ACA. No reader of Common Sense, of course.

** Cruz concluded the debate better, alluding to an old SNL skit about a recording session wherein the cowbell ringer always wanted “more cowbell” in every take. “It was government control that messed this all up. And Bernie and the Democrats’ solution is more cow bell, more cow bell.”

*** “[I]f you have more than 50 people, you know what, I think — I’m afraid to tell you — I think you will have to provide health insurance.”

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folly ideological culture media and media people

The Advertising Hypocrisy Gap

Audi, Super Bowl, advertising, advertisement, wage gap, feminism

“What do I tell my daughter?”

So begins the Audi advertisement millions of Americans saw last Sunday during the yearly super celebration of commercials that, sandwiched in between them, included one of the most exciting football championship games ever. 

The ad shows a father watching his young girl racing go-​carts against young boys, and his thoughts continue: “Do I tell her that her grandpa’s worth more than her grandma?”

She won’t believe that. 

“That her dad is worth more than her mom?”

Not unless you want to sleep on the couch. 

“Do I tell her that despite her education, her drive, her skills, her intelligence, she will automatically be valued less than every man she ever meets?”

His daughter wins the race and dad considers, “Or maybe I’ll be able to tell her something different.”

Maybe? Maybe he’s fallen hook, line and sinker for the canard of the “gender pay gap.”

That gap is simply the median income of all men in the economy compared to the median income of all women. As the Washington Post explains, “The gender wage gap … can be primarily explained by differences in industry and occupation choice, hours worked, and gaps for taking time off to have children.”

The Post also discloses that Audi has “just two women on its senior leadership team in the United States and no women on its global management board.” I don’t know what they’re going to tell their daughters.

But I’ve always told my daughters they can do anything they put their minds to.

And perhaps I’ll add this advice: “Don’t buy an Audi.” 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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