Kevin Drum has created a taxonomy of Bush lies, and fi you just want to spare yourself some time, here is all you really need to know: Bush and Co. are lying whenever Democrats say he is lying.
Kevin lists several types of lies. First, there is the brazen lie, which is known by virtually every other human being on the planet by its simpler name, which is ‘a lie.’ As an example of the brazen lie, he offers up Cheney’s performance this week-end. I have no problem with the brazen lie– it is indeed a lie in every sense of the term.
The second type of ‘lie’ described by Kevin is the “the confidently expressed, but currently undisprovable assertion.” You are probably familiar with this second type of lie, because elsewhere outside the Planet Democrat, that is known as a policy disagreement. Kevin offers up this ridiculous bit as an example of this second type of ‘lie’:
For example, the idea that his (Bush) 2003 tax cut proposal would spur job growth was almost universally scorned by mainstream economists, but you couldn’t prove it wouldn’t work, so he got away with it.
Surprise, surprise. You can’t prove it did work, you can not prove it did not work- has to be a lie. We have the economy as it was, and we have the economy as it is now with the tax cuts. We can’t go back and have a do-over without the tax cuts to see if job growth and economic growth – grown-up adults will just have to agree to disagree, but only in the schoolyard playground that is Democrat electoral politics could anyone consider this a lie.
This second type of lie is one that seems to motivate most of the hatred in Democrats. They simply are incapable of accepting a viewpoint other than their own, and anything contrary to their belief structure is a lie. Say, for example, you think of your self as pro-environment but you don’t think the Kyoto treaty was good policy- LIAR! You hate the environment.
Say that you think privatizing Social Security is a decent option for the long-term health of the system- LIAR! You just want to tear apart the social safety net that Democrats have worked so hard to build. I don’t need to give any more examples- 90% of the time you hear or read someone on the left accuse this administration of lying, this is what they really mean- I disagree with your position.
Kevin’s third type of lie is what he calls the technical lie, and here is his definition:
a statement that’s very carefully constructed to leave an incorrect impression
Mason
This kind of hysterical “code word” wink-wink-nudge-nudge Bush-opened-his-mouth-so-he-must-be-lying (“Bush wants more arsenic in the water!!!!”) talk just ensures that fewer and fewer swing voters will actually vote Democratic.
Man, does it get old.
HH
This stuff is borderline Orwellian but it’s nothing new. We’ve been hearing “they speak in code!” for a while.
Andrew Lazarus
Kevin has chosen a poor example for the third type. I can think of at least one better one: a statement that went something like “Senior citizens receiving dividends will get an average tax cut of $X” Do you see the flaw? Over half of all seniors don’t get any dividends at all! Bush didn’t enter all those zeroes into the average. (In fact, since this is another example where “median” is the professional accepted measure of central tendency, the average is zero. But even using the mean, it’s cheating to leave out the zeroes.)
I must confess, I thought Josh Marshall’s analysis of the unfalsifiable but incredible statement was brilliant. Like, “If we don’t pass another tax cut, American will be invaded by space aliens.” After the tax cut passes, who are we to wonder if the whole premise was false? Perhaps it’s not a lie. Perhaps it’s just sloppy and deceptive.
John Cole
That would be great a rebuttal, Andrew if Bush actually were out there saying things such as “If we don;t pass tax cuts we will be invaded by space aliens.”
I would even join you and call Bush the biggest liar I have ever heard. But Bush isn’t saying things like that- he is merely advancing ideas that arrogant twerps like Marshall do not like. Thus- this is a policy disagreement, not a lie.
Terry
Would somebody explain why they bother reading twits like Kevin Drum?
Kimmitt
From Merriam-Webster (as long as we’re using the hoary tactic of digging out dictionary definitions):
lie, noun:
2. something that misleads or deceives
I believe it is this definition which is in use. Thank you.
John Cole
Kimmitt- And that definition means that a lie is something that by its very nature deceives- not something that if you read it ten times can confuse you into being mislead- not something that if you are an idiot and paranoid can be read the wrong way.
dwight meredith
Bill Clinton was asked under oath “are you having an affair with Ms. Lewinski?” (that is a paraphrase but the tense is correct). He answered no.
Was that a lie? As a technical matter he was not having an affair at that moment, he was giving a deposition.
The law imposes a duty in certain circumstances not only to be technically accurate but also to disclose all material facts.
The failure to disclose all material facts when in a fiduciary relationship, for instance, constitutes fraud under the law.
Should our Presidents have the duty to disclose all material facts about public policy issues they choose to address?
I think that is an interesting question and I for one, am not prepared to give a definitive answer.
Barney Gumble
“More than 40 percent of people who receive dividends make under $50,000 per year….”
Hey John, me and you are going to split a million dollars.
You get $1, I get $999,999.
We split a million dollars.
(I never said it was going to be split down the middle)
Kimmitt
I think the “misleads” portion is the more appropriate part of the definition. The Bush Administration’s specialty is statements which are technically accurate but which . . . mislead.
Gary Farber
“Democrat electoral politics….”
Democratic. The word is “Democratic.”
John Cole
I refuse to budge. There is simply NOTHING inaccurate or misleading about the following statement:
“More than 40 percent of people who receive dividends make under $50,000 per year….”
That you can contort it into a statement that means something else testifies to your prowess with manipulation, but it does not reflect at all on the current administration’s honesty.
Andrew Lazarus
Hey John, GWB may not have saved us from space aliens, but his minions insist that tax cut saved us from much worse job loss. (You’ll recall, we have lost 3MM+ jobs under his reign.) Most economists think his package was not structured to act as a stimulus, but rather to ease the life of the upper-upper-class. From a strictly logical standpoint, I can’t offer much stronger an argument against his having saved us from space aliens than his having saved us from worse job loss. This type of counterfactual argument is difficult in any case.
I’m willing to concede that Kevin’s 40% example is not deceptive, but I reiterate that my “ The 9.8 MM seniors receiving dividends” is. This was not a made-up example, as linked.
J Bowen
Andrew – did you miss the phrase “receiving dividends”? Of course that excludes those who did not, ie, those who received 0.
That’s not even deceptive – if someone isn’t bright enough to recognize a clear qualification such as “receiving dividends”, they simply lack critical thinking skills.
Andrew Lazarus
J Bowen, no *I* didn’t miss it. We’re talking about phrases that are LITERALLY TRUE, but DECEPTIVE. Most people reading that phrase either WOULDN’T notice, or wouldn’t have the NECESSARY background knowledge to understand the economic consequences that fewer than half of “seniors” are covered by the clause. (Bush’s unprofessional use of the mean instead of median similarly raises unwarranted expectations in the audience. Clever, but dishonest.)
A number of Bill Clinton’s lies are true by your newly-relaxed standards.
Ricky
Average is the mean, so the only dishonest is coming from the folks complaining about someone ACCURATELY giving the average.
Average = mean.
Average > median.
Ricky
Well, the html tag changed the previous, but it originally ended with “average does not equal median”. My fault.
Karen
After reading this thread I have come to one conclusion. Conservatives believe the American people are intelligent enough to listen to various viewpoints and come to a conclusion. Liberals believe the American people are utterly stupid and should be spoken to in words of one syllable, as in a first grade primer.
There has never been a time in history that a politician has given his/her position and followed it up with a “On the other hand…”. All politicians (hell, all people) stake out a position and try to convince others by presenting the most positive information. To pretend this is new and applies only to Republican administrations is dishonest.
Andrew Lazarus
Ricky, the last time this came up, I posted quotes from at least six elementary statistics textbooks or online courses explaining that for income and price distributions, the mean is too much affected by outliers, and the median is the preferred measure of central tendency. For example, those statistics on the radio about home prices in a given city are, as a rule, MEDIANS. Bush is taking advantage of a confounding of colloquial ideas about average and terms-of-art in measures of central tendency.
You would also find out, if you read these sources, that although the colloquial phrase “average” USUALLY refers to the mean, in some cases it’s really referring to the median or the mode. Example: People talking about “average” height are probably referring to the median
By your own admission, Bush is again being deceptive by using the mean (computed with omission of zeroes, into the bargain) in a case where unanimous professional opinion and historical practice, which set people’s expectations, is to use the median. I am not disputing that there is a sense in which Bush’s statement is literally true. Literally true statements can be deceptive, misleading, and dishonest. What I subit is: I doubt you can find a single use of the mean as the measure of “average” for income or tax distributions by government economic professionals prior to the Bush Administration.
For the benefit of lurkers who might want to know why I am so angry about this, and why I know what I am talking about, I have a standing consulting agreement with a major law firm to help with certain types of statistical analysis (including critical reading of opposing experts). I also have a Ph.D. in mathematics.
Ricky is welcome to post credentials for his assertion that the fact the mean is the most common type of average makes its use in this context acceptable contrary to every authority I was able to find.
Robin Roberts
Recommend that the law firm ask for refund of fees.
David Perron
Two things:
1) Kimmitt’s dictionary has a slightly different 2) reference for “lie”; mine says _intentionally_.
2) So, is anything that can be misconstrued by a complete idiot a lie? Just asking.
Kimmitt
I like your definition better — the intent to mislead is an important aspect of this process; the Bush team makes statements which are technically accurate but misleading, with the intention of producing a false impression in the minds of those watching them.
HH
Well except that under oath, he said he never had an affair with Lewinsky, an out and out lie. So, bad comparison.
Andrew Lazarus
HH, I believe Clinton’s backup justification for that testimony was that as asked he didn’t think it referred to fellatio.
I don’t buy that, but I don’t care if Clinton lies about his sex life; I would try to lie about mine. Matter of fact, I’d like to examine GWB under oath about cocaine use and his military record.
HH
It’s horseshit and not “technically accurate” in the slightest of course, which, again is the difference. Good luck with the lawsuit…
jack
Kimmitt–that’s all well and good, that you like David’s ‘2’ better, but, if we’re consulting the dictionary, why aren’t we using the primary meaning of the word? Where’s thw ‘1’?
Andrew, like the 40% example, the phrase you cited was neither confusing nor deceptive. The idea that a sentence can be considered a ‘lie’ because some elitist has decided that some people are too stupid to understand it is just ridiculous.
The liberal disdain for any form of intelligence that fails to come to the same conclusuions as thir own gets worse and worse. Small wonder that their pronouncements seem to get farther and farther out of touch with reality.
John Osuna
in order to assume that the 9.8 M seniors comment was intended to mislead you would have to assume that people were dumb enough to think there were only 9.8M seniors in the US. My only question are those high school seniors or college seniors? teminal stupidity is not a crime.
James Stephenson
So Andrew you do not mind that Clinton lied about his sex life, to a Grand Jury about a case involving his predatory sexual relationships?
So if a CEO has sex with an Underling, and then lies to a grand jury about past experiences of sex with underlings, that is fine?
So basically he can lie anytime he wants as it is just about sex. Even cases about sex?
And there is no hope for Kimmet, professional Student.
Dean
Out of curiosity:
If the RATE of increase of government spending on a given project or subject drops, but remains >0, is that an example of declining spending?
If it is not an example of declining spending, then is it misleading to say that programs are being gutted?
I seem to recall an awful lot of ink being spent on charges that Reagan and company cut social welfare spending when only the RATE of increase went down, and did not drop below zero (meaning that there was an actual increase in the amount of spending).
Whither the outrage?
Andrew Lazarus
1. Dean, I think you’re right that sometimes the absolute quantity and the rate of increase got confused. Probably on purpose. I wasn’t in the business then. I’ve seen other bogus liberal statistics and spoken out against them. I would point out that the conservatives of the Reagan era had a bad habit of failing to adjust numbers for inflation (much higher then) and population growth (e.g., Medicare spending PER ELIGIBLE).
2. John Osuna, give me an example of a literally true statement that you find misleading. (You might check out the David Corn thread for examples more to your taste.) I’m so glad that you aren’t too stupid to understand this, and I hope you will have the same brave face when Dean’s liberal statistical fakes come back into play.
3. Mr Stephenson, I think you’re confusing “fine” with something else. I’m tired of talking or thinking about the Clenis, but the short answer is a man who lies about his sex life seems better to me than a man who lies about public policy in order to start a war and boost his party’s political standing. (For example, John Cole admits that our VICE-president is a liar, although I’m sure he doesn’t impute as base a motive as I do.) As far as consensual sex between Clinton and that woman, Ms. Lewinsky, in the utter absence of coercion, I’d say that’s their business, and maybe Hillary’s. How that got before a Grand Jury is a long, very sad story.
john osuna
Andrew, How about we start and finish with “that depends on what your denfinition of is is.”
Kimmitt
“Lie” is a major enough word that it simply has multiple definitions, none of which are particularly primary.
Ricky
Hmmmm….I’m more for the traditional language, where the average is the mean.
Now, you’re free to critique what would be the more preferrable method (or, in real world terms, subjective assessments over a speech done after the fact), and I certainly won’t be uncivil towards you…..but average is still the mean.
As I’ve said a gazillion times, there is sooooo much to criticize this administration for, I’m constantly amazed at the lengths folks will go to in order to manufacure something new.
And unless you’re offering me a job, I fail to see the rationale for posting my resume’ on a blog (in the comments section, at that). I recall Yglesias posting something on SAT scores a while back & it seemed like none-too-few folks could hold back their eagerness in telling the world their score.
?????
I’m quite secure in my degree and mathematics expertise, Andrew. I’m reminded of it every time I pick up a paycheck. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d prefer a civil discussion instead of a pissing contest, okay?
David Perron
I’d also have to say that my expertise in mathematics outstrips that of Andrew and most other casual posters. That said, I don’t know of anyone at all that would say mean when they meant median, or average when they meant median. They simply mean completely different things. That they occasionally mean the same thing is just a by-product of the shape of the probability density function.
In short, the average and the median are two completely different statistical measures. Anyone who aspires to analyze statistics knows this difference, or ought to know it. Andrew’s completely wrong on this, and Ricky’s right. So, Andrew: can we put your name on the top of the list of people who were misled? This sounds like an admission to me.
Andrew Lazarus
No, David, I wasn’t misled, because, frankly, I knew what to look for. All the time, though, I see misleading mathematics, and this was a prime example. (I’m a great fan of books like “Innumeracy”.)
As far as credentials, I couldn’t find a single refereed publication of yours in the Mathematical Reviews index. In fact, you don’t appear to be a member of any mathematical professional society. That leads me to doubt very, very much that your mathematical expertise outstrips mine. And yes, I used Google to find out what your line of work is. Ironically, it’s the same as mine! Indeed, I probably applied to at least one of your Help Wanted ads. Glad I didn’t get it. [On second thought, you probably are, too.]
Frankly, it matters only partially to my case whether the median is ever colloquially used as an average. Textbook after textbook will tell you that the mean is a very poor indicator of central tendency for income distribution for exactly the reason the Bush Administration chose to use it: it’s too sensitive to outliers. Would you be happy if I said they weren’t dishonest, but that they were too stupid to pass freshman stats?
RW
Like I said earlier, it’s fine to say that they should’ve used something else, but to say that Bush lied is just ridiculous.
And yes, there were immediate responses of “liar” when he accurately called an average……an average. And yes, they were coming from the usual factions of the peanut gallery.
David Perron
So, Andrew, you admit that you weren’t misled. Is there a specific person you’re playing White Knight for that was, or is there some mythical, postulated group of people who were utterly fooled by this? Without anyone having been misled, you’re left without a rhetorical leg to stand on.
Certainly a point could be made that the mean isn’t a useful statistical parameter in this case. But that’s not your point.
My apologies for the insult. I figured either you didn’t understand the distinction enough, or you were coming to the rescue of someone who likewise failed to understand. Or is there a third alternative?
So, what do you do?
Andrew Lazarus
I’m newly-hired Director of R&D for a small quant firm whose principal would probably faint at my politics. (OTOH, my former boss, in the same line of work, was a Jesse Jackson supporter, even left of me. And he was worth something in 8 or 9 digits.)
C++, C, SQL, Java, Matlab, Monte Carlo simulations, report design and implementation, etc. Our fresh technical analysis plans are, I’m sure you will excuse me, proprietary. We don’t (yet) manage money, although that may be in the cards. My math background is mostly, I must say, elsewhere, but it’s pretty broad.
David, I suppose I could go out and do a man-in-the-street interview to see how many people were fooled by the use of mean here (it looks like we agree that it’s not the best choice by far), but before I play even more hookey from my real computer, (1) why else would Bush bother to frame the tax cut push this way and (2) why else would half a dozen textbooks at the public library give this as an exercise in “Which mesaure is best?” ??
I too will try to be a little less angry. I don’t think I’ve ever met a mathematician I couldn’t be civil with, including a couple wack cases who ended up drugged out on the streets.
David Perron
Hmmm…so it’s your contention that if someone believes something that’s not true, it’s the fault of the Bush administration? This seems rather odd to me.
It’s my experience that people will jump to conclusions all on their own, with little need for a push from Bush, so to speak.
My background is engineering, as you might guess from my email, but with a liberal (so to speak) sprinkling of graduate-level math. I’ll never be the sharpest knife in the drawer mathematically, but I know a bit more than the average EE.