Friday, May 30, 2008

What's popular vs. what's right

Is the popular answer the same thing as the right answer?

I'm pretty certain that
Dale - a fellow blogger - will never cite the popularity of Bush from November of 2001 as proof that Bush was right. Not when his favorability ratings went into the 80 percentile. I'm quite certain that Dale would never argue that everyone should have liked Bush then, because so many other people did.
I'm also certain that he wouldn't argue that Americans are right, when between 55-75% disapprove of the job that the Democrats in Congress are doing.

Yet, in "That Fifth Dentist", Dale tosses himself into that logical void, never to return. In it, Dale argues that I'm the guy who doesn't agree with the population who disapproves of Bush... and thus I'm incorrect for calling Olbermann out for editing one word out of Bush's interview.

Being popular is never the same thing as being right.
Democrats used to brag about how popular Clinton was. They don't do that so much anymore.
We know what those four dentists said, but we don't know what the fifth dentist answered. Thus, there is that logical falacy of believing that the fifth dentist is automatically wrong.

Dale writes:
In the comments, Dentist #5 has thrown himself into to the defense of our so-called president, insisting that this answer stopped between the "o" in the word "No" and the comma immediately after it; the rest of the president's answer, the part that amounts to a detailed yes -- consisting of the president's anecdote about having had a round of golf interrupted by deadly news from Iraq, and arriving at the epiphany that it's just worth it to play golf -- only seems responsive to the question as asked.

I never said that the sentence stops at the word No.
Unlike Olbermann, I included the rest of the sentence.
I didn't leave out the one word that would put to death my conclusion, as Olbermann did.
I included the whole text. Which is why I'm still a thousand times more honest then Olbermann will ever be.

The rest of the president's answer doesn't amount to a detailed yes. Not if you include the word "no" before it.
I've explained this to Dale before, but I guess that the first few explainations didn't sink in. Maybe they weren't popular enough to warrant his attention.
I'll try again.

If I were asked if there was any particular moment or incident when I decided to learn how to program computers:
"No. My friend had a Bally computer that allowed you to program in BASIC. I remember sitting in front of it for hours, just to get it to put together streams on text on its own."

Does that mean that I learned how to program computers that day?
No.
Does that mean that it was the Bally computer that I first programmed on?
No.

Of course, if we're to take the Dale/Olbermann route to my answer, the word "no" should be ignored and clipped off, and only the second part of the sentece is relevant.

Its worth noting that Dale previously argued:
And the larger point, of course, is that the sacrifice of golf is all this piece of crap could give by way of reply to the question of how he himself has sacrificed for his Iraq war.

This is incorrect
Bush was never asked what he had sacrificed. He was asked:
Q Mr. President, you haven't been golfing in recent years. Is that related to Iraq?
I note that to date, Dale hasn't corrected himself for saying that. Maybe he's waiting for a different point of view to become popular first, so that he can agree with the other four dentists.

Friday, May 23, 2008

Why Politico and the Huffington Post are dishonest

About a week ago, I caught a brief glimpse of an article that said that George Bush had given up golf out of respect for the dead in Iraq.
I thought it sounded out of context, and it was. But what's pretty horrific to me is the way that Politico, the Huffington Post, and of course Keith Olbermann have been deliberately slanderous in interpreting what was said.

To bring you up to date, this is what Politico wrote, and quoted:
Bush said he made that decision after the August 2003 bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad, which killed Sergio Vieira de Mello, the top U.N. official in Iraq and the organization’s high commissioner for human rights.

Sounds pretty cut and dry. Right?
This is the actual quote from Bush that they provide:
“I remember when de Mello, who was at the U.N., got killed in Baghdad as a result of these murderers taking this good man's life,” he said. “I was playing golf — I think I was in central Texas — and they pulled me off the golf course and I said, ‘It's just not worth it anymore to do.’"
From that, you would assume that Bush was asked when he made the decision to give up golf, and his response was that he did it when de Mello was killed.
Correct?
There probably isn't a word that could change that meaning. Right?

Now let's look at the actual transcript:
Q Mr. President, was there a particular moment or incident that brought you to that decision, or how did you come to that?

THE PRESIDENT: No, I remember when de Mello, who was at the U.N., got killed in Baghdad as a result of these murderers taking this good man's life. And I was playing golf -- I think I was in central Texas -- and they pulled me off the golf course and I said, it's just not worth it anymore to do.
Note the very first word out of the president's mouth - the one I bolded - when he was asked if there was any particular moment or incident that bought him to that decision.
The word was "no."
That word is kinda important, because Politico left it out of their quote. Please note that.

Now Keith Olbermann has interpretted Bush's statement to say that he promised - the day that de Mello was killed - that he wouldn't play golf anymore. (Olbermann had video of Bush playing two months later, and slobbered into his petty microphone that Bush lied about golfing. Its important to note that in the past 4 years, no one has come up with an incident of Bush playing golf.)
This would be relevant if Bush hadn't actually said "No..." when he was asked if there was any particular moment or incident that made him take that decision.

Does Bush follow up with a story on something that clearly helped him come to that decision? Yes. But only after telling the interviewer "No..." that there was no particular moment or incident.

Let me put it another way. If the word "no" didn't blunt the words after it... then why did Politico edit it out?

Now you can argue that the Huffington Post just never read the actual transcript. Cool... they've had time to read it since then.
-And you can't possibly argue that Olbermann hasn't seen the whole transcript, so he's just being a dishonest asshole as usual.

But to me, the question becomes about the left in general. How is it that the actual transcript eluded all of them? Didn't someone on the left feel obliged to say, "Hey, you know, he actually said 'no' at the beginning of that sentence"?
Really?
Anyone?