« Ah, Journalism | Main | Changing Times » Pants on Fire30 Jul 2008 10:28 am Washington Post: "For four days, Sen. John McCain and his allies have accused Sen. Barack Obama of snubbing wounded soldiers by canceling a visit to a military hospital because he could not take reporters with him, despite no evidence that the charge is true." Unfortunately, much of the rest of the article proceeds as if harshly-phrased dishonest attacks exist on a continuum with harsh, accurate attacks. Comments (33)
This is no more a lie than Obama's (and his supporters') constant distortion of the 100-years-in-Iraq quotation. Did Obama tell the truth when (you can see the transcript on Media Matters site) someone in his campaign got Andrea Mitchell to accuse the Pentagon of doing the McCain campaign's dirty work in scuttling the trip? Or was that a lie, and the truth is, as Bob Gibbs now says, that they felt they had an impossible choice to make and chose not to go so as to avoid appearing political? Those stories are contradictory (despite the WaPo's claim that they are technically consistent--either the Pentagon screwed Obama or he made his own choice, not both), which means one is false--a lie. What is not a lie (though it is a distortion, as I note above) is that Obama could have gone, that he chose not to, and that his schedule was not so full that he could not go to the gym. Is the suggestion that he prefers the gym to visiting wounded troops false? Certainly. But it is a fact that those are the choices he made, according to his own narrative. Where is the McCain lie? 
I actually think that was a pretty sharp takedown. They connect this particular episode to a larger issue, suggesting it contradicts McCain's pledge to run a civil campaign and not question Obama's patriotism. They also make a point of McCain's claim not only being wrong, but in his campaign continuing to push the claim after it has been widely confirmed to be wrong. And they give Gibbs the last word: "That's completely untrue, and I think, honestly, they know it's untrue," Gibbs said. So I personally think this is a good example of a developing press backlash to the McCain campaign's recent behavior.
This is no more a lie than Obama's (and his supporters') constant distortion of the 100-years-in-Iraq quotation. McCain actually said he had no problem being in Iraq for 100 years. Obama never cancelled a visit with wounded troops because he couldn't take cameras with him. Did Obama tell the truth when (you can see the transcript on Media Matters site) someone in his campaign got Andrea Mitchell to accuse the Pentagon of doing the McCain campaign's dirty work in scuttling the trip? Yes, he did. It has been documented that the Pentagon sent out a statement that the visit should be considered a campaign event. Or was that a lie, and the truth is, as Bob Gibbs now says, that they felt they had an impossible choice to make and chose not to go so as to avoid appearing political? What's the contradiction here? The Pentagon proclaimed the visit would be a campaign event, so they cancelled it, because they didn't want to be seen doing a campaign event with wounded troops as props. Where is the McCain lie? The lie is that Obama cancelled the visit because he wasn't allowed to take cameras with him. A blatant lie, which both contradicts the truth, and was known to contradict the truth by McCain when he said it.
Those stories are contradictory Yes, but only one comes from the campaign, so your comparison is meaningless. Andrea Mitchell (aka Mrs. Alan Greenspan) has been an outspoken critic of Obama for some time (calling him "arrogant" for pointing out that the Bush administration was now talking to Iran). But at least you've shown us what kind of idiot would fall for this shit.
despite no evidence that the charge is true No evidence except, you know, Obama's cancellation of the trip. The idea that the MSM isn't completely in the tank for Obama become increasingly ludicrous. This "news story" is simply an Obama press release.
"Where is the McCain lie?" That Obama didn't do the visit because he was told he couldn't bring reporters and cameras. From the ad: "And now, [Obama] made time to go to the gym, but canceled a visit with wounded troops. Seems the Pentagon wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras.” From McCain's Larry King appearance: "I know that, according to reports, that he wanted to bring media people and cameras and his campaign staffers." From this article: "McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds said again yesterday that the Republican's version of events is correct, and that Obama canceled the visit because he was not allowed to take reporters and cameras into the hospital. 'It is safe to say that, according to press reports, Barack Obama avoided, skipped, canceled the visit because of those reasons,' he said. 'We're not making a leap here.'" That's the lie. And they know it is a lie, but they are repeating it anyway.
No evidence except, you know, Obama's cancellation of the trip. Still not evidence, since the argument concerns WHY Obama cancelled it, not whether or not he did. OK, now we have TWO examples of how stupid you'd have to be to fall for this crap.
No evidence except, you know, Obama's cancellation of the trip. That the trip was cancelled is not what McCain lied about. He lied about WHY it was cancelled.
Then again, Al was waving the doctored quote around ... under a post about how the quote had been doctored! It's like they keep having to grow extra layers of stupid in order to remain Republicans.
Al wants us to believe that if part of a charge is true that it's all true. Specifically, canceling the trip was not for the reason alleged. Al and McCain (and Limbaugh and O'Reilly etc.) want us to believe that you can invent a reason and have the invention be "true" just so long as you piggy-back the charge onto a fact. It's like justifying a home-invasion if the home-owner answers the door bell.
DTM, Thanks for the Larry King reference--I grant you that THAT is untrue; laying out the sequence of events as the ad does is not. The pentagon did tell them about the restrictions; it doesn't follow from that that the restrictions are the reasons they canceled the trip, and to imply it is a distortion. As it is a distortion to imply that, because McCain said he doesn't care if our troops are in Iraq for 100 years if the model is Germany, McCain "wants to fight a 100 year war in Iraq" and other such versions of what he said. I completely agree that the campaign should stop claiming that there was an indication that Obama wanted to bring cameras, and if they candidate said that knowing it was false then he lied. I don't know what he knew before Larry King (as opposed to what his staffers told him), but he should certainly retract that claim. He should fire whatever staffer told him that, too. Politics aint beanbag, and I don't mind the 100 year kerfuffle--McCain should be careful what he says about so important a topic, however shameful it was of Obama to exploit it dishonestly, that's how campaigns roll. Similarly, Obama made his own choice here, about how to use his time, then he gave inconsistent stories about why the choice was made. I think the ad McCain ran is fair game, therefore, but not the Larry King comments. Cheers.
Al wants us to believe who cares what Al wants? he's a fucking troll. ignore him.
What's fascinating is that Al can be goaded into writing intelligently on non-political topics. It is only when dealing with politics that he has either completely shut off his brain in favor of spewing the talking points that he has been fed, or he's being intentionally dishonest, believing that "Lying for McCain" serves some kind of greater good.
Al, I've never seen a troll get so routinely pwned. Not only that, but instead of learning from your mistakes and presenting better arguments with each defeat, you seem to be getting worse by the day. I encourage you to stop and regroup. Rethink your strategy. Try to put together an intelligent and well-reasoned argument and then come back swinging. At this point you are just a parody of yourself and people only read your comments for comedic value. Cheers and best of luck.
This is no more a lie than Obama's (and his supporters') constant distortion of the 100-years-in-Iraq quotation. FACT: John McCain said it was fine by him to be in Iraq for 100 years. FACT: To be there for 100 years would require us to create permanent bases, like the 58 requested by Bush (and never repudiated by McCain). FACT: McCain said it was the same as the situations in South Korea and Germany (though he earlier had said just the opposite). This means large numbers of troops. FACT: Obama does not want a permanent, large-scale military presence in Iraq. He also said that Iraq was nothing like the situations in South Korea and Germany. Where's the distortion?
Did McCain cancel Obama's trip to the hospital? No. No proof needed of anything, Obama cancelled the trip, he shouldn't have. Bad politics by Obama.
Bill, I don't see how you can defend the ad. The crucial line is: "Seems the Pentagon wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras." Now it might be true the Pentagon had a no-cameras policy, but this statement implies that Obama wanted to bring cameras, and cancelled the trip only after he was informed about the camera policy. The first part we now know is just false, and I strongly suspect from the fact he has visited troops in hospitals many times that he was already informed of any camera policies back when he planned this trip. Now it could be that at the time the ad was made, they were just making this stuff up without actually knowing it was false. But that is bad enough, and no defense of the ad. Finally, I see little point in revisiting the 100 years issue, since even if it was just as bad that wouldn't make this episode justifiable. Nonetheless, I will note that the message people were trying to convey when making ads using the 100 years quote was that McCain had no plan for getting our troops out of Iraq in the near future, and didn't see a need for one. And both of those things were actually true about McCain, regardless of whether that particular quote proved it or not. But the message behind this ad is that Obama only visits troops when he can bring cameras and reporters, which proves he doesn't actually care about them. That is just false all the way around, and I think treating it as equivalent to the 100 years episode is misleading.
I was a little surprised that the article started off as a straightforward deconstruction of the falsehood, and then proceeded to mire down in a confused narrative of how the story started and then a weak examination of what Obama should have said to knock it down. As for "100 years," it's pretty simple. As on other occasions, McCain said it, later was confronted with the fact that what he said sounded terrible, and then instead of explaining his thoughts in detail, just denied he ever said it. For example, see his recent "timetable" quote. I think I know what he meant, but he did say "timetable," so why deny he used that word? Or the "economics" quote that Russert caught McCain on. McCain had to be confronted directly with his quote, before he laughed and admitted he'd said it. This is a really weird habit of his, given we live in the YouTube age.
Breaking! Attention McCain Troll Team, this is a code-red alert! HQ now admits the charge is bogus. Your Target is now: the media! You have your orders. Make it so! Remember kins, earn enough McCain points and you'll receive a McCain Secret Decoder Ring!
So he did go and visit the troops? Well played Barak, well played indeed.
I've never seen a troll get so routinely pwned. Obviously you haven't been reading many comment threads involving Mixner.
McCain gets confused easily.
http://pacificgatepost.blogspot.com/2008/07/obama-gives-bernanke-vote-of-confidence.html This does not bode well.
WaPo has filled their quota of reporting factual information.
DTM, We don't know why Obama canceled the visit, except that it had something to do with politics (by his own account, or by the McCain account). He says he did it out of fear, McCain says he did it because it wasn't worth his time with no cameras there. Is there any evidence for the McCain charge? None. Is there any evidence for Obama's explanation? None. McCain's claim that there are reports that Obama had planned to take reporters is false, and now that he presumably knows it's so, he should not repeat it. The ad does not advance that claim, though it implies a political motive behind Obama's decision, related to the fact that the event would have been private. That explanation is not falsified by Obama's never having planned to take cameras--the question is why he didn't go through with the event, why it didn't merit his time in the end, when other things did. That's fair game. The 100 year comment was never denied by McCain--he's still willing to make it. His claim was never one about wanting to be there for 100 years, much less wanting to fight for 100 years, both of which were the routine charges of the Obama camp for a good bit of the spring. That's a pretty massive distortion of McCain's desires, opened up by, as your man would have it, an "inartful" choice of words by McCain. You say the message behind the ad is "he would never visit troops without cameras." No, the ad implies he chose not to visit the troops, and suggests it was because there were no cameras allowed. The implication is he made a choice based on politics, which we know is true. It's just a matter of which politics they were--the ones he (now) claims, or as McCain's ad claims. I will grant McCain is likely wrong, but I think your putting his ad in a worse light. On the other hand, your revisionism about what Obama and others were saying about the 100 years is just flat out false. See http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/03/hoping_for_100_years.html, for instance. It's quite clear that Obama frequently accused McCain of saying 100 years more of fighting was OK by him, and it's quite clear McCain never said any such thing. That's a pretty serious distortion. Like I said, politics aint beanbag, not as Barry plays it, and not as McCain plays it. Lament the distortions of both sides (and I'll join you in that), but lets just not pretend that there are clean hands here with one campaign and not the other. Cheers.
Bill, We know Obama has visited troops before without cameras. I think it is highly likely Obama planned this visit knowing there would be no cameras. So I think we know the ad's charge was false. Conversely, to my knowledge there is no dispute about the Pentagon informing Obama he couldn't bring Gration because Gration wasn't on Obama's Senate staff, and that Gration's presence would make this a campaign event. If your point is we only have Obama's word on that being the reason he cancelled the trip, fine. But the ad went beyond questioning Obama's explanation, and instead asserted its own explanation, which was false. And no, you can't save the ad by substituting the generic proposition that he didn't go because of "politics" for the charge that he didn't go because he couldn't bring cameras--that would indeed have been a milder ad, but it wasn't the ad McCain actually ran. Finally, your link didn't work, but again I am not really interested in revisiting the 100 years episode since I don't see it as a defense in any event. I will just note that even if the 100 years quote in particular didn't directly imply McCain would be fine with 100 years of fighting, he has never ruled out that possibility himself.
DTM, I'll try one last time to point out that (a) I think McCain's implication is likely false, though it has not been falsified; (b) Obama's claim that the media said no politicos with you is likely true, but does not answer why HE didn't go--he has not said that he was forbidden to visit; (c) Obama's claim that he didn't want to visit and be seen as political does not falsify McCain's suggestion that, absent cameras, it wasn't worth his time; (d) the fact that Obama never intended to take cameras also does not falsify that Obama might have decided a private event was not worth his time. The ad does not imply that Obama canceled when he learned he could not take cameras; it implies that Obama didn't think the event, which would have been private, was not worth his time. In the end, all we know is he did not think the event was worth his time. He says it's because he feared he be attacked. But, as you note above, he made such a private visit before. Was he attacked for it? Was his fear of being attacked really the reason he didn't go? I doubt it. The Atlantic's software made my comma part of the hyperlink above, so if you delete the comma it will work. I realize your view is "they all do it" is not a defense, and I partially agree. That is, in an ideal world, none of the distorting would go on. But many a Democrat has lost following that advice, and I don't think it's the worst thing about Obama that he has refused to take that line. At the same time, however, his supporters can't pretend that this is a race of good against evil on that score.
So he did go and visit the troops? Yes, he did. You might have seen the footage of him with the troops in Iraq. It made the news for a few days, don't know if you've been paying attention. He also visited wounded troops in hospitals in Iraq, though you wouldn't have seen footage of that, since he did it without cameras, which would have been inappropriate.
the fact that Obama never intended to take cameras also does not falsify that Obama might have decided a private event was not worth his time. This is a fairly absurd standard. You could also say that Obama's clame doesn't not falsify that Obama could not have attended because he had to commit an assassination on the orders of his master Mamhoud Ahmadinejad that day or any other fantastical reason you can come up with. What is this supposed to prove? What debate school did you attend Bill, where they taught you to reason so poorly? Would it be a lie if I said: "Obama couldn't visit our wounded soldiers. It seems Mahoud Ahmadinejad needed some assassinations on that day." Unless you posit an absurdly narrow definition of the word "lie", then, yes it would be. The McCain ad contained a lie. There is no other way to parse it.
"The ad does not imply that Obama canceled when he learned he could not take cameras." Of course it does. Again, the relevant text is: "And now, [Obama] made time to go to the gym, but canceled a visit with wounded troops. Seems the Pentagon wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras." Let's try an uncontroversial parallel. Suppose I say: "John missed the final exam. Seems he overslept." A reasonable person would interpret me as suggesting that John missed the final exam because he overslept. And that is exactly what this ad was intended to do: suggest that Obama canceled the visit because the Pentagon wouldn't allow him to bring cameras.
A lie is a moral issue: you don't get to parse morality. If you're trying to give a false impression, you're lying.
DTM, No, it doesn't. It implies that the lack of publicity mattered to Obama in his choice of how to spend his time. You think McCain is "lying" about that, I think McCain is making a guess that may well be false. Because I think Obama halfway decent, I concede it's likely false. I think Obama was probably tired and just didn't go. Obama, on the other hand, settled after multiple attempts (never a good sign that he's giving you the truth), on the explanation that he would be attacked for visiting the troops OR attacked for not visiting, and therefore he preferred the latter. How is that a happy explanation? Is it likely even a true explanation? You've established that he's visited troops without photos before; was he attacked? No. If the answer was "attacked either way," why not VISIT the wounded soldiers if that's at all important to you, since, by your account, NOT visiting was going to result in the same outcome (namely, attack). But Obama's real smart and transcends mere human morality, so I must be missing something. Sorry that this is put sharply, but it's late, and I've made these points before. You just keep pretending that the only possible read of the McCain ad is that the rule itself canceled the visit, whereas it's quite possible (and consistent with all the facts we know) that the lack of publicity contributed (but was not the sole explanation) to Obama's decision not to visit as he had planned. It's the idea of triage, and Obama's explanation for his triage seems to put the soldiers behind politics, as McCain suggested, no? Cheers.
Comments closed August 13, 2008. |
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Heads in the Sand
"Despite no evidence that the charge is true" should say "despite plenty of evidence that the charge is a lie."
More on this here:
http://strategy08.wordpress.com/2008/07/29/washington-post-rips-mccain-on-misleading-troop-ad/
Posted by Dan | July 30, 2008 10:44 AM