Truth, Varnished in So Many Ways
We have enjoyed the little dustup the past couple months over the award given by some group for the word "truthiness" as the word of the year. This word wasn't from what I can tell actually coined by Stephen Colbert (of Comedy Channel's "Colbert Report" - note the "t's" are silent), but he definitely provided the glitter by unearthing and featuring it prominently on his show. The actual entertainment came about because he was not even mentioned when the quasi-award was announced! Believe me, he got a bit of mileage out of that.
I won't get it precisely correct, but the working definition is along the lines of "what you would like to have be the case," although at least for me there is also a distinct flavor of the related concept of giving lip service and/or minimal attention to the actual facts while brazenly making case for your detached-from-reality position. Col-bear would no doubt bristle (that would be in character) at my extension, but at least I have properly offered attribution. Incidentally, if by some quirk of circumstances you have not seen the Colbert Report, it is programmed immediately after the Daily Show (Comedy Network), which I must then presume you have also not seen, since the former is a spinoff of the latter and the latter always acknowledges the former, and so on. There might be some fractal quality to this if one wanted to be analytical. You should at least periodically be checking in on both if you have any interest in politics - and if not, why are you here??
I offer that as backdrop. My topic here is a close relative of "truthiness." I've got three persona in mind here as I plunge in, frankly not knowing where this will go: G. Bush, ombudswoman Howell of the Washington Post, and Oprah. I've ordered those names in proportion to my expectation of making a connection between words and concepts based on "truth" and the person involved.
GW of course is notoriously loose with the truth. As an aside, my recent reading ("Prelude to Terror") noted that Oliver North was well-known for his habitual lying, often for no reason. It was apparently part of what you (or a biographer) might call his character. Junior of course gives off much the same stench. Why tell the truth when you might get away with lying? And then, mega-disturbingly, why bother with the truth (or, say, reality) when you have power?
But the bottom line with the unelect is that he seems to be unable to mouth the words "I was wrong," "sorry," "I made a mistake," or anything even vaguely equivalent. Despite everyone who is paying attention knowing that in fact he makes mistakes - Big Ones - with surprising regularity. He also of course lies, with regularity. Pathologically. What he doesn't do is admit error. I have no shingle for this, but it certainly seems to me that a person that could never admit error, were he not the president, would almost automatically by the time of having exhibiting this behavior for a decade or so be a candidate for some sort of serious therapy. Let's be honest here - he got the job because the Supreme Court ruled that he should live in that house regardless of the will of the voters.
Let's move on to Howell. Her Washington Post blog recently echoed right-wing nonsense to the effect that the Abramoff pay-to-play contributions to lawmakers, presumably to influence their decisionmaking (duhh), involved democrats as well as republicans. The right-wing line was wrong, as usual, she was stupid to make use of it, and when loudly called on it (thank goodness!), she and the paper went silent for days. Far too late she and the Post did an embarrassing self-smackdown, mouthing half of an acknowledgement, nothing resembling an apology, and basically a comical dance of defensiveness. I believe even a senior editor weighed in with over-the-top hysteria to the effect that much of the response had been profane and unprintable. Given the nature of the dialogue on the InterNet, what would we expect? You get out there, you have a chance of attracting profanity and flames. It doesn't sound like this was at all beyond the pale. The bottom line is that it appears Howell basically failed at her job of researching the issue, repeated propaganda, and then fell back on stalling and expecting her management to bail her out. Which, to the discredit of the paper they did. Try again, Post. Have you looked at those Abramoff donation lists yet?
And then there is Oprah. I don't want to dwell on this. She probably did, as she acknowledged, screw up in supporting author Frey ("Million Pieces"). I'm not really a fan, but I greatly admired her mega-pology. Of course she has an incredible marketing empire and credibility to defend. There was significant exposure there when she called in to the talk show and defended the author, and doubtless that was a consideration, but there was genuine remorse as well. That's something we have seen nothing of in the case of the fellow living in the white house these days. And there was only the faintest hint of remorse on the part of the Washington Post. The New York Times barely acknowledged that they allowed a white house propagandist (Miller) to collect a salary there while pretending to be a reporter. And of course the former "paper of record" also has yet to explain why they delayed publishing (1) the revelation that the government was spying on us without bothering with the legal details and (2) the evidence that bush was wearing a radio-pack during the presidential debates. Apparently both of these issues, obviously appropriately inviting questions about the president's actions, were well-documented in reports the Times had in hand before the 2004 presidential election.
In conclusion:
I won't get it precisely correct, but the working definition is along the lines of "what you would like to have be the case," although at least for me there is also a distinct flavor of the related concept of giving lip service and/or minimal attention to the actual facts while brazenly making case for your detached-from-reality position. Col-bear would no doubt bristle (that would be in character) at my extension, but at least I have properly offered attribution. Incidentally, if by some quirk of circumstances you have not seen the Colbert Report, it is programmed immediately after the Daily Show (Comedy Network), which I must then presume you have also not seen, since the former is a spinoff of the latter and the latter always acknowledges the former, and so on. There might be some fractal quality to this if one wanted to be analytical. You should at least periodically be checking in on both if you have any interest in politics - and if not, why are you here??
I offer that as backdrop. My topic here is a close relative of "truthiness." I've got three persona in mind here as I plunge in, frankly not knowing where this will go: G. Bush, ombudswoman Howell of the Washington Post, and Oprah. I've ordered those names in proportion to my expectation of making a connection between words and concepts based on "truth" and the person involved.
GW of course is notoriously loose with the truth. As an aside, my recent reading ("Prelude to Terror") noted that Oliver North was well-known for his habitual lying, often for no reason. It was apparently part of what you (or a biographer) might call his character. Junior of course gives off much the same stench. Why tell the truth when you might get away with lying? And then, mega-disturbingly, why bother with the truth (or, say, reality) when you have power?
But the bottom line with the unelect is that he seems to be unable to mouth the words "I was wrong," "sorry," "I made a mistake," or anything even vaguely equivalent. Despite everyone who is paying attention knowing that in fact he makes mistakes - Big Ones - with surprising regularity. He also of course lies, with regularity. Pathologically. What he doesn't do is admit error. I have no shingle for this, but it certainly seems to me that a person that could never admit error, were he not the president, would almost automatically by the time of having exhibiting this behavior for a decade or so be a candidate for some sort of serious therapy. Let's be honest here - he got the job because the Supreme Court ruled that he should live in that house regardless of the will of the voters.
Let's move on to Howell. Her Washington Post blog recently echoed right-wing nonsense to the effect that the Abramoff pay-to-play contributions to lawmakers, presumably to influence their decisionmaking (duhh), involved democrats as well as republicans. The right-wing line was wrong, as usual, she was stupid to make use of it, and when loudly called on it (thank goodness!), she and the paper went silent for days. Far too late she and the Post did an embarrassing self-smackdown, mouthing half of an acknowledgement, nothing resembling an apology, and basically a comical dance of defensiveness. I believe even a senior editor weighed in with over-the-top hysteria to the effect that much of the response had been profane and unprintable. Given the nature of the dialogue on the InterNet, what would we expect? You get out there, you have a chance of attracting profanity and flames. It doesn't sound like this was at all beyond the pale. The bottom line is that it appears Howell basically failed at her job of researching the issue, repeated propaganda, and then fell back on stalling and expecting her management to bail her out. Which, to the discredit of the paper they did. Try again, Post. Have you looked at those Abramoff donation lists yet?
And then there is Oprah. I don't want to dwell on this. She probably did, as she acknowledged, screw up in supporting author Frey ("Million Pieces"). I'm not really a fan, but I greatly admired her mega-pology. Of course she has an incredible marketing empire and credibility to defend. There was significant exposure there when she called in to the talk show and defended the author, and doubtless that was a consideration, but there was genuine remorse as well. That's something we have seen nothing of in the case of the fellow living in the white house these days. And there was only the faintest hint of remorse on the part of the Washington Post. The New York Times barely acknowledged that they allowed a white house propagandist (Miller) to collect a salary there while pretending to be a reporter. And of course the former "paper of record" also has yet to explain why they delayed publishing (1) the revelation that the government was spying on us without bothering with the legal details and (2) the evidence that bush was wearing a radio-pack during the presidential debates. Apparently both of these issues, obviously appropriately inviting questions about the president's actions, were well-documented in reports the Times had in hand before the 2004 presidential election.
In conclusion:
- Grade of D to Howell and the Post
- D- to Times (Miller fails class of course)
- The world knows that gw and his entire cabal are a failure
posted by Sir Gumbo at 10:03 PM
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