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What's your favorite politician blunder/misspeak/"oopsy" moment??

StillBallin75 said:
Sorry, I should have added "I think." I don't think she was being purposefully deceitful. I just think she's full of ****. And people who are full of **** are prone to making up arbitrary statements of fact.
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You think that. The correct, logical statement is to say: "We don't know she lied. We do know she said something stupid that could have hurt people."

You think that people who say stupid things are prone to making things up. Prone =/= always. Logically, you can't say that Bachmann lied, because people who say stupid things aren't necessarily lying, but just being stupid. :shrug:

tessaesque said:
....Seriously? You're the one who threw a temper tantrum over how we need to either "ignore all gaffes" or condemn/judge all gaffes.
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"Tantrum?" You initiated a debate over me saying it was stupid of Obama to say there were 57 states. Lol?
 
Back on track:

Silvio Berlusconi gaffes....

"Last night I had a queue outside the door of the bedroom....There were 11...I only did eight because I could not do it anymore"

"What's his name? Some tanned guy. Ah, Barack Obama! You won't believe it, but the two of them sunbathe together because the wife is also tanned."


From Cheney:

Then came the offensive punch line. Cheney explained that during the course of researching his family lineage for Lynne's memoir "Blue Skies, No Fences" last year, he learned there were Cheneys on both his father's and his mother's side of the family. There was a Richard Cheney on his mother's side, the vice president said.
"So I had Cheneys on both sides of the family and we don't even live in West Virginia," Cheney quipped.
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And Al Gore:

"I am not part of the problem. I am a Democrat."

"During my service in the United States Congress I took the initiative in creating the Internet."
 
Here's a collection of gaffes:

 
Bushisms take the cake..
I have loved some of GOP party candidate blunders though. Herman Cain on-Libya, China acquiring nuclear weapons, and pretty much everything else.
 
Nixon asking Haldeman to "call a plumber to fix that leak" comes to mind. Turns out that what Tricky Dick was referring to was the hot water valve in his private john. ;)
 
soccerboy22 said:
Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we. - Bush II


I'm the decider, and I decide what is best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the Secretary of Defense. - Bush II
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Those aren't gaffes.
 
Bush's OB/GYN comment is the all time great. It was funny and human and you could just imagine him as he figured out what he said and the thoughts going through his head.

By the way, it is painfully sad to see what can and should be a fun thread ruined by those who cannot shut off the over the top hyperpartisanship.
 
" Mr Cameron, on his first visit to the U.S. as Prime Minister, made his gaffe in an interview with Sky News.

'I think it's important in life to speak as it is, and the fact is that we are a very effective partner of the U.S., but we are the junior partner,' he said. 'We were the junior partner in 1940 when we were fighting the Nazis.'

In fact, Britain under the leadership of Churchill - one of Mr Cameron's heroes - stood alone in 1940 against Nazi Germany and had far more men under arms than the U.S. until 1944. ,,, "


Read more: David Cameron describes Britain as 'junior partner' to Americans in 1940 | Mail Online
 
Redress said:
By the way, it is painfully sad to see what can and should be a fun thread ruined by those who cannot shut off the over the top hyperpartisanship.
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If you meant me, I was merely talking about an Obama gaffe in a gaffe thread. Furthermore, hadn't asked for that debate, though it was entertaining. Hyperpartisanship creates certain gaffes, as well as excuses actual gaffes.
 
I swear to god I'm going to pistol whip the next person who says "gaffe."
 
Ron Paul. He is not infallible but he tells the God's honest truth even at the expense of defying his own voting base.

It's too hard to imagine integrity running the country though. He doesn't stand a chance. But he is my favorite, current day, politician.
 
Captain America said:
Ron Paul. He is not infallible but he tells the God's honest truth even at the expense of defying his own voting base.

It's too hard to imagine integrity running the country though. He doesn't stand a chance. But he is my favorite, current day, politician.
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He's carved out a very specific niche for himself. He's not alienating anyone who he doesn't intend to alienate. But, see, that's the problem. If he actually wanted a wider degree of support, he'd have to start compromising some of his principles. It's especially easy for him to "keep it real" because he knows he doesn't have a real chance.
 
StillBallin75 said:
He's carved out a very specific niche for himself. He's not alienating anyone who he doesn't intend to alienate. But, see, that's the problem. If he actually wanted a wider degree of support, he'd have to start compromising some of his principles. It's especially easy for him to "keep it real" because he knows he doesn't have a real chance.
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I think he knows he doesn't stand a chance and never will. So, I wonder. Why?

Why even bother? Could it be that he actually cares about the message and sees the race as a podium to get the word out? Could it be he actually wants to make an honest difference in America?

What's the motive?
 
Seven pages and no one mentions Rep. Hank Johnson?

Addressing Adm. Robert Willard, who commands the Navy's Pacific Fleet, Johnson made a tippy motion with his hands and said sternly, "My fear is that the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize."

Willard paused and said: "We don't anticipate that."
 
 
This will date me, but I will never forget the collective laughter here in the US when JFK said at a Berlin Wall ceremony... speaking in German... "I am a jelly doughnut!"


Over the years many folks have tried to minimize this mis-step by claiming that he was saying "I am a Berliner", he said it correctly and that any native German speaker would have understood it as such. But I recall watching film of that speech on tv, and half the German-speaking audience was trying to keep from laughing. :mrgreen:

Oh, and I loved JFK, so not bringing a political agenda here. I was just very young at the time, and it was the funniest thing I'd ever heard a president say! :)


Edit: I just remembered one of my favorite George W. moments. He'd just given a somber yet authoritative talk while on tour somewhere, then turned to leave the stage and yanked on a "door" that wouldn't open for what seemed like an eternity, wearing the expression of someone who just realized he was not wearing pants, until that country's president went to get him, and usher him away!
 
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DiAnna said:
This will date me, but I will never forget the collective laughter here in the US when JFK said at a Berlin Wall ceremony... speaking in German... "I am a jelly doughnut!"


Over the years many folks have tried to minimize this mis-step by claiming that he was saying "I am a Berliner", he said it correctly and that any native German speaker would have understood it as such. But I recall watching film of that speech on tv, and half the German-speaking audience was trying to keep from laughing. :mrgreen:

Oh, and I loved JFK, so not bringing a political agenda here. I was just very young at the time, and it was the funniest thing I'd ever heard a president say! :)


Edit: I just remembered one of my favorite George W. moments. He'd just given a somber yet authoritative talk while on tour somewhere, then turned to leave the stage and yanked on a "door" that wouldn't open for what seemed like an eternity, wearing the expression of someone who just realized he was not wearing pants, until that country's president went to get him, and usher him away!
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No Way! It really translated that way?
 
poweRob said:
No Way! It really translated that way?
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The talk he gave was in English, and he was talking about how the world was empathetic with Berlin, how the world were with Berliners, then he popped out the infamous phrase in German and basically, the crowd collectively choked trying not to laugh. There was no live tv at that time, so by the time the film was brought back and shown on tv, the "oops" in what he'd said had already been reported by German-speaking media here in the US. It was a riot, and since there wasn't this malicious partisian divide back then, everyone thought it was pretty damned funny! :mrgreen:
 
ich bin ein Berliner!

it's actually an accurate way to say "I am a Berliner".
if he was actually a Berliner, it would not have been an accurate phrasing ("Ein" is used figuratively, not literally)

Ich bin Berliner, is the correct way for a Berliner to declare his residency...
Ich bin ein Berliner , is the correct way for a non-Berliner to figuratively declare his residency, as JFK did.

but yeah, the German media had fun with it the following day nonetheless....
 
Thrilla said:
ich bin ein Berliner!

it's actually an accurate way to say "I am a Berliner".
if he was actually a Berliner, it would not have been an accurate phrasing ("Ein" is used figuratively, not literally)

Ich bin Berliner, is the correct way for a Berliner to declare his residency...
Ich bin ein Berliner , is the correct way for a non-Berliner to figuratively declare his residency, as JFK did.

but yeah, the German media had fun with it the following day nonetheless....
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Awesome clarification! And from a guy who was in all probability in the crowd just after college.
 
Most gaffes are stupid.

First there are those that are taken completely out of context and twisted to mean something the speaker obviously didn't intent, like "I don't worry about the poor."

Then there are those that are obviously honest flubs that should be laughed at, but not made a serious issue of, like "refudiate" and "57 states."

Finally there are actually serious gaffs, like Obama's "cling to guns and religion" comment and Hillary's description of landing in Africa in the middle of gunfire, or Gramm's "nation of whiners."
 
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