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2012 - Election Lying

In today's election, politicians have more to gain than lose from lying


  • Total voters
    14
  • Poll closed .
The public is stupid, which is really sad since we live in the information age. So yes lying can be rather helpful.
 
The public is stupid, which is really sad since we live in the information age. So yes lying can be rather helpful.

What really worries me about this is not only are people able to easily fact check, but that they have such an aversion to media that doesn't confirm to their viewpoints regardless of where it came from. That essentially removes our capacity as a society to actually learn objective facts. And the worst debaters here are those who do not operate from a position of base facts. Imagine society doing that. Canada anyone?
 
The public is stupid, which is really sad since we live in the information age. So yes lying can be rather helpful.

Even intelligent people on both sides with tons of information available to them can't decide on what the truth is. This is heavily evidenced on this board (excepting the hacks). Not much chance for the average drive by political follower.
 
Wrote not sure.
It depends on the lie, if it is too outrageous it will hurt.
If it is pure policy it will hurt in the long run, In the sense that they will be proven to have lied when they get into office, depending on the importance of the lie to voters it will affect them more or less. If it is small most will forget and of course they will blame their inability to come through on their policy on their predecessors.

If it is pure rhetoric, Ie I will create 10 million jobs in my first term, it can help. Though if they get too outrageous it will hurt. Something like "I have seen the written pact my opponent has with the devil to enslave your souls", will probably come back and bite them in the arse.
Most politicians lie about their opponent as it is hard to "prove" that you are lying about them. Usually to demonize them.
Many lie about themselves/their past to make them look more accomplished/sympathetic/competant. Sympathetically you could call this more stretching the truth is most cases.
Most politicians lie about their plans as they can only hope to do what they want and never fully KNOW if their policies will work, they (usually/hopefully) believe that they will.

basically politicians lie always have always will, soemtimes it helps sometimes it hurts depending on the circumstances.
 
"Obama is socialist/communist" seems to be a pretty effective lie.
 
Even intelligent people on both sides with tons of information available to them can't decide on what the truth is. This is heavily evidenced on this board (excepting the hacks). Not much chance for the average drive by political follower.

































The internet, twiitter, facebook etc. has put out so much info that most people don't know what to believe. You now have to be a researcher to find out what is true. Because of that alot of people just believe what they see and hear. A real downside to the information highway IMO.
 
it depends on the lie.
 
I'd have to say depends on the lie, if it's clever wording you can get away with it. If it's an outrageous and stupid and you get caught with your pants down maybe not.
 
In today's election, politicians have more to gain than lose from lying.

Agree/Disagree?
One politician can only lie as he has nothing else. He can try to smear Romney but the one term Marxist flexible president really cannot tell the truth. Can he?

Romney has no reason to lie. He needs to focus solely on the truth of the miserable Obama performance, other than golf, of course.
 
"Obama is socialist/communist" seems to be a pretty effective lie.
Do you agree that the young Obama grew up surrounded by Marxists, Communists, socialists, and progressives? Do you agree that "spreading the wealth around" was something he said we should do? Do you agree that Obama has said the wealthy should pay more because they can? How is that any different from what Radical Karl wanted?

When Obama says he wants to fundamentally transform America what do you think he means? Does he plan to strengthen capitalism and reduce the number of federal regulations? Or is his goal Marxist European-style socialism?
 
I agree that they generally have more to gain than lose by lying. This is largely due to the way the media typically reports on such events. For example, if Candidate Smith makes up an outrageous lie pulled straight from his ass, the media will report it as "Candidate Smith claims that Candidate Jones supported a law to kick puppies; Candidate Jones disagrees with that characterization of his position." It's very rare for the media to actually call someone out on their BS and tell their viewers that what the candidate said is not true. Even if it's blatant, outrageous, and not open to much interpretation. And on the rare occasions that the media calls them on it, the candidates can just whine that the media is being unfair to them, and make media bias the issue rather than their own dishonesty.

Mitt Romney is probing the limits of this phenomenon with several brazen lies in his everyday stump speech, and unfortunately he doesn't seem to be paying much of a price for it. This leads me to believe that unless the media changes how it reports on these things, both parties will just get more and more bold with their lying over time.
 
Do you agree that the young Obama grew up surrounded by Marxists, Communists, socialists, and progressives? Do you agree that "spreading the wealth around" was something he said we should do? Do you agree that Obama has said the wealthy should pay more because they can? How is that any different from what Radical Karl wanted?

When Obama says he wants to fundamentally transform America what do you think he means? Does he plan to strengthen capitalism and reduce the number of federal regulations? Or is his goal Marxist European-style socialism?

His goal is a mixed capitalist system with certain regulations and some degree of closing the gap between the rich and the poor, considering that gap is enormous right now.
 
His goal is a mixed capitalist system with certain regulations and some degree of closing the gap between the rich and the poor, considering that gap is enormous right now.
By mixed capitalist you either mean statist or socialist. What are those certain regulations? Which of the more than 80,000 regulations are the ones you mean?

Freedom demands inequality. Most of the poor are poor for a reason. Are you arguing that we should all be less free become some have not skills, are stupid or make very bad life decisions?

Please clarify.
 
His goal is a mixed capitalist system with certain regulations and some degree of closing the gap between the rich and the poor, considering that gap is enormous right now.
Misterveritis got you. The topic was lying as part of a political campaign in general and how well does it work. And you were just bagged by one who lives in lies.
 
I agree that they generally have more to gain than lose by lying. This is largely due to the way the media typically reports on such events. For example, if Candidate Smith makes up an outrageous lie pulled straight from his ass, the media will report it as "Candidate Smith claims that Candidate Jones supported a law to kick puppies; Candidate Jones disagrees with that characterization of his position." It's very rare for the media to actually call someone out on their BS and tell their viewers that what the candidate said is not true. Even if it's blatant, outrageous, and not open to much interpretation. And on the rare occasions that the media calls them on it, the candidates can just whine that the media is being unfair to them, and make media bias the issue rather than their own dishonesty.
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The media is a for profit business. It takes less investment to report: He said …, But then The other one said … .You also say out of trouble doing it this way. In addition most people like to watch a fight rather than a debate where the viewers have to have informed themselves using rational thought. (A rational thought is the type of unbiased thinking an engineer might do in a lab.)
 
Stretching the truth, yes. Once you frame the debate, and get enough people to buy into that framing, you are golden.
 
The public is stupid, which is really sad since we live in the information age. So yes lying can be rather helpful.

Actually, the information age can contribute to ignorance. The amount of information becomes so intense that what is needed is proper framing, a proper reference...someone to sort through the information and to tell us how to view reality.
 
Misterveritis got you. The topic was lying as part of a political campaign in general and how well does it work. And you were just bagged by one who lives in lies.
LOL. I do agree that I made his position untenable. Just by telling the truth. I know how uncomfortable that can seem so one unaccustomed to it.

You could try it a few times. And if you and I disagree it is not a very big deal.
 
What do they have to lose? When caught lying a politician can simply feign ignorance and the general public will usually bite or he/she can just come clean, apologize, and cry on camera for all to see.......in which case his/her original supporters will cheer their "honesty" and their poll ratings will generally go up. The uninformed masses simply foam at the mouth over such drama. :shrug:
 
It depends on which party they're from. One party can expect the MSM to cover for them and the other party can expect the opposite.
 
One politician can only lie as he has nothing else.

Since when did Ryan, Romney and Obama merge into a single person?

He can try to smear Romney but the one term Marxist flexible president really cannot tell the truth. Can he?

Stop defining Marxist as anything you dislike.
 
Misterveritis got you. The topic was lying as part of a political campaign in general and how well does it work. And you were just bagged by one who lives in lies.

Misterveritis is not lying. Misterveritis defines words as he so pleases with no regards for their actual definitions. To lie, you must know what you pass as the truth is wrong. Misterveritis does not lie because what he says he believes to be true. The core problem with his ideology is that is has no respect, regard or basis in actual facts.

He defines a President who has centralized power and wealth in the elites as a Marxist. He defines a president who committed the country to saving the backbone of a capitalist economy as a Marxist. By his definition, if we applied it consistently makes essentially every President of a capitalist country a Marxist. And if properly apply his definition, presidents who actively move to decentralize power and wealth in a country, (which is far more Marxist then his definition), they are not Marxists. Insane no?
 
I think that this endless lying is a big mistake and if a politician stuck to the truth only, they would be revered instead of despised by at least half the population.

By the time they get elected, its pretty hard to respect them.

In today's election, politicians have more to gain than lose from lying.

Agree/Disagree?
 
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