Romney's Lying is an effective Tactic

[cthulu2016]

Reagan would say anything that entered his mind. It was astonishing. But political folks noticed that the people did not mind. There was a fact check piece the day after every Regan utterance pointing out the endless statements of things that were false. Somebody in the Reagan WH (can't remember who) said that they understood that a Reagan speech is page one news and the fact checking and retractions from spokespeople were page A-5 news.

G. W. Bush seldom said anything true. He was even worse than Reagan. Like Reagan, he paid no price for it. The media had decided that voters do not care about compulsive lying from Republicans, and that after a while pursuing something the voters don't care about becomes biased. Fact-checking became "gotcha" politics... concern with the facts was a partisan anti-Republican stance. And that guy in the Bush WH laid out the whole Orwellian rap to Ron Suskind of the NYT Sunday magazine, about how the people fretting about what was true were mere bystanders to history. While some embittered reporters worked out their neurotic expectation that leaders should be honest the leaders were doing... changing the world. The fact-checkers and good-government types were just the peanut gallery, hung up on the idea of truth while the doers simply created whatever reality suited them.

Romney lies more than anyone. This is not just a personality defect. It is a considered and calculated tactical stance, just like Regan's front page versus page A-5 insight. "The president lied yesterday," would never be the lead story on the news, so what is the downside of lying? And, just ike Regan's communication people and Bush's communication people, the Romney campaign has all but boasted about it—"Etch-a-Sketch." We will say whatever we want to say whenever it is beneficial to say it.

The Etch-a-Sketch is real... it is the public conciousness and the media's attention span. The Etch-a-Sketch really does just erase everything. And, in that cynical nihilstic way they have, Republicans know that if the national Etch-a-Sketch is constantly being wiped there is little reason to be consistent. It will just get you in trouble. Just say something new tomorrow because the Etch-a-Sketch is a continual tabula rasa.

Whatever the political downside of constant lying, it is less than the upside. Lying is a net winner. Thus to maximize the benefit, maximize the lying.

So if you have a history of utter hypocrisy, of constantly saying one thing then saying the complete opposite, what's the right play? Just deny it. Deny things you're on tape saying. Claim to have said things you never said. Just claim whatever history you want.

This is all a political tactic. A campaign plan. Romney is disciplined and his willingness to lie, no matter how many hours of refuting video exist, not matter how many reams of official documents exist, is disciplined execution of a political tactic.

It is an effective tactic. And that's the world we live in.

[Fumesucker]

1. I'm reminded of Epimenides paradox..

All Cretans are liars.

Anyhow, I agree with your analysis here, the upside of never telling the truth is greater than the downside politically, those who support Romney for the most part won't care and a lot of swing voters won't notice or will ignore it as partisan bickering or he said she said stuff.

[snot]

2. Look up "reality based community" on Wikipedia:

"The source of the term is a quotation in an October 17, 2004, The New York Times Magazine article by writer Ron Suskind, quoting an unnamed aide to George W. Bush (later attributed to Karl Rove[1]):

"The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' ... 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."[2]

When I says "we," I believe he's basically referring to the 1%.

[DCBob]

3. Sadly this is true.

Good post.

[nc4bo]

4. I think the evolution of the internet may be of assistance..

Information can be found with lightening speed, is not dependent on the Ministry of Propaganda and more people than ever have access to the internet.

[Fumesucker]

5. Most people suck at searching for information..

And by no means is it just computer stuff that people can't find online, I've tried to show a number of very plugged in types with smartphones and such how to really search effectively and few of them really get it.

Not to mention you have to want to find the information in the first place, most people are used to having information spoon fed to them and don't undertake to look on their own.

I'm reminded of this flow chart from XKCD..

[cthulu2016]

6. I would say the opposite

The internet has made the culture of lying more effective.

The internet degrades information. Since every side of every question is available there is no concept of truth.

Yes, the internet makes it easier to get the truth "out there," but it also makes it easier to get lies "out there." The truth one gets "out there" has no special status as truth. Think of the things that have been thoroughly debunked every day for the last decade, yet continue to grow stringer.

(Krugman calls these "zombie ideas.&quot

Whatever you want to believe, you can confirm it on the internet, and one web page is as authoritative as another... there are all "on the internet."

I say X. You say Y. In 1982 we could say, "Okay, lets' look it up." In 2012 we first have to agree where to look it up, because X and Y are both out there on the internet, stated with absolute authority.

In 1982 the White House press corps was an elite (representing a small number of media outlets) with some pride in journalism and a notion that truth is not merely whatever the powerful say. They resented Reagan and were constantly challenging him (and his press people). But over time it became apparent to their editors (and advertisers, of course) that the people sided with Reagan against the "know it all" press corps.

But there were limits. Big media (all there was at the time) had its center-right point of view but there were no major news outlets devoted to flat-out lying. No FOX. No Drudge. No million bloggers just saying whatever they wanted to be true.

In the information glut, truth is not privileged in any way.

IMO.

[coalition_unwilling]

8. I've been saying ever since 9-11 that we face an

epistemological crisis (epistemology being that branch of philosophy concerned with what we know and how we come to know what we know).

When 70% of Americans can report they believe that angels exist, we are in deep, deep trouble.

I wish I knew what the cure for this is, but I am at a loss.

[flamingdem]

7. Ed Rendell just said that Dems should back off..

on msnbc ... but later admitted that Romney needs to quickly address the issue.

Looks like pressure IS the right tactic. Logic has some room to run even if dummies
tend to forgive lying politicians -- I believe they won't if there's enough media on it.