Ignorance is Dangerous

diabolicalnerd said: Obama’s-gunna-take-mah-guns paranoia is baseless anyway. He’s EXPANDED gun rights during his term and hasn’t done a single thing to restrict them. Me and my guns aren’t concerned.

THANK YOU!!

Now whether they shhoouulldd be restricted… Well, I think so.

Outlawed? No.

There is a difference. 

fawfulfan:

We all take it for granted. Politicians lie…Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, freshmen and veterans. They all swindle us to get the vote and to build support for their agenda. But how egregious is this lying? And for that matter, how do different politicians compare to one another on their honesty? Is there any way we can find out?

As a matter of fact, we can. There’s a great website known as PolitiFact, which does independent research on all the well-known claims each one of our political figures make (and even a few foreign ones…Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has a couple of entries, both of which turn out to be lies). PolitiFact stands alone as one of the only political analysis sites which is almost perfectly nonpartisan. Politicians’ statements are placed in one of six categories: true, mostly true, half true, mostly false, false, and “pants on fire”. Let’s do some data mining to find out how badly we’re being taken for a ride, and by whom.

So let’s begin with an obvious one: Obama versus Romney. Who tells the truth more reliably? Well, let’s take a look at their files.

The breakdown for controversial Obama claims:
92 were true
93 were mostly true
101 were half true
47 were mostly false
58 were false
6 were “pants on fire”

The breakdown for controversial Romney claims:
23 were true
21 were mostly true
43 were half true
26 were mostly false
27 were false
14 were “pants on fire”

To make things simpler, let’s consolidate the categories to create one list of truths and one list of lies. As a conservative estimate, we’ll put the “true” and “mostly true” claims in the truths category, and everything else in the lies category.

That would mean that of Obama’s 397 controversial claims, 185 were true and 212 were lies. Assuming this list is representative, we can conclude that Obama tells the truth 46% of the time.

Meanwhile, of Romney’s 154 controversial claims, 44 were true and 110 were lies. Again, if we take this to be a representative list, Romney tells the truth 29% of the time…barely more than half of Obama’s honesty rate. There’s certainly room for debate over whether Romney or Obama has a better plan for shaping America’s future, but there’s one incontrovertible fact that stands out here. Romney is a bigger liar than Obama. Much bigger.

Now, just for fun, let’s compare running mates Joe Biden and Paul Ryan. How honest are they?

The breakdown for controversial Biden claims:
11 were true
13 were mostly true
13 were half true
8 were mostly false
8 were false
3 were “pants on fire”

The breakdown for controversial Ryan claims:
2 were true
2 were mostly true
4 were half true
4 were mostly false
0 were false
2 were “pants on fire”

Of Biden’s 56 controversial claims, 24 were true and 32 were lies. So he tells the truth 43% of the time…surprisingly high, given his well-known loose tongue.

The Ryan sample is probably too small to be representative, but it’s all we’ve got, so let’s calculate it anyway. Of Ryan’s 14 controversial claims, 4 were true and 10 were lies…meaning he tells the truth 29% of the time, just like Romney.

For fun, let’s do a few other people. Here’s the honesty scoop on Sarah Palin!

The breakdown for controversial Palin claims:
12 were true
6 were mostly true
7 were half true
9 were mostly false
14 were false
5 were “pants on fire”

Of Palin’s 53 controversial claims, 18 were true and 35 were lies. So Sarah Palin is 34% honest…surprising that she’d get a higher honesty rating than Romney!

Now, Michele Bachmann. Ooh, boy.

The breakdown for controversial Bachmann claims:
5 were true
4 were mostly true
6 were half true
7 were mostly false
19 were false
12 were “pants on fire”

Of Bachmann’s 53 controversial claims, 9 were true and 44 were lies…which would make her just 17% honest. My favorite one of Bachmann’s absurd claims? Her claim on December 15th, 2011, in which she was debating Newt Gingrich and said smugly, “After the debate that we had last week, PolitiFact came out and said that everything I said was true.” That one got classified as “pants on fire”. Here’s a tip, M.B.: if you’re going to lie, don’t lie about what a fact-checker says about you. That’s just pathetic.

And speaking of which, because I have a tremendous beef with this guy, let’s review Newt Gingrich.

The breakdown for controversial Gingrich claims:
6 were true
6 were mostly true
13 were half true
13 were mostly false
13 were false
10 were “pants on fire”

Of Gingrich’s 61 controversial claims, 12 were true and 49 were lies…meaning the Gingrich has told the truth 20% of the time. Worse than Romney, Ryan, and Palin, but better than Michele Bachmann. Then again, who isn’t better than her?

Okay, now let’s look at our Speaker of the House, our lovable wooden puppet John Boehner.

The breakdown for controversial Boehner claims:
17 were true
3 were mostly true
5 were half true
11 were mostly false
16 were false
1 was “pants on fire”

Of Boehner’s 53 controversial claims, 20 were true and 33 were lies. That makes him 38% honest…fairly decent compared to the rest of his party, and probably not that surprising. After all, he doesn’t really create the obstructionism and scheming in the Republican Party; he’s arguably just as much a hostage of it as Obama is.

Now, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.

The breakdown for controversial Cantor claims:
5 were true
3 were mostly true
3 were half true
5 were mostly false
5 were false
2 were “pants on fire”

Of Cantor’s 23 controversial claims, 8 were true and 15 were lies. So Cantor is 35% honest.

Let’s analyze Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

The breakdown for controversial McConnell claims:
2 were true
2 were mostly true
2 were half true
1 was mostly false
3 were false
0 were “pants on fire”

Of McConnell’s 10 controversial claims, 4 were true and 6 were lies. So McConnell tells the truth 40% of the time…very good for a Republican. Then again, this is a small and potentially non-representative sample, and in any case I haven’t reviewed every single member of the GOP.

Come to think of it though, all of these guys have just been Republicans who tick me off. Let’s audit a Republican who I actually have a tremendous amount of respect for…former ambassador and governor of Utah, Jon Huntsman Jr. It has been my impression that he ran by far the cleanest and most sensible campaign in the Republican primaries…I think he would actually have made a terrific president. But let’s see if the numbers support my belief.

The breakdown for controversial Huntsman claims:
2 were true
4 were mostly true
5 were half true
5 were mostly false
1 was false
1 was “pants on fire”

Of Huntsman’s 18 controversial claims, 6 were true and 12 were lies…so Huntsman is 33% honest. I’m a little disappointed; I hoped it would be higher than that. Still, it was a small sample, and at least Huntsman told very few outright lies…most of his claims at least had some truth to them.

I think we all get the point about Republicans. None of them broke the 40% barrier for truth-telling, although Mitch McConnell planted his feet right on the line. Let’s audit some Democrats for their honesty as well, starting with House Minority Leader and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The breakdown for controversial Pelosi claims:
1 was true
2 were mostly true
9 were half true
2 were mostly false
4 were false
2 were “pants on fire”

Of Pelosi’s 20 controversial claims, 3 were true and 17 were lies. Yikes! That means she tells the truth only 15% of the time…less frequently than Michele Bachmann! However, I would point out that this simple analysis obscures a fair amount of important information. For Bachmann, the majority of her lies were egregious, wild fabrications, whereas Pelosi more frequently took true data but skewed it to her own ends (of her claims, almost as many were “half true” as every other category combined). Well, a liar is a liar, some might say, but I don’t know about that. Liars can still be grounded in reality. Pelosi is; Bachmann is not.

Now let’s check on our friend, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Recently, he came under furious criticism for his claim that Mitt Romney has not paid taxes for 10 years. That was a bald-faced lie…he had no evidence whatsoever to support this bold assertion. But is this lie representative of how Reid handles politics? Let’s find out!

The breakdown for controversial Reid claims:
2 were true
2 were mostly true
3 were half true
3 were mostly false
3 were false
2 were “pants on fire”

Of Reid’s 15 controversial claims, 4 were true and 11 were lies. That earns Reid a 27% honesty rating…Romney is more honest than that.

Now, let’s look at a Democrat who is generally adored, now he’s been out of office for a long time…former president Bill Clinton.

The breakdown for controversial Clinton claims:
4 were true
1 was mostly true
5 were half true
1 was mostly false
2 were false
2 were “pants on fire”

Of Clinton’s 15 controversial claims, 5 were true and 10 were lies. So Clinton told the truth 33% of the time…as great a president as he was, we can’t exactly call him an infallible source of wisdom.

I wanted to check out some more Democrats, like Barney Frank and Elizabeth Warren. But sadly, there was too little data to make any conclusions from them at all, even rough approximations.

Finally, let’s figure out one more thing. Ron Paul is so popular among a small but persistent segment of the population because he’s viewed as an idealist, a straight shooter who refuses to play political games and does what he truly believes is right. Even the majority of people who don’t actually support him often accept that he’s a paragon of honesty and integrity. Let’s see if the numbers support that conventional wisdom.

The breakdown for controversial Paul claims:
7 were true
8 were mostly true
8 were half true
5 were mostly false
7 were false
3 were “pants on fire”

Of Paul’s 38 controversial claims, 15 were true and 23 were false. So Ron Paul’s honesty rating is 39%. Conventional wisdom busted: Ron Paul tells the truth less frequently than Barack Obama. Or Joe Biden. Or Mitch McConnell!

So, to summarize all the important revelations here:

• Barack Obama tells the truth 46% of the time. His many lies notwithstanding, he is the most honest politician I have seen, from either party. And since he has the most data available, this also happens to be the figure I am most confident in.
• Joe Biden tells the truth 43% of the time. He may be an awkward orator, but he isn’t terribly dishonest by Washington standards.
• Mitt Romney tells the truth 29% of the time. This is a mediocre rating; in fact, many Republican leaders whom I have less respect for than Romney, such as Boehner, Cantor, and McConnell turn out to be more honest.
• Paul Ryan also tells the truth 29% of the time. So if Romney became president and something happened that rendered him unfit to carry out the remainder of his term, we may well expect a change of policy when Ryan took the lead, but we shouldn’t expect any more or less integrity. They’re both the same, and both bad.
• Sarah Palin tells the truth 34% of the time. That means she’s more honest than Mitt Romney! It turns everything I have assumed about politics upside-down; of the two of them, Sarah Palin has used rhetoric which is far more toxic. Then again, toxic doesn’t necessarily mean lies. The data wouldn’t factor in all the vicious, petty insults Sarah Palin threw at Obama and other Democrats. Even more mind-boggling is the implication that she is more honest than Bill Clinton. That is something I would never have guessed in a million years. Still, the data set is small enough for Clinton that an overestimation of his mendacity is quite possible. In any case, it’s clear that Sarah Palin is severely lacking in many other necessary skills besides honesty.
• Michele Bachmann tells the truth 17% of the time. No big surprise; she’s well known for having turned lying into an art form. But again, I wouldn’t have expected that Sarah Palin was twice as truthful.
• Newt Gingrich tells the truth 20% of the time. Also not a shock; the dude abandoned all pretense of being on the level during his 2012 bid for the White House. I’ll never understand how he hung on so long.
• John Boehner tells the truth 38% of the time. Fairly good, considering the state of his party right now. In fact, of the three House Speakers I analyzed, he was by far the most honest. Maybe that explains why he has a hard time keeping the Tea Partiers in line.
• Eric Cantor tells the truth 35% of the time. Nothing too notable here; just a standard run-of-the-mill liar.
• Mitch McConnell tells the truth 40% of the time. That may be inflated by the fact that the data set is too small to be reliable, but even if it’s true, it doesn’t let him off the hook for all of the obstructionism and partisan attacks he has led, and he doesn’t even bother trying to cover up.
• Jon Huntsman tells the truth 33% of the time. A bit disheartening to see that even one of the brainiest Republicans around is still a pathological liar. But at least he has more integrity than Romney. And 33% by no means precludes you from being a successful president…remember, Huntsman is tied with Bill Clinton.
• Nancy Pelosi tells the truth 15% of the time. This is the lowest honesty rating I have encountered for any politician, even the Tea Party nutjobs, but it’s deceptively low, since Pelosi tells few outright lies; most of her dishonesty comes from using true data to mislead people. But is that really any better than if she had just pulled the numbers out of her ass? I’ll leave that up to my readers to decide.
• Harry Reid tells the truth 27% of the time. Aside from the President and the Vice President, the Democratic leadership seems awfully dishonest. You could argue that’s cause to throw the Democrats out. But I personally think it’s a reason to cling to Obama as tightly as we can. Perhaps, if he had a little more clout and authority, he could keep his fellow Democrats in line.
• Bill Clinton tells the truth 33% of the time. It’s no big surprise that Clinton hasn’t always been honest with us (“I did not have sex with that woman…”), but as a man who presided over a tremendously strong economy and a tremendously solvent government, we put a lot of trust in him when he gives his two cents on current affairs. Perhaps we shouldn’t be so hasty.
• Ron Paul tells the truth 39% of the time. By Washington standards, that’s pretty good, but it still shoots to pieces the myth that he is a sincere idealist. He bends to the culture of dishonesty just the same as any other politician. Perhaps he shoots straight on a few issues most other politicians skirt, but that just means he has a different set of goals than the others, not that he’s more honest. The numbers speak for themselves.

And, to summarize even further, here’s a list of all fifteen politicians, ordered by honesty:

1. Barack Obama (46% honest)
2. Joe Biden (43% honest)
3. Mitch McConnell (40% honest)
4. Ron Paul (39% honest)
5. John Boehner (38% honest)
6. Eric Cantor (35% honest)
7. Sarah Palin (34% honest)
8. Bill Clinton (33% honest) [tie]
9. Jon Huntsman (33% honest) [tie]
10. Mitt Romney (29% honest) [tie]
11. Paul Ryan (29% honest) [tie]
12. Harry Reid (27% honest) [tie]
13. Newt Gingrich (20% honest)
14. Michele Bachmann (17% honest)
15. Nancy Pelosi (15% honest)

I urge my readers to go and check out PolitiFact for themselves; you’ll find all sorts of awesome things. And I’m prepared to bet that there are dozens of lies each of us believe that have been debunked on that site, and are sitting there, just waiting for you to uncover them.

Politifact should be on national televison.

I really like this post, but like with all statistics you should take everything you read with some degrees of freedom, especially small and/or incomplete sample sizes. And especially if the one doing the statistics is biased (no offense). I personally like the outcome of this, but I know many who will cry foul.

extremecapitalism:

tofamoustocare:

If you dont pay income taxes, you cant talk about them.

If you dont have wealth, you cant talk about the wealthy.

If you dont have a gun, you cant talk about gun control.

If your not facing execution, you cant talk about the death penalty.

If you dont create jobs, you cant talk about employment.

Do you morons get how stupid that line of reasoning is?

Does everybody get how hilarious this is though? It’s the epitome of liberal groupthink. “YOU CAN’T HAVE AN OPINION.” You’re not allowed to think. You’re not allowed to talk. You do not fit our parameters. Adjust yourself. Reabsorb into the collective.

I really don’t think this reasoning is stupid. Here’s why most of your examples are bad:

You can be shot by someone elses gun, that’s a good reason to be concerned. 

You a) can someday be wealthy. b) used to be wealthy. c) can be underrepresented because the wealthy are buying politicians who are supposed to represent you. d) can have any aid you receive threatened because of the bought politicians. - I don’t care what the wealthy do with their money as long as they pay their share and don’t violate anyone’s rights.

You can have family facing execution, another good reason to be concerned. You could also some day be wrongfully facing execution, shit happens.

You can be an employee. That’s a good reason to be concerned about jobs. Or unemployed, that’s an even better reason. You could be discriminated against in places of employment.

As for the taxes, well you may have a point there. People not paying income tax shouldn’t really talk about income tax. *cough* Romney *cough cough*

Anyone can have an opinion about a woman’s uterus, but that doesn’t mean that opinion should be taken into account. My abortion does not affect anyone except maybe the father. And even then my rights over my body outweigh his paternal rights.