When Republican Senator Jon Kyl asserted that ninety percent of Planned Parenthood’s activities centered around abortion, rather than the more accurate three percent, his office asserted that his statement was “not intended to be a factual statement.” My question is: How did they say that with a straight face? Did they really think that would justify such outrageous distortions to any but the most devoted, blindered right wing excuse-nik?
If Obama’s people claimed that the President had said something that was “not intended to be a factual statement,” it would define his presidency the way that, “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is” defined Clinton’s.
Last I checked, something not intended to be a factual statement is typically referred to as a “lie.” This does, however, serve as a convenient excuse for any horndog who’s willing to say whatever it takes to nail a girl. “You said you loved me!” “Yes, but that was not intended to be a factual statement.”
PAD
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I keep seeing people say that the base problem is that Planned Parenthood performs more abortions than any other organization, and therefore should not get government funding.
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On the one hand, this makes me wonder if hospitals should stop getting government funding since they are the source of more infections than any other organization. Obviously, they are a danger to the American people and must be stopped.
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On the other hand, I wonder if this is a self perpetuating issue. I’ve read that many hospitals and doctors refuse to perform abortions because most health care providers refuse to cover it. This makes Planned Parenthood the only recourse for some people.
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I saw an online video of a husband who confronted protesters outside of a Planned Parenthood, taking them to task for making his wife’s already difficult and heart wrenching day even worse. His unborn child had died in the womb, but was not expelled as a miscarriage. And, because the procedure was technically an abortion, their doctor refused to grant it. For his wife’s health, they had to turn to Planned Parenthood.
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I wonder if one were to back out all of the abortions done by Planned Parenthood which were to save the life of the mother, but that her regular doctor and hospital would not provide for financial or insurrance reasons, would the number even be as high as 3%?
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Theno
This makes Planned Parenthood the only recourse for some people.
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And that is by design. The Right seems to believe that since PP is where people generally must go for an abortion, if they can destroy PP, they’ll end all abortions.
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Instead, abortions will go to the back alley, where they won’t be safe and they certainly won’t be stopped.
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It’s also convenient for them because of the other services PP provides, such as birth control. Birth control is another ‘evil’ that many would like to go away. I mean, we can’t prevent those unwanted babies from being created and born in any way, can we?
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PAD: “None of which has anything to do with the fact that a GOP senator issued a bald-faced lie and backed it up by saying that it was never meant to be taken as truth.”
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Actually, it does. This has everything to do with it.
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You started a thread to talk about the “what” of an event, but Darin has come along to illustrate the “why” of the event. Kyl (still annoyingly with no “e” on the end) told a lie and knew he could get away with it with little to no blowback from his specific base or the Republican voters as a whole.
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He told a lie. He knew he was telling a lie and then he had his people explain that, yeah, it was a lie because he never intended to have what he said as a “fact” taken as the truth.
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That seems insane on the face of it. Who goes out to tell a lie and when caught admits that they were telling a lie but don’t care that they did it and expects no blowback or damage to their careers or credibility? Well, Kyl obviously. And he knew he could do it because he was attacking an organization that he connected to abortion in the attack he made while launching his lie into the public debate.
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He knew that because he was attacking something that so many carry such a strong ideological dislike of that they would do and say anything to excuse the lie or deny it outright. And along comes Darin to prove that he was 110% bang on.
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Planned Parenthood does abortions as 90% of everything they do. That’s a lie. It’s not even a lie that’s close to the factual figure. But, because the Darins of the world hate abortion and anyone or anything connected with it, it’s an okay lie to tell or even not a lie at all according to the Darins of the world.
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And the Darins of the world, because this is about something they have such an ideological hatred of, will do massive contortions to get around facing the simple facts of the matter or admitting that it is fact a lie.
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Kyl didn’t lie. Why? Well, because blacks in New York have a high percentage of abortions in their population.
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That has nothing to do with the simple facts of the matter, but it’s about the subject as a whole.
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Kyl didn’t lie. Why? Well, abortions are morally wrong.
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That has nothing to do with the simple facts of the matter, but it’s about the subject as a whole.
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For the Darins of the world, the lie is acceptable, maybe even not a lie at all, because the lie was made as a part of an attack on something they hate. Darin hates abortion, so anything that attacks abortion or any organization that is known as a provider of abortions is just fine even if it’s a lie. And Kyl knows that he can count on the Darins of the world so long as he keeps telling the lies about the things that the Darins of the world hate.
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Darin hates abortions, so the lies are okay or not even lies at all. And when confronted with the straight up, indisputable facts showing that Kyl lied, Darin will just throw out whatever anti-abortion nonsense that comes to his mind, related to the facts presented or not, as to why the lie wasn’t really a lie.
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He is, whether he likes me saying it or not, a fanatic for his cause. He is the “why” behind the “what” in the matter. He is what the Kyls of the world count on and lie for because the Kyls of the world know that they will always have the support of the Darins of the world so long as the lies they tell please the Darins of the world and the Darins of the world believe that the lies will ultimately help them in their crusade.
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So, yeah, does have something to do with it, Peter. It has everything to do with it actually.
Truthiness to a T.
Brilliant.I was going to leave a comment on this blog but you eloquently and clearly articulated my thought better than I could have ever done on my own.
Hmmm… I wonder how Obama’s office will react to his off mic gaffe (yes, I’ve learned how to spell the word “gaffe” finally). Hopefully, he will learn from Kyl’s example and NOT say that the comments were not intended to be taken as factual.
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What, don’t treat any mic your near like it’s a dead mic? Not quite the same as telling a lie with specific figures and then claiming it wasn’t a lie because you never intended the specific figures to be taken as facts even if that’s how you presented them.
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Besides, Obama already did that (the telling lies using specific figures part) Wednesday in his budget speech. He just hasn’t bothered having his people send out air headed statements excusing them so that air headed supporters can defend them or claim that they weren’t lies to begin with (yet.)
Of course, there is always the possibility that Obama was simply being old school.
I think he should say that he meant every dámņ word of it.
LARRY – “I think he should say that he meant every dámņ word of it.”
I think he should too, actually.
“Yes, Democrats have their fair share of tax-troubled individuals.”
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Uh, Geithner isn’t just an individual. he’s head of the stinking TREASURY!
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“But they’re not the party actively seeking even more tax breaks for the rich and corporations, as the GOP is doing within their “budget cutting”.”
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Which tax breaks for corporations are you talking about. can you name one specific one? because just like the simplistic Pelosi doing hewr usual demogogic routine by saying “big Oil” would b getting a break, chances are it just ain’t so.
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The only “break” Big oil would be getting is the ability to drill on more U.S. land. Which would mean they would pay more taxes, hire more workers, make us less dependent on foreign countries who hate us and cause prices at the pump to decrease for the average American. The bášŧárdš!
You do know that oil corporations benefit from government subsidies they don’t need, right?
Sasha,
“You do know that oil corporations benefit from government subsidies they don’t need, right?”
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You do know that many other industries get subsidies as well. like farmers NOT to grow stuff or to keep stuff like milk, high, right? And that the majority of these subsidies go not to “family farms” but corporate farms.
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Yet, no one bashes Big Farms or the agriculture industry.
I don’t see how the fact that Big Agro also receives subsidies it oughtn’t translates into a defense of oil corporations subsidies.
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(BTW, I have heard a fair amount of grumbling about Big Agro and their subsidies, especially in regards to ethanol.)
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“Yet, no one bashes Big Farms or the agriculture industry.”
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Actually they do. Not only have I done it myself, but I’ve seen news stories on cable channels and on the networks talking about the wasted money and the wasted food. It especially pìššëš me off because the one piece that (I think) Brian Williams did a few years back discussed the fact that the farmers that take the subsidies and turn around and destroy the food or dump the milk out have to do that by law. They can’t take it and give it to a homeless shelter or a food bank if they take the state or federal subsidies. They can have much needed for that could be going to starving people and they destroy it so that they can keep prices on items at a higher, more profitable rate and to get some extra cash on top of that from the government.
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But I think that most politicians and activists let that one die on the vine anytime anyone brings it up because Democrats know that they won’t get much traction from it and Republicans know that attacking that bit of wasteful spending will pull back the curtain on one of their favorite lines of bûllšhìŧ.
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Democrats can’t get people worked up about “salt of the earth” farmers. Even if they point out that most farms are giant corporation owned things, most people don’t have that image in their head. It’s like trying to attack granny and apple pie. Republicans are screwed because their favorite dodge to go to when talking about the estate tax is to claim that it will destroy poor people who own, amongst other things, family farms. If they were to go after the corporate subsides that all of those “family farms” are getting, then they lose one of their big lies from their arguments against the estate tax.
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Mush easier to demonize oil companies. Their large, smelly and most people almost automatically think Arabs and OPEC or )now) the BP disaster when you bring them up.
Mush easier to demonize oil companies.
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Well, the profits are so much larger with oil companies or many corporations compared to farmers.
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Like, in that link to the hoax that was pulled on GE. GE has billions in profit, yet employs an army of people who’s only job is to make sure the company pays $0 taxes.
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“Which tax breaks for corporations are you talking about. can you name one specific one? because just like the simplistic Pelosi doing hewr usual demogogic routine by saying “big Oil” would b getting a break, chances are it just ain’t so.
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The only “break” Big oil would be getting is the ability to drill on more U.S. land. Which would mean they would pay more taxes, hire more workers, make us less dependent on foreign countries who hate us and cause prices at the pump to decrease for the average American. The bášŧárdš!”
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It’s less about specifics and more about general corporate tax code combined with a few specifics. That’s one of the ways that the Left screws themselves in a lot of these discussions. Yes, there are provisions written into bills and passed along with other financial laws that are targeted specifically at “Big Oil.” But the really used and abused ones are the ones that any large (but interestingly not most of the small businesses that every leaps in front of a camera to proclaim their love for) corporation can use and that oil companies use in conjunction with the deals they’ve gotten as their industry perks.
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But, yeah, the oil companies also have some sweeter deals than most others and they use them to pay almost nothing in taxes when it’s all said and done and may even get more in subsidies and federal money than they pay in taxes in any given year.
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During the BP mess, there was an interesting piece in the financial news discussing how BP was ducking taxes in multiple ways on the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform. The obvious one was their flying the flag of the Marshall Islands on it since they registered there. Nice tax dodge that a lot of companies use. Fine, but it wasn’t the only trick they used.
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See, BP was leasing that rig. According to a letter they sent last year to the Senate Finance Committee, BP used a tax break for the oil industry to write off 70% of the rent for Deepwater Horizon. That worked out to something like a deduction of more than $225,000 a day since the lease began. But it gets better! According to a study by the Congressional Budget Office from back in 2005, capital investments like oil field leases and drilling equipment are only taxed at an effective rate of about 9%. That’s significantly lower than the overall rate of 25% for businesses in general and lower than virtually any other industry. Hëll, for some small and midsize oil companies, the tax on capital investments is so low that it is basically eliminated by the various tax credits that they’re given and as a result their returns on those investments are sometimes higher after taxes than before.
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Hey, I know I’d love if if I was earning more money after taxes than what my salary says I earn, but that’s not how things work for people who don’t have millions )or even billions) to dump into the pockets of politicians and political campaigns. To be sure, businesses as a whole make outa lot better than their mouthpieces like to pretend whenever someone mentions taxing them at a fair rate or reducing subsidies, but, yeah, oil companies have gotten some really sweet deals in the last few decades.
PAD, I am almost sorry that I started it and I set Darrin off, but I agree with Jerry Chandler. The Senator thinks he is fully justified in telling a lie.
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There will never be common ground here. One side see it as mass murder of innocents. The other side see it as a religious-political group trying to reduce humans to sheep that have no say over their own breeding choices.
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Honestly, I agree that worry over the poor innocent fetuses is hypocritical. It’s a lot deeper than that. It’s really about a group that sees sexual freedom as having destroyed a cherised, idealized social order, and everything that can restrict sexual freedom is very desirable.
Heh. I wonder if the GOP representatives who suddenly had to change their votes will tell their incredulous constituents that their public positions are not meant to be factual.
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Cute. They put the Republicans in the position of voting on the conservative bill of their creation that they say is a good bill but more of a compromise bill or the conservative bill of their creation that they keep telling their base that they would pass if only they could… and they panic and pass the one that they and they base claim is the lesser bill.
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That has the potential of being fun explaining later. They get to explain to their most rabid base that they either voted for the rabid base bill and died at the ballot box by having a huge turnout of democrats and moderates against them or they voted for the bill that is slightly less out of the mainstream and then die at the ballot box because their own rabid base either turns their backs on them or tries to replace them in the primaries with an even more extreme conservative.
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The Democrats (deservedly so) catch grief for being lousy at the games like this, but that was a very interesting win/win game they pulled off for themselves today.
I have to admit, I’m impressed. And I’m rarely impressed by House Democrats. If you’ve ever wondered about the figurative meaning of “hoist them on their own petard,” that’s it.
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PAD
Especially hilarious since, despite the fact that the Republican Study Committee who created the bill is comprised of over 170 GOP representatives, only 119 Congressional Repubs votes for its passage.
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Add to that Obama’s savaging of Representative Ryan’s budget plan and his recent gaffe (which was most certainly intended to be a factual statement and possibly was him taking a page from Jed Bartlett and going “old school”) and I’m beginning to think that the Dems are actually serious about getting into the game.
Gah! Caught in the filter.
Right wing tactic #1: Deny.
Right Wing tactic #2: Cry victim.
Right wing tactic #3: Change the topic to something morally gray and cannot be commented on unless by opinion.
He lied. He stated a fact, which would be the number, the number was wrong, and he then said the statement was not to be taken as a fact. That’s lying.
Right wing tactic #1: Deny.
Right Wing tactic #2: Cry victim.
Right wing tactic #3: Change the topic.
He lied. He stated a fact, which would be the number, the number was wrong, and he then said the statement was not to be taken as a fact. That’s lying.
He lied. He stated a fact, which would be the number, the number was wrong, and he then said the statement was not to be taken as a fact. That’s lying. What else are YOU arguing about Darin?
“Yet, no one bashes Big Farms or the agriculture industry.”
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“Actually they do. Not only have I done it myself, but I’ve seen news stories on cable channels and on the networks talking about the wasted money and the wasted food. It especially pìššëš me off because the one piece that (I think) Brian Williams did a few years back discussed the fact that the farmers that take the subsidies and turn around and destroy the food or dump the milk out have to do that by law. They can’t take it and give it to a homeless shelter or a food bank if they take the state or federal subsidies. They can have much needed for that could be going to starving people and they destroy it so that they can keep prices on items at a higher, more profitable rate and to get some extra cash on top of that from the government.”
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I can’t remember who I heard it from, but long years ago someone told a story about how, during the Depression, subsidized farmers growing potatoes were taking entire crops, chopping them up, dying them purple and selling them as hog feed. This when people were starving.
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One of Larry Niven’s minor bits in “The Return of William Proxmire” involved Proxmire arguing with Andrew Minsky over milk price supports, then saying, “To Hëll with you, I’m not a senator anymore.”
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I’m starting to think maybe we need to toss out the lot. Maybe a new revolt is called for. I don’t expect to see it happen, though.
I’d suggest to anybody reading this to not bother with Darin, even insulting him. On another board (I’ll link it if you want to see for yourself) he was so utterly toxic with his talking points bûllšhìŧ that by the time he left it was a semi-weekly event where a thread would descend into people mocking him for doing it. A lot of times it was on non-political threads too. The only reason he didn’t get banned was because he was pals with an admin who’s similar politically.
And regarding lying, Darin:
“When I was in grade school, I had text books that clearly stated that our solar system has 9 planets in it. Today, it’s an accepted fact that we have 8 instead. Were those text books from my grade school “lying?” Of course they weren’t.”
Here’s a relevant quote from Darin regarding his thoughts on lying and science.
“(It’s based upon the fantasy of evolution, after all.)” – Darin
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Ha!.
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Kyl’s new tactic for dealing with the statement? Scrub the record.
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Sen. Kyl Erases His False Statement On Planned Parenthood From Congressional Record
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http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/04/sen-kyl-erases-his-false-statement-on-planned-parenthood-from-congressional-record.php?ref=fpa
So apparently the pic of Weiner’s weiner is in fact genuine, despite his initial claims that it wasn’t. I wonder if his initial claims were intended to be taken as fact?