The excuses for Obama’s lies are more revealing than the lies themselves
President Obama repeatedly and brazenly lied to the American people about keeping their health insurance plans and their doctors, and now he uses sophistry and more lies to weasel out of it, adding that they should just “Shop around” for a new one if they lost the one they had.
Here’s a three-and-a-half-minute excerpt from Obama’s speech, including (at about 1:33) the part where he uses that phrase:
I was going to analyze what he said in the excerpt, but I quickly became overwhelmed by the magnitude of the task. Although it’s short, it contains so many lies, prevarications, distortions, errors, and attempts to mislead that the analysis would be novella length.
And to what point? There are those who have noticed and been offended by lie after lie after lie, and those who have either been taken in by them, are not paying attention, minimize them, excuse them, or applaud them because the ends justify the means and they agree with his ends.
Is there even one liberal talking head on TV or pundit in print who has admitted that the president flat-out lied? Is there one who hasn’t offered a convoluted excuse that should fill that person with shame but somehow does not? The only one I’ve seen so far who admits Obama lied is Douglas Schoen, and he’s hardly any sort of Democrat at all, although he still calls himself one. He opposed Obama’s 2012 run, and some time ago declared the ACA a “disaster” for the Democratic Party.
So as a Democrat, Schoen certainly has a large asterisk next to his name.
The others offer a cornucopia of excuses, proving (if there had previously been a particle of doubt) that they have given up any pretense of integrity. Smilingly, they present the official talking points, from “he didn’t know the truth when he made the promises” (despite this) to “it was an incomplete statement; what he really meant was…” to “all the canceled policies were junk and those who liked them fools, so we must make the decision for them in order to protect them from their terrible judgement” to “oh, it only affects a few people anyway.”
Obama doesn’t plead ignorance—most likely because that would be to admit error, and Obama does not acknowledge errors. His stance is basically that there was absolutely nothing he did wrong. But as you can see from the tape, he does offer his own versions of the other excuses.
This is how tyranny comes to America. Watching the smug faces behind him during the Faneuil Hall speech I sense yet again that this is a plot I’ve seen before, but with slightly different lines and characters. I’m pretty sure the worst excuse of them all would be the “we must make the decision for them” one. That thought is the base on which the tyranny rests.
Some of those nodding, smiling people around Obama while he made that speech want to take over control because they love power itself. Some are just arrogant and think they know best and can actually create a better world. Some are mere followers who bask in reflected glory and like to dance in a ring. But they all have conceded that they have the right to do this.
[NOTE: A bunch of excuses from the administration itself, especially the “incomplete statement” one: it wasn’t a lie, it was a “simplification.” Note, also, that Jonathan Gruber, MIT economist and architect of Obamacare, uses the minimization excuse: the “president’s description of it was ‘pretty low on the totem pole of political overstatements.'” Wow: “overstatement.” From an economist, yet.]
How can you go shopping when the store is closed and when it opens there is only one approved product?
A lot of people, whether they are Democrat supporters like Mitsu or those who technically don’t support socialist policies, can rationalize a single person or leader’s deception as a one off thing.
However, when the cover up, damage control, and propaganda operations become active, it becomes so much more difficult to rationalize it as a “one off” deception or lie.
“Watching the smug faces behind him”, “nodding, smiling” . . .
Bingo. Not really grotesque — except that I know I see it that way in the context — nor exceedingly ugly-looking, nor frightfully mean-looking, nor at all angry-looking, nor particularly anything-looking.
Just “smug, nodding, smiling”. The face of authoritarian evil.
The Infantile Majesty is a chronic-pathological LIAR. His hero & ‘polar north’, Dr.Alinsky, encouraged constant lying as the most basic premise of his ideology of neighborhood activism. Ya know, for the Greater Good. (*See Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Che, Pol Pot, Ho, Mao, Allende, Fidel, Kim, Deng, Lin Pao, etc, etc, etc, etc..*)
Wasn’t the Rubicon crossed when Bill Clinton looked in the camera and said “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky,” or when he said “It all depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is,” or when he had all his top people, including Vice President Gore and Secretary of State Albright, line up behind him and state that they believed 100% of what he said about the whole sordid mess?
Lying for a good cause is OK and since all the lefty causes are good continual lying is required.
@Neo
Here’s an article that addresses your question about the number of winners vs. losers in the exchanges. Specifically, it makes the point that each victim of Obamacare will influence those closest to them (friends, family, etc.) and have a multiplier effect:
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=2212AF8A-99F6-4115-BDA6-FA38F5D060DF
2008 – “Fool me once, shame on you”
2012 – “Fool me twice, shame on me”
And if “a fool and his money are soon parted”, so to can fools part from their liberty.
“So this is how liberty dies…with thunderous applause.” ominously stated by the fictional character Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman) in “Star Wars III: The Revenge of the Sith” as she watches Emperor Palpatine tell a cheering Senate that he had taken all power away from them to form a Galactic Empire
Mr. Frank,
“How can you go shopping when the store is closed and when it opens there is only one approved product?”
You remind me of the old photos from the 1960s showing the Russian people lined up for the privilege of shopping for necessities at a store which had less to sell than the demand. All the while the apparatchiks shopped freely at GUM.
So here we are, citizens of the USSA, being forced to queue up, waiting for the cyber store to open so that we can buy our govt approved product all while the govt apparatchiks sail on their yachts and fly in their private jets.
It’s a cynic’s concept of truth, that it does not exist, or is at the least relative.
“Tyrannical ambition is nothing new, and throughout human history it has nearly always presented itself to men in the guise of idealism.” – Paul Rahe (Found this quote on the internet some time ago.)
” . . . those nodding, smiling people around Obama . . . “
It really would be quite laughable, those smiling nodding heads, while the lone dissenter is “escorted” out of the forum if it weren’t for the fact that this is bad, really bad for the future of the US and the world when these kinds of tactics are used to “control” affairs and the news media is quite silent.
There is an old old depiction of the problem Pambasileias ClownDisaster finds himself bemired with, in Xenophon’s Cyropaedeia, I:vi.,22, father Cambyses addressing his son, Cyrus:
*** “There is no shorter road, my son,” said he, “than really to be wise in those things in which you wish to seem to be wise; and when you examine concrete instances, you will realize that what I say is true. For example, if you wish to seem to be a good farmer when you are not, or a good rider, doctor, flute-player, or anything else that you are not, just think how may schemes you must invent to keep up your pretensions. And even if you should persuade any number of people to praise you, in order to give yourself a reputation, and if you should procure a fine outfit for each of your professions, you would soon be found to have practiced deception; and not long after, when you were giving an exhibition of your skill, you would be shown up and convicted, too, as an imposter.” ***
Ann, 3:04 pm —
Maybe when campaigning Lyndon Johnson insisted in 1964 that he would not send American boys to fight an Asian boys’ war. [My recollection is that he was already intending to do just that even as he said what he was saying on the campaign trail.]
Or even before? We Americans have been incredibly forgiving [when it’s a Democrat darling in the White House — and before the Viet Nam War escalation, LBJ was very much the media darling; he was so-o-o much more acceptable in polite society than that evil, extreme reactionary Barry Goldwater].
The Aryans, before Islamic jihad destroyed their culture in Iran, believed boys needed to be thought 3 things until they are adults.
1. Riding
2. Archery
3. How to despise lies
That linked 2005 “dance in a ring” post of yours about Bush, the left, and the Iraq War is terrific, Neo. This part seems to pinpoint what motivates and sustains those either applauding or countenancing all the Obama lies:
A few edits and that “reductionist principle” fits just perfectly in the case of Obama’s lies: In any power struggle between members of the Democratic party and the Republican party the Democrats are always right.
OT but not really – I just returned from a walk in my ultra-lib Silicon Valley neighborhood where I saw the following bumper sticker:
“Republicans hate kittens”
Strip away the sophistry, the double-talk, and the bushwah, not to mention the outright lies like “You can keep it” – that’s all they’ve got, isn’t it?
In fact that gives me an idea for another bumper sticker:
“No, you CAN”T keep it!”
Have you been seeing the ads around the Internet for eHealth? “America’s #1 health insurance site.” Pretty funny. Shouldn’t health.gov be #1?
Wow, T! You just gave me great pause….
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Ann:
For some of us, the Rubicon was crossed when we discovered that the guys who got drafted and sent to the jungle to die all seemed to have come from families that didn’t have political connections or wealth.
Shortly after that, Richard Nixon looked the nation in the eye and said “I am not a crook.”
I was became liberal back then, but I’m older and wiser (and sadder) now. I’d take Nixon back in a heartbeat.
“Republicans hate kittens”
“Strip away the sophistry, the double-talk, and the bushwah, not to mention the outright lies like “You can keep it” — that’s all they’ve got, isn’t it?” FOAF
Yes. Tragically the 2012 election conclusively demonstrated it to be all they need.
“Reason is poor propaganda when opposed by the yammering, unceasing lies of shrewd, evil and self-serving men. The capacity of the human mind for swallowing nonsense and spewing it forth in violent and repressive action has never yet been plumbed.” R.A. Heinlein
Half of America resists the passing of the USA, while half work for the emergence of the USSA, the United Socialist States of America…
I’d take Nixon back in a heartbeat.
By American political standards back then, he wasn’t a crook. The FBI and intel apparatus that he inherited had been digging up political dirt and info on Republicans since at least FDR’s time, and giving it to the reigning President. Whether he knew about it or not, whether the FBI guys setup Nixon up or not, all this was “normal” at the time.
The media was used as cat’s pawns to make it seem otherwise, just like now, but that’s no different.
Also, Johnson and JFK were the ones that lied to the public about starting a war in East Asia. Nixon was just the guy tasked with cleaning things up and pulling a victory from a defeat. Which would have went as well as Iraq in 2006 if the Democrats hadn’t diverted funding from South Vietnam into their own pockets.
Here is the only liberal I have seen stand up to the President’s lie:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/02/debbie-wasserman-schultz-bill-maher_n_4205123.html
In a Friday appearance on HBO’s “Real Time With Bill Maher,” Wasserman Schultz batted down Maher’s suggestion that “the ship has sailed” on Obama’s “credibility.”
“It was not a lie, let’s just be very clear,” Wasserman Schultz said. “So let me knock that down right away. When the president and myself and every other Democrat that talked about that if you like your health care, you can keep it, that was referring to the overwhelming majority of Americans who had health care.”
…Maher worked off that point, questioning whether the issue for Americans was one of truth over quality of the plans. Wasserman Schultz responded that the lie debate was “arguing over minutiae” — a point that Maher fired back at in disagreement.
“To a lot of Americans, it’s not minutiae and I think they’re insulted when you say that because they think it’s something important when the president doesn’t square up with them,” Maher said.”
notherbob2, 1:26 pm —
I do believe I’ve seen that video clip. Some reactions:
Wasserman-Schultz: the less said the better, aside from the fact that I richly detest the woman. The usual talking points with the usual omissions. Been there done that. No amplification needed here (let’s save bandwidth).
Rob Reiner: the Republicans are at fault for not helping ACA work. Yes, and if, just as an example, a comprehensive immigration act were passed that provided that all those here illegally had to return to their country of origin and apply for citizenship, Democrats would help implement such an act? Gimme a king-sized break. Let’s have a level playing field here. In this political environment, to matter-of-factly expect an opposition party to help implement an extremely controversial and bittterly rammed-through act of the in-power party is asking a bit much — especially when it’s only a one-way street. Meathead indeed.
Bill Maher: I’ve saved this one for last. Maher off-handedly remarks that some people simply have been against the narcissist-in-chief [my term, not Maher’s] from the start, and Maher snarks, “I wonder why that could be”, wink-winkedly implying racial prejudice against the affirmative-action-poster-child-in-chief [my term again, folks]. I and/or neo and/or most commenters here (excluding, I suppose, Mitsu and his merry band of liberal types) could wax eloquent for minutes on end about exactly *why* we’ve opposed this liar-in-chief [my term, but hardly mine alone] from the start, and exactly *none* of the reasons is related to his racial pedigree. That snide Maher aside riles me up even more than the other panelists’ stupidities, I guess because it’s so snarkily implied. Part and parcel of the culture war we’re losing.
MJR, when Maher loses his head come the Day, it won’t matter what he can say later.
Just as we don’t care what a gun or knife thinks about doing a job, the same attitude should be taken with the Left’s tools.
Are you upset if a chainsaw calls you a rapist or racist? What does a tool think it is to call us anything?
Among other things, especially the intention to never admit ANY error, is the fine tuning of manipulation, such as understood in the documentary “Century of the Self.”
http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-century-of-the-self/
Not to mention these too smart senior advisors that are theoretical wizards, but have no real experience outside their world.
No wonder there is such a failure to govern.
Whenever you vote Republican, a kitten dies.
Now if only people recognized the truth of that concerning the Leftist alliance’s member, PETA. PETA tends to euthanize more pets and animals in existence than people realize.
The Left is always… special in ways people cannot imagine.
Ymarsakar concludes, 3:08 pm — “Are you upset if a chainsaw calls you a rapist or racist? What does a tool think it is to call us anything?”
I’d like to respond with this account of an otherwise insignificant event. There was a video on Facebook in which Cher says something about how it would be better if all Republicans were dead, or something very much like that. I snarkily responded on Facebook that *were* Cher to die, it would be a mercy killing due to ugliness.
Dear wife responded by first accusing me of *wanting* Cher to die (I kid not at all). I pointed out to her my wording, underscoring that I did *not* wish Cher to die [though I freely admit to failing to see how the world is better with her in it], but I was merely offering my *own* snark: *were* Cher to die. Wife then took exception to my being nasty; since many of her relatives are Facebook friends with me, she was very embarrassed. I deleted my comment, in the name of peace for all humankind. (Also, I admit that others’ snark should not of itself give rise to my own contribution to snark.)
Okay, I got that off my chest.
Dear wife asked me what I care what Cher thinks (anyway). My point is, and I tried to communicate this to dear wife, remarks like Cher’s *and* like Bill Maher’s seep out into the culture-at-large. They become part of the zeitgeist, and all of us are affected by it. The notion persists that Republicans, or Tea Partiers, or other groups of those opposing creeping pee cee collectivism are a lesser form of humanity.
(Dear wife even remarked once that a few of her former co-workers [she’s in a different field now] regard Republicans, Tea Partiers, etc. as less evolved than the collectivists.)
That’s why that dame at IRS doesn’t see anything reprehensible about harrassing and shushing Tea Partiers. That’s why Meathead can’t see why we guys won’t go along to get along, when *his* guys would never dream of cooperating with *us* guys in my hypothetical immigration reform act in my example at 2:28 pm.
That’s why this seepage of Cher’s and Maher’s sewage into the culture are the actual seeds of genuine authoritarian repression. When we guys are seen by the power structure as less than human, and members of that power structure are truly vengeful and vicious, what is bound to follow?
Capn Rusty:
Some statistics for you:
What MJR said … it about breaks my heart to see how Tea Partiers have been ‘othered’ so effectively by the mass media, and celebrities like Cher. What was so damn offensive about being for fiscal responsibility, adherence to the Constitution and a *real* free market (not the crony-capitalist big corporation who can hire expensive K-Street lobbyists)? What was so offensive about being interested good citizens that we should be calumniated as being ignorant hillbilly racists?
I don’t go onto Facebook much to do combat in that arena – my Facebook presence is for my books and inoffensive cute photographs. I don’t want to kick potential readers of my books in the teeth. But … I don’t see how this all can end without tears. From someone.
My daughter has bought her own health care insurance for the last six months or so – a policy which she can just barely afford. Apparently the Obamacare version will more than double her monthly payment. She is not able to pay that amount – and likely will be uninsured, when and if Humana drops her. I think a lot of people at her age, and living on the edge will do that.
The next year or so will be interesting.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304527504579171710423780446
^^^^
This article spells out my claims about the granular nature of 0-care — down to the county level.
The days of getting medical services outside your specific county are coming to a rapid end.
As the above cancer survivor can attest, there are no end of patients that are currently drawing on resources across county lines.
She figures to be road kill by way of 0-care.
Certainly, any Death Panel will write her off. She’s already logged $1,200,000 with zero prospect of ever being cured.
In any other nation on Earth she’d have long since died.
Socialized medicine can’t justify such outlays, only heartless American insurance executives do so.
@blert
Funny how the conservative solution to healthcare was to expand insurance coverage across state lines, making for a larger and more competitive marketplace.
Seems like Obamacare is going in exactly the opposite direction.
Sgt Mom (@7:50),
“. . . it about breaks my heart to see how Tea Partiers have been ‘othered’ so effectively by the mass media’. . . .”
Well, I recently received my Gadsden flag, and from now on it will be on display every time I display the Stars and Stripes (just slightly lower, subject to flag-display etiquette). So, as far as I’m concerned, the MSM can “other” away.
Matt, I take it as HIGHLY significant that 0-care is structured around Medicaid as against Medicare.
Barry’s taken funding out of Medicare to flush it into Medicaid.
I can see HHS bending the rules after amnesty such that the illegals grandly qualify for Medicaid.
Both are of the one scheme: to eliminate the need for elections by creating a one-party state — which is what Hawaii and California (de facto) are.
As against that prospect, Barry has created an instrumentality that can’t be financed. He’s carving into the flesh of the body politic as we speak.
Human capital is being destroyed.
Tyranny is on the march as a consequence.
Is there even one liberal talking head on TV or pundit in print who has admitted that the president flat-out lied?
judge janine pirro
How can you go shopping when the store is closed and when it opens there is only one approved product?
obama heard chavez had that problem licked with toilet paper
@ blert
I suppose the nightmare scenario would be the establishment of the one-party US, extending decades into the future while we have to suffer under it.
The US is so broke that I’m not sure there’s enough time to execute that plan. If the economy collapses, not only will it make financing the welfare state extremely difficult but those in power *may* be (rightfully) blamed.
It seems Cloward-Piven is starting to look like the underwear gnomes:
Step 1) Expand the welfare state
Step 2) Collapse the current system
Step 3) Profit
Cloward-Piven seeks to bring Chaos. The thing about Chaos though, is that it can’t be controlled.
artfldgr:
Judge Jeanine Pirro is not liberal as far as I can tell:
You only have to see a couple of her rants against Obama to know she’s no liberal.
Per the article topic:
Obama’s lies are bad enough, but what I hate are the sycophants. People who, once cornered, are willing to rationalize his lies because they were “for a good purpose.”
This brings to mind the practice of discrediting witnesses on the stand, the purpose of which is to demonstrate to the jury that “if they’re willing to lie about X, how can you believe anything they say?”
Indeed, any rational person can’t.
And yet, maybe because conservative columnists need something to write about (or for the same morbid curiosity that’s piqued at an accident scene) we continue to discuss the words of these people when they should be shunned.
I wish someone would keep a blacklist of leftwing commentators online, including links to the work that truly discredited them for all time.
It would make it a lot easier to ignore them.
Here, let me start it off (sorta). I won’t read:
Paul Krugman
Greg Sargent
Ezra Klein
Anybody who hosts a show on MSNBC, but especially Chris Matthews and Melissa Harris-Perry.
Ymarsakar, Maher won’t lose his head on Der Tag. I understand he’s already applied for a position in the Ministry of Humor, as a People’s Humorist, Grade 3.
Well, this is a good time to revisit the National Health Service’s prison planet care.
The link takes you to an article in the UK Telegraph:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/yf555kq
An excerpt [there’s much more at the link]:
‘In September that year, an 86-year-old pensioner [retiree] was admitted to Stafford Hospital with an enlarged hernia. It should have been a fairly routine operation, but shortly before being discharged, Bella Bailey suffered a fall. Over the next fortnight Mrs Bailey’s condition rapidly deteriorated. Worse, she had to endure terrible conditions on the ward during her final days.
‘Her daughter Julie, 47, said: “My mum was supposed to come out after six weeks, but she was dropped by one of the nurses, and she never recovered. My mum would not let go of my hand after that because she was so afraid of the staff.”
‘Ms Bailey, of Lichfield, mounted a 24-hour vigil by her mother’s bedside and was shocked by what she witnessed. Poorly trained health care assistants brought meals to patients without helping them feed themselves, elderly men were left to wander the ward in a confused state, vulnerable patients were left hungry, dirty and frequently in pain. Some patients were so thirsty they were reduced to drinking from the flower vases scattered around the ward.
‘”Patients were screaming out in pain because they could not get pain relief. Patients would fall out of bed and we would have to go hunting for staff,” she said. “It was like a Third World country hospital.
‘”Things were so bad on the ward that I started feeding, watering and taking all the other patients to the lavatory,” she said. “It felt like it was not just my mum I watched dying, but all the others as well.”
‘One explanation for the shortage of staff Ms Bailey witnessed on the wards was the financial crisis gripping Mid Staffordshire General Hospitals NHS Trust during that period. For months the trust had been struggling to overcome the legacy of a £10 million deficit which had forced it to cut 150 jobs in order to balance the books.
‘Although the trust board said most of the cuts were being made in managerial and support services in order to minimise the impact on front-line services, Mr Bastin expressed his suspicion in April 2006 that many of the redundancies were among clinical staff and patient care was being affected.’
“Is there even one liberal talking head on TV or pundit in print who has admitted that the president flat-out lied?” Well, Clarence Page said he lied, but that it was one of those political lies and so didn’t count (sorry, can’t find the source right now). Page refers to himself as a “proud factory-town liberal” on his Trib blog.
@Beverly
“‘Although the trust board said most of the cuts were being made in managerial and support services in order to minimise the impact on front-line services, Mr Bastin expressed his suspicion in April 2006 that many of the redundancies were among clinical staff and patient care was being affected.’”
Reminds me of universities in the US. When cuts are made, the administrators are always last on the chopping block…same for the government, too. It’s the “golden rule” in practice.
I had a first-hand experience with NHS that really opened my eyes about the subject. As a 20-something tourist, I had a minor medical emergency. The “gimme dat” set would only remember not getting a bill on the way out; but my takeaway experience was about the conditions (at the public hospital, at least) which were … unexpected. Let’s just say that whatever British taxpayers paid to fund this incident was likely vastly overpaid.
“When cuts are made, the administrators are always last on the chopping block. . . .”
The fat is always in a position to cut the muscle and then proclaim: “See! We told you the budget cuts wouldn’t work.”
Neo:
“For some of us, the Rubicon was crossed when we discovered that the guys who got drafted and sent to the jungle to die all seemed to have come from families that didn’t have political connections or wealth.”
You tell me that only 1/3 of Viet Nam vets were drafted; the rest were volunteers. O.K. I’ll call re-write.
“For some of us, the Rubicon was crossed when we discovered that the guys who got drafted and sent to the jungle to die, or the guys who volunteered and were sent to the jungle to die, all seemed to have come from families that didn’t have political connections or wealth.”
Better?
They become part of the zeitgeist, and all of us are affected by it.
People only care because they think they are fellow humans. That’s sort of the problem, given human instincts and socialization.
If they matter, it is because dogs with rabies are a threat, that they have the power to destroy. What people are giving Leftist minions the authority to determine isn’t so much power, as social authority.
While one is not free to erase power from the powerful. One is free to deny the Left their “social” authority, morality, superiority.
Capn Rusty:
No, not better.
First of all, since you apparently just discovered the actual statistics, that Rubicon could only have been crossed for you within the last 24 hours.
In addition, you write that all of those who were “sent to the jungle to die seemed to have come from families that didn’t have political connections or wealth.”
Was John McCain not from a family with political connections or wealth? Or does he not count because he didn’t die? There were plenty of people like that.
See this, for example:
See notes 5 and 7 here for more. Suffice to say, “the science is not settled.”
Suffice to say, “the science is not settled.”
SCIENCE DENIER!!!!
Burn the witch! 😮
Neo:
O.K., I’ll call re-write again and change “all” to “a number higher than their percentage of the population.”
But also, consider this and the section regarding the Viet Nam era here.
The crossing of the Rubicon referred to in this thread meant when we first discovered how badly our government was lying to us. For me, that happened a lot more than 24 hours ago, Neo. At the latest, it occurred when I worked around Capitol Hill in the 70’s.
You also might recall that before 1968, college and graduate students got draft deferrals.
Capn Rusty:
See this, this, this, and most especially this.