The Totally Useless, Non-Scientific BBO Opinion Poll for Current Events

[kenrexford]

Ken, we are talking about government here, not about who is the most fun on a reality TV show.

 

Rik

Obviously. And you have a point. However not real impressed with the status quo "serious" government. Not many are. The only practical way to get to the Republican nomination process was to be wildly different. The only way to take on Hillary Clinton is about the same. That does not necessarily translate into actual governing. We they find out.

[hrothgar]

The NYT compiled a list of the "on the record" lies Trump told over the last seven days

 

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/09/24/us/elections/donald-trump-statements.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

[kenberg]

A couple of pages back I asked, in keeping with the Poll idea of the thread, if anyone was still undecided in Trump/Clinton and, if so, what they were waiting for. In the country at large, apparently there are still people making up their minds or else re-thinking their decision. For example see . Click on registered/ likely for a clearer view.

 

So. Where are we headed?

 

I'll phrase a question for the candidates.

 

It is natural that Assad wishes to regain control in Syria. Russia appears to be backing his effort. The NYT quoted an official describing the latest Russian-Syrian effort in Aleppo as Dresdenesque. Having run out of hospitals to bomb, they are bombing the water supply.

Please describe the response that you recommend.

 

Another:

 

Recently Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf went before the Senate. He began with a statement accepting responsibility and then, under questioning, made it clear that he accepts no responsibility whatsoever. What is a Wells Fargo, he might as well have asked.

Please describe what should be done. For example, would you recommend waterboarding?

 

 

Of course I imagine the questions will be more along the lines of

Mr. Trump: The Times ran a story last May in which a woman said that, when she was a 26 year old model and you were 44, you asked her to change into a bikini at a pool party. Do you deny this?

Secretary Clinton: Do you feel that this disqualifies Mr. Trump for the presidency?

 

[helene_t]

Having run out of hospitals to bomb, they are bombing the water supply.

Please describe the response that you recommend.

What about sponsoring the Saudi bombing of hospitals in Yemen, just to divert attention?

[hrothgar]

Here's a similar analysis by Politico

 

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/2016-donald-trump-fact-check-week-214287

 

After he lied on Sept. 16 that he was not the person responsible for the birtherism campaign to delegitimize Barack Obama’s presidency, POLITICO chose to spend a week fact-checking Trump. We fact-checked Hillary Clinton over the same time.

Story Continued Below

We subjected every statement made by both the Republican and Democratic candidates — in speeches, in interviews and on Twitter — to our magazine’s rigorous fact-checking process. The conclusion is inescapable: Trump’s mishandling of facts and propensity for exaggeration so greatly exceed Clinton’s as to make the comparison almost ludicrous.

Though few statements match the audacity of his statement about his role in questioning Obama’s citizenship, Trump has built a cottage industry around stretching the truth. According to POLITICO’s five-day analysis, Trump averaged about one falsehood every three minutes and 15 seconds over nearly five hours of remarks.

In raw numbers, that’s 87 erroneous statements in five days.

[kenberg]

On this sort of note, see

https://www.washingt...omepage%2Fstory

 

Possibly the most demanding job in the Trump campaign is defending Trump's remarks without sounding like a blithering idiot.

[Al_U_Card]

So then, once DT is elected, it will be an improvement over the current situation.... :ph34r:

[kenrexford]

Here's a similar analysis by Politico

 

http://www.politico....eck-week-214287

 

 

 

This is the kind of "fact checking" that causes many people to roll their eyes.

 

For example, consider the first 12:

 

1. "Manufacturing" is a large concept. There is a difference between manufacturing generally and product-specific manufacturing. If the green widget industry is doing well but the red widget industry is getting hammered, then buying red widgets overseas because of manufacturing being gone is not inconsistent with green widget manufacturing booming. The "fact check" is too general.

 

2. A citation to a source with "questioned methodology" is not false. It is debatable. A debatable point is not false simply because you side with one perspective.

 

3. A win-loss ratio of, say, 50-50 does not prove that the WTO is fair if the win-loss ration should be 75-25.

 

4. A gain of 3 million jobs is not a NET gain if the loss is, say, 10 million jobs. For example, if 3 million importing jobs replace 10 million manufacturing jobs, there is no gain. The numbers provided as a "fact check" do not answer that question.

 

5-6. The fact that the "vast majority" of tax increases are on the rich does not mean that there are not substantial tax increases on the poor.

 

7. It is not a false statement to opine that HRC is full of crap with her latest claims. It is opinion, and probably valid.

 

8. The unemployment rate is bogus. Everyone knows this. Labor participation rate is more accurate.

 

9. Sure, overstated by a bit, but still frightening.

 

10. This is a matter of degree. In my opinion, Politico is more wrong than Trump on this point. Average wages includes rich people making WAY more than before, as an aside.

 

11. "doing nothing" usually means "doing nothing meaningful."

 

12. Being optimistic is not a lie.

 

When your first 12 fact checks are filled with this sort of analysis, I am not impressed. I do not see the same sort of picky, opinion-based analysis as to HRC's supposed truthfulness.

 

 

 

[kenrexford]

The funniest part about all of this can be Illustrated in the example of fact checking Trump on the issue of wages. Trump supposedly is telling a lie in that regard. HRC however is not cited as telling a lie in that regard. However Hillary has said that American workers have not had a raise in so many years. When they are both saying the same thing but Trump is lying and Hillary is telling the truth with the exact same point then the fact checking is bogus.

[kenberg]

Some of these statements could be looked at with an open mind. I'll take number 10.

 

Trump: "We're keeping jobs, they're bad jobs. We're losing our good jobs."

I would call it simplistic rather than a lie.

 

Politico: "The average hourly wage for American workers was $23.06 five years ago in August 2011; last month it was $25.73. The relatively slow pace of wage increases is a frequent criticism of the economy under Obama — and it's spread unevenly across the workforce — but it's not the broad collapse of good jobs that Trump is portraying."

 

Also simplistic.

 

$25 per hour is 50K per year for a 40 hour week with two weeks unpaid vacation. So assume 50K a year. How should we look at this figure? As it happens, I filed the income tax statement for my father in the 1950s so I can tell you that his income was about 5K per year in 1955. I went to the CPI inflation calculator at http://data.bls.gov/...1955&year2=2016 and found that 5K in 1955 translates to a little under 45K in 2016. So 50K is not that much of a gain compared with what I thought of as working middle class, but not a loss either, and 1955 was considered a good time for the working man. My mother did not have a job, we owned our home, in 1953 we bought a new Chevrolet and paid cash. I went to a decent school. Life was reasonably stable.

 

KenR points out, and I also noticed it right away, that this $25.73 per hour is an average. This could be a problem for making any good use of this figure, depending a bit on who is included. Lawyers charge by billable hours. So do consultants. There are a lot of people making significantly less than this average. [An aside, I seem to recall someone running for office who promised that if he is elected everyone would have a job that pays more than the national average.] Averages can definitely hide problems.

 

It seems to me that lots of kids are growing up today in considerably worse circumstances than I did. I enjoyed my childhood, I would like kids today to enjoy their childhood. Many of them are pretty much raising themselves. Exactly how this happens is not totally clear to me. Some of the oversimplification that we hear drives me a bit nuts.

 

Bottom line: I am hoping for, but not really expecting, something better than:

"Our jobs suck."

"You lie."

[kenrexford]

Runs like this:

 

Trump, "Jobs suck."

Politico, "Trump lies."

Hillary, "There is a gap between the rich and the poor that keeps growing. Main Street has not had a pay raise in 15 years. We need better paying jobs."

Politico, "Hillary speaks the truth."

Mass of voters, "Per politico, Trump lies more than Hillary."

[kenberg]

With regard to trade, jobs, etc here would be a good question for HC:

 

You once supported the TPP, you called it the Gold Standard, you now reject it in its current form. Please explain, specifically, which features of the TPP in its current form have led you to this change of view. In particular, do you believe that if a few fairly modest adjustments could be made then you would favor its passage or do you believe it should be scrapped in its entirety?

[kenrexford]

With regard to trade, jobs, etc here would be a good question for HC:

 

You once supported the TPP, you called it the Gold Standard, you now reject it in its current form. Please explain, specifically, which features of the TPP in its current form have led you to this change of view. In particular, do you believe that if a few fairly modest adjustments could be made then you would favor its passage or do you believe it should be scrapped in its entirety?

I had nothing to add but I thought your suggestion was so good that it needed to be quoted and reposted so people had to read it twice.

[Cyberyeti]

I've never heard a politician dissolve into prolonged laughter when asked a legitimate question before. Step forward Emily Thornberry who holds one of the shadow foreign policy positions.

 

The question was (sense correct possibly not exact words):

 

"It's quite possible Donald Trump will be elected US president, where do you think he and Jeremy Corbyn will find common ground ?"

[shyams]

I've never heard a politician dissolve into prolonged laughter when asked a legitimate question before. Step forward Emily Thornberry who holds one of the shadow foreign policy positions.

 

The question was (sense correct possibly not exact words):

 

"It's quite possible Donald Trump will be elected US president, where do you think he and Jeremy Corbyn will find common ground ?"

 

Could the laughter have been about Jeremy Corbyn ever becoming Prime Minister? or was it solely in connection with Trump ever becoming President? I feel the former is much more unlikely than the latter.

[kenberg]

Could the laughter have been about Jeremy Corbyn ever becoming Prime Minister? or was it solely in connection with Trump ever becoming President? I feel the former is much more unlikely than the latter.

 

I took it to be a concept for the Theater of the Absurd. An updated version of Travesties perhaps.

 

Anyway I am preparing for the debate. Alcohol is involved.

[Cyberyeti]

Could the laughter have been about Jeremy Corbyn ever becoming Prime Minister? or was it solely in connection with Trump ever becoming President? I feel the former is much more unlikely than the latter.

 

Not from one of his team I suspect. I think it was just the vanishingly small chance of them agreeing on anything important.

[WellSpyder]

"It's quite possible Donald Trump will be elected US president, where do you think he and Jeremy Corbyn will find common ground ?"

A whole new vision for the so-called "special relationship"..... :)