NY Times says Trump is "lying"

[A dot Ham]

A lot of people consider the NY Times as the "paper of record" for the whole country. That might be a stretch but it's widely known and regarded highly by the center and left.

For the first time I can recall the NY Times has said a politician is "lying". Pretty harsh.





Trump Won’t Back Down From His Voting Fraud Lie. Here Are the Facts.

WASHINGTON — During a private meeting with congressional leaders on Monday, President Trump asserted that between three million and five million unauthorized immigrants had voted for his Democratic opponent and robbed him of a victory in the national popular vote.
There is no evidence to support the claim, which has been discredited repeatedly by numerous fact-checkers.
That did not stop Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, from standing by the president’s words on Tuesday during a briefing with reporters at the White House. “As I said, I think the president has believed that for a while based on studies and information he has,” Mr. Spicer said.
That much appears to be true. Mr. Trump repeatedly raised doubts about the integrity of the American voting system in the period before the election in November and has falsely said since his victory that millions of people voted illegally.

Pressed to present the evidence on Tuesday, Mr. Spicer appeared to conflate two different studies that Mr. Trump’s staff had previously cited in defending his claim. “There’s one that came out of Pew in 2008 that showed 14 percent of people who voted were noncitizens,” Mr. Spicer said. “There’s other studies that have been presented to him.”
Here are the facts
Neither study Mr. Spicer apparently referred to supports Mr. Trump’s claim.
The first study was conducted in 2014 by professors at Old Dominion University and discussed on Monkey Cage, a blog hosted by The Washington Post. Using data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study, the researchers found that 14 percent of noncitizens who responded to the survey in 2008 and 2010 said they were registered to vote.
The problem is that the study relied on flawed data and was roundly criticized by political scientists who said that a more careful examination of the data revealed no evidence that noncitizens had voted in recent elections.
The second study, conducted in 2012 by the Pew Center on the States, found that 24 million voter registrations were no longer valid or “significantly inaccurate”; that more than 1.8 million dead people were still listed on the voter rolls; and that almost three million were registered in multiple states, probably because they had moved from one state to another.
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The study did not find evidence that those errors led to voter fraud, however, simply that they presented avoidable costs and inefficiencies in the electoral process.
The primary author of the study, David Becker, made that plain in a Twitter post in November.

“It does occur,” he said of voter fraud, declining to quantify the scope. “There are always arguments on both sides about how much, how frequent and all the rest.”

That's an interesting quote to end your article on. I'm no writing expert but I seem to remember that your final thoughts should re-emphasize your argument/statement, not create doubt to its validity.

It's like a Tootsie Pop commercial.

Title - How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop?

Body - 1, 2, 3, CRUNCH!

Conclusion - The world may never know!

Excellent read. I can see why the "mid and the left" hold the NY Times in such high regard.

If you guys are going to be successful in Trump bashing its going to at the very least be solid in the middle, and right leaning otherwise its just going to come across like sore losers.

Truth be told REPORTING FACTS would probably be enough to sell papers. Trump is outrageous and entertaining without having to fabricate some story about it. Keep the fiction out, report the facts.

I didn't see very many facts in the article honestly. Just a lot of he said she said. A lot of twitter posts by David Becker, who's job it would appear is very dependent on voters feeling confident in the system.

I am confused though. Where exactly do liberals stand on the issue? Was voting solid? Or did Russia hack us? Because you can't have it both ways. Or do we just ignore your expert (David Becker) altogether and claim that voting fraud DOES exist, IS rampant, but only on the republican side of things.

[alexw]

A lot of people consider the NY Times as the "paper of record" for the whole country. That might be a stretch but it's widely known and regarded highly by the center and left.

For the first time I can recall the NY Times has said a politician is "lying". Pretty harsh.

Well the press have tried putting out the truth and correcting Trump without actually stating he is lying, but that's got them nowhere. He continues to lie.

So if he isn't going to be deterred by the truth then they need to go the whole hog and rebut him utterly and call him a liar every time he lies.

When he lies he needs to be called out by everyone. None of this "perhaps there is some misunderstanding" or "he meant it in a different context".

No he didn't he is just plain old lying.

[Garnier Fructis]

I am confused though. Where exactly do liberals stand on the issue? Was voting solid? Or did Russia hack us? Because you can't have it both ways. Or do we just ignore your expert (David Becker) altogether and claim that voting fraud DOES exist, IS rampant, but only on the republican side of things.

This only fails to make sense if you think that liberals are claiming Russia hacked election machines or something. Russian hacks influenced the election, but didn't change any votes. Ergo, voting wasn't compromised. There's no contradiction here.

[Endus]

I mean, the voter fraud issue is just absolutely crystal clear. There are three possible explanations for that statement by Trump;

1> He has information that he's unwilling to give to the American people that is informing his viewpoint, in which case he's being dishonest by hiding the truth from the people for no reason.

2> He knows the information doesn't support his statement, and makes it anyway; this is a deliberate, malicious lie, to mislead the people.

Or 3> He doesn't know that the information doesn't support his statement, and makes it anyway, meaning he's grossly ignorant of what he's taking a position on, and doesn't care.

So you can pick; he's either grossly ignorant, dishonestly manipulative, or a blatant liar. There's no 4th option. And this is just dealing with this one specific statement.

[A dot Ham]

This only fails to make sense if you think that liberals are claiming Russia hacked election machines or something. Russian hacks influenced the election, but didn't change any votes. Ergo, voting wasn't compromised. There's no contradiction here.

Some of those fine mental gymnastics you guys are famous for here.

Please elaborate on how Russian hacks influenced the election. I am genuinely curious because from where I am sitting it all sounds like supermarket tabloid nonsense.

[Endus]

I am confused though. Where exactly do liberals stand on the issue? Was voting solid? Or did Russia hack us? Because you can't have it both ways. Or do we just ignore your expert (David Becker) altogether and claim that voting fraud DOES exist, IS rampant, but only on the republican side of things.

It isn't about "liberals", at all. We know the Russians were attempting to weight the election, but there was never any evidence that they directly tampered with the votes. We had a few recounts in close States, but that's not remotely unusual in a highly-contested election, and confirming results should never be a "bad thing".

Also, the "voter fraud" that doesn't exist is in-person voter fraud, where Joe Bates shows up a the polls and votes as Joe Bates, goes away, comes back, and votes as Hank Coors. This basically doesn't happen, and is the ONLY kind of voter fraud that voter ID laws could have any effect on, which is why they're largely a pointless endeavour that won't "protect the vote" in any appreciable way. Voter registration fraud is more prevalent, but also won't be affected by voter ID legislation. And even voter registration fraud hasn't been shown to be a major factor anywhere.

[alexw]

Spicer should quit imo. Staying loyal to Trump will kill any future job prospects and Trump is likely to fire him at some point anyway.

Yeah he could quit now and get sympathy. Noones going to think badly of him if he does so given he was ordered to go in front of the press and lie.

If he stays though....... that will make everyone doubt his character, and he will be toxic as a future employee.

[A dot Ham]

It isn't about "liberals", at all. We know the Russians were attempting to weight the election, but there was never any evidence that they directly tampered with the votes. We had a few recounts in close States, but that's not remotely unusual in a highly-contested election, and confirming results should never be a "bad thing".

Also, the "voter fraud" that doesn't exist is in-person voter fraud, where Joe Bates shows up a the polls and votes as Joe Bates, goes away, comes back, and votes as Hank Coors. This basically doesn't happen, and is the ONLY kind of voter fraud that voter ID laws could have any effect on, which is why they're largely a pointless endeavour that won't "protect the vote" in any appreciable way. Voter registration fraud is more prevalent, but also won't be affected by voter ID legislation. And even voter registration fraud hasn't been shown to be a major factor anywhere.

That's interesting because that isn't what the article here says.

I'll refer to the ending quote one more time.

“It does occur,” he said of voter fraud, declining to quantify the scope. “There are always arguments on both sides about how much, how frequent and all the rest.”

[A dot Ham]

Might seem like mental gymnastics to someone who has trouble grasping it. For some reason the phrase "election hacking" is what was used to refer to the overall incident of the Russians hacking the DNC and using propaganda campaigns to influence the election. It's closer to the meaning of the phrase "life hacks" like you see in those youtube videos where it's just some clever tip to make life easier, you're obviously not literally hacking life. In the same manner no one is actually claiming Russia literally hacked voting machines.

LOL. This is going to sound like trolling but its not. You aren't giving a clear cut answer here in regards to what the big hub bub was about regarding Russian hacks?

Fact 1: What was done? Specifically.

Fact 2: What was the effect?

[PC2]

NY Times are fake news purveyors. They'll do anything to get more sales.

[TheRabidDeer]

I was hoping that Trump was just acting crazy for the votes. Nope, turns out he is just crazy.

[Molis]

Politicians lie?

[Edge-]

Good, he and his administration need to be called on their lies. Not "untruths" or "falsehoods", but lies.

The fact that anyone bothers to humor Trump instead of pointing out that he's lying to himself is painful. The man is the fucking president of the United States, he should stick to facts and reality, not his own little headcanon.

[Sky High]

Good, he and his administration need to be called on their lies. Not "untruths" or "falsehoods", but lies.

The fact that anyone bothers to humor Trump instead of pointing out that he's lying to himself is painful. The man is the fucking president of the United States, he should stick to facts and reality, not his own little headcanon.

he has coasted on conspiratorial bullshit for the whole election and most of his life, I can't see why he'd stop now.

[Breccia]

The best defense Trump's team could offer, is that he saw some studies and doesn't understand them.

Seriously, listen to Spicer's specific choice of words. His own team, hand-picked, is leaning in that direction.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017...distances.html

I personally like "he continues to maintain that belief"

Does anyone here speak press secretary? What's press secretary for "I have no idea, and my boss refuses to give me anything to use to defend his position"?

[Filipse]

Politcians lies? MY LIFE IS A LIE!

(lol k)

[Felya]

NY Times are fake news purveyors. They'll do anything to get more sales.

Go back to Russia, communist!

[Felya]

Politicians lie?

That would mean his claim to not be a politician was also a lie... mind... blown...

[A dot Ham]

I wasn't trying to answer those questions really but if you read more carefully you would see that I did. Russia was involved in many smear campaigns, the effect of smear campaigns is pretty obvious. I was attempting to help clarify the post you labeled as "mental gymnastics". All I was saying was that the term "hacking" isn't being used to refer to literal hacking. It's just the label used to refer to all of Russia's involvement in the election.

So smear campaigns are now considered hacking? Interesting.

[Felya]

I personally like "he continues to maintain that belief"

Does anyone here speak press secretary? What's press secretary for "I have no idea, and my boss refuses to give me anything to use to defend his position"?

I can't comment at this moment.