THE GREAT BOWLING GREEN MASSACREE OF 2011 THAT ONLY KELLYANNE CONWAY KNOWS
I grew up in Nashville, TN. As a result, I tend to associate Bowling Green, KY with either drag racing or Government Cheese.
Now I get to associate it with Kellyanne Conway.
It’s almost too obvious a thing to do a blog post on, and the jokes pretty much write themselves. But it’s one of those things that is simply breathtaking on so many levels. I mean, consider that there are two possible explanations for Conway defending a policy with an example that is blatantly untrue in every respect:
1. She made up an alternative fact off the top of her head for the single purpose of justifying her argument, and without really caring whether or not anyone would bother to verify it.
2. She made an honest mistake like she says, which would then mean that she honestly thinks the words “massacre” and terrorists” mean exactly the same thing to the point that they're practically interchangeable. Either that, or she was thinking of a haunted house and got her wires crossed.
(There’s also a third possibility being offered by Trump fans - she intentionally phrased it that way because her media strategy is not unlike 5D chess - she wants to trick the mainstream media into fact-checking the BGM so that they would report the story she really wanted them to tell - i.e. Obama let terrorists move to Bowling Green). I’m pretty sure we can safely discount that one.)
Option 1 seems the most likely to me, if only because her boss has the same tendency. But it’s also the least comforting explanation, because she didn't just make up a fictional terrorist attack - she also qualified that comment that if you’ve never heard of the Bowling Green Massacre, it’s because the media never reported it.
(Yes, because if there’s one thing the mainstream cable TV news channels always refuse to cover 24/7, it’s a major terrorist attack on US soil.)
Still, it's consistent with the Team Trump mantra that the media is a pack of biased lying liars who report fake news, which means (1) if we say something you’ve never heard about, it’s because the media refused to report it, and (2) if we say something untrue and the media reports what we said, then the media is the one guilty of lying to you, not us, because it’s their job to fact-check us. (Seriously: Conway actually criticized an NBC journalist for not asking her to clarify her BGM statement before reporting it - a slight variation on Trump’s mantra of “The media lies because it reports what I said, not what I meant to say,”)
Remarkable.
They can do this, of course, because trust in the media on both sides of the aisle isn’t that high right now. Team Trump seem keen to milk that.
It also seems to be something the media is keen to correct. I’ve noticed a considerably different tone in newspaper reporting since Trump took office - at least for the natonals. NYT, WaPo and others are now going to great pains to point out when Trump or any member of his admin says something that isn’t true or contradicts something they said earlier.
Which is of course what they should be doing. I just wish they’d done that over the last 20 years or so - and not just with the POTUS, but every politician in America. Sure, we had Jon Stewart for that. But he only stepped up because the people who were supposed to be doing it weren't.
NOTE: Not every newspaper is keen to fact-check Trump. The ones owned by Rupert Murdoch, for example.
Keep me honest,
This is dF
This entry was originally posted at http://defrog.dreamwidth.org/1596280.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
Now I get to associate it with Kellyanne Conway.
It’s almost too obvious a thing to do a blog post on, and the jokes pretty much write themselves. But it’s one of those things that is simply breathtaking on so many levels. I mean, consider that there are two possible explanations for Conway defending a policy with an example that is blatantly untrue in every respect:
1. She made up an alternative fact off the top of her head for the single purpose of justifying her argument, and without really caring whether or not anyone would bother to verify it.
2. She made an honest mistake like she says, which would then mean that she honestly thinks the words “massacre” and terrorists” mean exactly the same thing to the point that they're practically interchangeable. Either that, or she was thinking of a haunted house and got her wires crossed.
(There’s also a third possibility being offered by Trump fans - she intentionally phrased it that way because her media strategy is not unlike 5D chess - she wants to trick the mainstream media into fact-checking the BGM so that they would report the story she really wanted them to tell - i.e. Obama let terrorists move to Bowling Green). I’m pretty sure we can safely discount that one.)
Option 1 seems the most likely to me, if only because her boss has the same tendency. But it’s also the least comforting explanation, because she didn't just make up a fictional terrorist attack - she also qualified that comment that if you’ve never heard of the Bowling Green Massacre, it’s because the media never reported it.
(Yes, because if there’s one thing the mainstream cable TV news channels always refuse to cover 24/7, it’s a major terrorist attack on US soil.)
Still, it's consistent with the Team Trump mantra that the media is a pack of biased lying liars who report fake news, which means (1) if we say something you’ve never heard about, it’s because the media refused to report it, and (2) if we say something untrue and the media reports what we said, then the media is the one guilty of lying to you, not us, because it’s their job to fact-check us. (Seriously: Conway actually criticized an NBC journalist for not asking her to clarify her BGM statement before reporting it - a slight variation on Trump’s mantra of “The media lies because it reports what I said, not what I meant to say,”)
Remarkable.
They can do this, of course, because trust in the media on both sides of the aisle isn’t that high right now. Team Trump seem keen to milk that.
It also seems to be something the media is keen to correct. I’ve noticed a considerably different tone in newspaper reporting since Trump took office - at least for the natonals. NYT, WaPo and others are now going to great pains to point out when Trump or any member of his admin says something that isn’t true or contradicts something they said earlier.
Which is of course what they should be doing. I just wish they’d done that over the last 20 years or so - and not just with the POTUS, but every politician in America. Sure, we had Jon Stewart for that. But he only stepped up because the people who were supposed to be doing it weren't.
NOTE: Not every newspaper is keen to fact-check Trump. The ones owned by Rupert Murdoch, for example.
Keep me honest,
This is dF
This entry was originally posted at http://defrog.dreamwidth.org/1596280.html. Please comment there using OpenID.