Eric Boehlert’s Response to the $100 Challenge: More Lies
My Eric Boehlert $100 challenge has been posted at Big Journalism. As a reminder, this is the challenge:
I am offering Eric Boehlert of Media Matters the easiest $100 he ever made.
All he has to do to earn the $100: unequivocally state whether James O’Keefe pretended to be a pimp at ACORN offices. If Boehlert makes the statement publicly — with no weasel-words, no two-stepping, and no qualifications — I will PayPal him $100.
I don’t think Boehlert will answer. The question shows that his manufactured controversy over O’Keefe’s clothing is a distraction, because no matter how O’Keefe was dressed, he pretended to be a pimp at ACORN. He repeatedly said that he was setting up a house where Giles and several underage girls from El Salvador would turn tricks and give him the proceeds, which he would eventually use for his Congressional campaign.
Boehlert yesterday characterized my challenge in this way:
@patterico is now trying to pay me to read his site. Dude, stop digging!
English, motherfucker! DO YOU SPEAK IT?!
I’m not trying to pay Boehlert to read my site. I’m proposing to pay him for a straight answer to a question he would rather ignore. Apparently my proposal carries little financial risk — because he’s ducking the question, as I suspected he would.
But he’s dipping his toe in the water:
Note to @patterico, O’Keefe pretended to be an aspiring pol, not pimp, in first ACORN vid. Pls. try to keep up.
Oh, really?! The first ACORN video was from Baltimore. James O’Keefe didn’t pretend to be a pimp in Baltimore?
Note well the first few seconds of the above video: O’Keefe showing himself walking into ACORN in a button-down shirt and slacks. Making NO EFFORT WHATSOEVER TO HIDE THAT FACT, in the FIRST FEW SECONDS OF VIDEO EVER SHOWN TO AMERICA.
Complete unedited audio here.
Transcript here.
English, motherfucker. DO YOU SPEAK IT?!
Err, excuse me for saying this, but you expected an honest response? Really? Seriously? You are a naive idealist, Patterico.
nk (db4a41) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:12 amRacist.
JD (d8c229) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:21 amAll the little [word you won’t let us say] could have said, if he were not a little [word you won’t let us say] could have been: Patterico, I don’t need your hundred dollars. I said what I said and I’m standing by it. If he were not a little [word you won’t let us say].
nk (db4a41) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:22 amI should have noted that we’re up to $160. I told Boehlert on Twitter.
Patterico (976196) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:23 amadd $40, make it an even $200.
and such language is going to get your rating changed from PG-13 to an R… I’m going to need an adult to buy me a ticket.
steve sturm (369bc6) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:38 amThese “challenges” always end well.
[note: fished from spam filter. –Stashiu]
imdw (7e609c) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:38 amAstonishing amount of dishonesty on Boehlert’s part. To what end? He’s only beclowning himself.
SPQR (8475fc) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:41 amI especially enjoyed this Twit: “My $100 offer to @patterico, prove O’Keefe was dressed as pimp inside ACORN offices. What, chicken? Figured.”
Why would Patterico try to prove the opposite of what he’s claimed? Why is it chicken to continue to hold a position?
There seems to be a lot of attention from the Left paid to the costume. Lots of claims (some persuasive) that O’Keefe and sympathetic media led people to believe that O’Keefe wore the costume into ACORN offices. But they being myopic, unwilling to look at the bigger — and much more relevant — question of whether O’Keefe represented himself as a pimp, costume or no.
roy (d6fc79) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:44 amBTW, not that it’s necessary, the better video about the pimp/whore credibility is the San Diego? one, where the ACORN employee tries to “engage” Hannah.
nk (db4a41) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:45 amOh, by the way, O’Keefe spliced that footage in to fool you folks and the national media types (he sure succeeded in the latter). He went on Fox wearing a damn chinchilla coat and told the Washington Post he borrowed his grandpa’s hat and bought a cane for $1, etc.
It wasn’t to fool ACORN (they’re too diabolical to fool so easily). It was to fool you. He has nothing but contempt for his viewers, i.e. you, with his Alinsky-ite tactics.
And, you ate it up, and, when his dishonesty is called, you guys defend him. He’s a pimp alright and, unfortunately, you’re his ho’s.
timb (449046) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:52 amBoelert os too busy picking Max Blumenthal’s boogers to write an honest sentence in response.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:55 amSpeaking of flies to crap, here’s timb doubling down on the falsity.
SPQR (8475fc) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:56 amTimb, you’re attacking a strawpimp. The only one talking about the costume here is you.
roy (d6fc79) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:05 amGee, timb, you posted that on another thread. I guess you need attention so badly that you keep saying the same thing.
Answer this question: did O’Keefe pose as a pimp in the ACORN offices?
Note that “posing” isn’t the same as “dressing”.
Think you can answer that, putz?
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:07 amRight. So why did Andy Breitbart lie about that in his Sept. 21, 2009 Washington Times column? And why have you defended him for it?
So did Andy even bother to watch the videos at all before he published them on his site? Or was he just so eager to launch his new website with a hoax video that happened to offer red meat to the GOP gullibles buying into the ACORN whipping boy nonsense that he didn’t care that it was a hoax, full of inaccuracies, misleading, etc.?
Either way, some folks — let’s say James O’Keefe — might describe such things as “journalistic malpractice”. And, for once, he’d be right!
How many times are you gonna let Breitbart play you for a chump, Patrick? How many times are you gonna keep going out there and make a fool of yourself on his behalf?
You have been well played, my friend. Sorry you haven’t figured that out yet.
Brad Friedman (5ecced) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:08 amBrad is no friend of Patterico’s, to be sure. What exactly was a hoax about ACORN employees eagerly assisting the aspiring pimp and prostitute?
JD (fdd4e9) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:12 amHey, Brad. Did O’Keefe pose as a pimp?
John Hitchcock (eb8752) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:14 amSome Chump said:
Is “dressing” the same as “dressing”? Because Patty has screwed that one up too. He almost even admitted to his egregious error, but didn’t have the courage to post that article on the front page where he had the completely inaccurate article.
Seems there’s LOTS of journalistic malpractice around here. But Patty isn’t likely to let you know about it.
Brad Friedman (5ecced) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:14 amBrad,
Supposing that Breitbart embellished exactly the way you said. What is disputable about the ACORN employees on the videos?
nk (db4a41) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:17 amSome chump… so Breitbart said “dressing” instead of “posing.” Who has ever made a big deal about the costume as being a factor in ACORN’s corruptness? Nobody. Nobody has said anything remotely like “hey, look how stupid ACORN was to be taken in with such obviously fake costumes.”
No, the bottom line is that the tapes prove that O’Keefe and Giles did in fact pose as a prostitute and her pimp, told ACORN representatives that that’s what they were, and, with that knowledge, ACORN employees worked hard to give them advice about best to establish a brothel for child prostitutes.
Now, Boehlert is claiming that the fact that O’Keefe didn’t wear the costume inside the ACORN office somehow establishes that he never posed as a pimp, and that thus ACORN did nothing wrong, because they weren’t helping a pimp. That’s just ridiculous. The proof is crystal clear on the tapes. Whether he was in a costume or not is immaterial to the core point, which is that ACORN gave advice on how to set up a brothel for child prostitutes. The fact that Breitbart may have misspoken in one column on an utterly irrelevant point about wearing the costume doesn’t change anything about ACORN’s level of corruption.
PatHMV (c0c73a) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:22 amNothing short of awe-inspiring to see how invested in beclowning themselves Friedman and Boehlert are.
All this effort to distract people from the core issue – ACORN. If they worked this hard against Dateline Catch a Predator, all we’d be hearing about was how much the undercover teen had asked for “it”.
The slut.
SPQR (8475fc) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:22 amDo you look like a bitch?
Check out the big brain on Boooooooehlert.
Mitch (890cbf) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:26 amBrad, why don’t you calm down and post links to the supposed “lies” and “malpractice” you’re talking about?
And remember: The material question is whether O’Keefe represented himself to ACORN workers as a pimp. Thus far, all you’ve come up with are more red herrings unrelated to the clear answer to that question, which is yes.
You have a Shakespearean life: full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Out, out, brief Brad!
Mitch (890cbf) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:29 amPatterico, do you always hold up your end of the bargain when you
1) make a deal with someone you’re arguing with on the internet
2) make the other person go first
and
3) concede that the other person has upheld their end of the bargain?
Foo Bar (72ba66) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:32 amThese leftists are a sad and pathetic lot. They must think the pimp getup was pivotal to the story because of all the profound statements leftists make by, for instance, wearing pink for war protestin’ or donning Halloweenesque papier mache masks for the remainder of their moonbat undertakings.
usually a lurker (682c85) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:33 amFUBAR, did O’Keefe pose as a pimp? Seems brave Brad tucked tail and ran instead of answering that question.
John Hitchcock (eb8752) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:34 amYes, but that wasn’t the question I asked. If you have a beef with Patterico, take it up with him. Don’t lash out at me.
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:35 am#24 Comment by Foo Bar
What?
That made absolutely no sense, you know.
Dianna (5f6ad4) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:38 amThat made absolutely no sense, you know.
Patterico knows what I’m talking about.
Foo Bar (72ba66) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:39 am“So why did Andy Breitbart lie about that in his Sept. 21, 2009 Washington Times column? And why have you defended him for it?”
Brad – What was immediately before the part of the clip shown above – yes, the B-roll Giles was talking about at C-Pac which shows them both “going to” ACORN offices, where they received the advice in evading taxes, committing mortgage fraud and operating a prostitution business. You can continue parsing words to your heart’s content Brad, about Breitbart’s column, it doesn’t mean your interpretation is correct, putz.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:40 amMedia Matters, Boehlert, Brad Friedman, imd-dumbass, timb, and Obama, are liars as soon as they open their mouths. All should be shunned, starved, and ejected into deep space like you would radioactive garbage.
PCD (1d8b6d) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:42 amFoo Bar – Don’t you have some punctuation to complain about?
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:45 amlet’s try this: “Habla ingles, pendejo?”
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:48 amHe repeatedly said that he was setting up a house where Giles and several underage girls from El Salvador would turn tricks and give him the proceeds, which he would eventually use for his Congressional campaign.
O’Keefe posing as a combination of pimp and pol makes Acorn look even worse. Then again, knuckleheaded liberalism, which is the essence of an organization like Acorn, naturally makes people look idiotic, laughable and contemptible.
Merely one more example in how corrupt — how easily and quickly corrupt — things become when people of the left (ie, 99.99% of Acorn workers, stereotpyically flaky and half-assed) are dominant in a community. Sad thing is “progressives” in general make a big mess of a situation and, like spoiled brats, expect others to clean up after them, or blame others once things start falling apart.
The history of metro America is a percentage of those same liberals, once things become too intolerable in a community even for them, then choose to pack up, rev up the moving van, get in their cars and relocate to another place. There they trigger a situation where the culture and politics become ripe for corruption and decline all over again.
Mark (411533) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:54 amBrad, even if I accept your assertion that Andy Breitbart lied about O’Keef’s attire, what does that mean?
Does it mean that O’Keefe did not actually represent himself as a pimp? Does it mean that the various ACORN offices didn’t try to help O’Keefe and Giles in their criminal enterprise?
Exactly what does it mean?
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:58 amWhy did O’Keefe go on FOX dressed as a pimp if he didn’t go into the ACORN offices dressed as a pimp (even if he posed as one, which he certainly did)?
Leviticus (f0f166) — 2/26/2010 @ 10:53 amMaybe it made for good television, Leviticus.
JD (6a2cc1) — 2/26/2010 @ 10:58 amO’Keefe is an odd duck and perhaps a little nuts, but it is irrelevant. The pimp outfit is a red herring. But this is typical of how the left operates.
usually a lurker (682c85) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:07 amBrad Friedman writes on his blog:
Despite the Times’ repeatedly misreporting that O’Keefe was dressed or posed as a “pimp” while meeting with ACORN employees in those videos, and even after being shown in no uncertain terms that he did not …
So we have another person on the left denying that O’Keefe even “posed” as a pimp in any fashion, regardless of how he dressed.
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:09 am[…] here: […]
» My $100 Offer to Eric Boehlert of Media Matters - Big Journalism (d59464) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:18 amI am going to have to differ with you, Patterico. Friedman is far more dishonest than Boehlert.
JD (d56a94) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:40 amMan, I love it when Right wing squares get all negro with the Samuel L. Jackson clips and the Tarantino dialogue. It’s almost like admitting they’re helplessly addicted to the liberal entertainment complex.
Bravo, PP, tomorrow’s lesson will touch on Jazz and the beatniks.
Later hepcats.
Assclown doodyheads (f0d390) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:44 amDoes that matter, Leviticus? Seriously, I can’t see how his attire on FOX is at all relevant. Maybe you can tell me why it is.
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:47 amIs there a pimp dress code now?
I guess the new claim is that O’Keefe cheated by only posing verbally as a pimp?
Its only fair if O’Keefe showed up inside the office wearing some Harlem in the 70’s, vintage Hollywood wet dream of a “pimp” outfit?
Please.
SteveG (909b57) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:47 amHumor. This was obvious, too.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:49 am“Does that matter, Leviticus? Seriously, I can’t see how his attire on FOX is at all relevant. Maybe you can tell me why it is.”
– Some chump
Really?
You can’t?
JD: I’d imagine it did make good television, yes. It was a heck of a get-up, if I recall.
Leviticus (f0f166) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:51 am36, Leviticus, you aren’t this stupid. You are deflecting and degenerating. I am to the point with you that you belong in the catagory of radio active garbage with imd-dumbass and timb.
To get right to it, as long as O’Keefe wasn’t naked, what difference does it make how he was dressed, unless you are trying to lay YOUR racist stereotype on what a pimp wears or not wears?
Levi, you are a racist.
PCD (1d8b6d) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:52 amBrad Friedman keeps stomping his feet and throwing hissy fits at the NY Times and they still find his narrative unconvincing! If Brad can’t even convince the NY Times of the merits of position, what kind of crap is he trying to peddle more broadly?
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:53 am“JD: I’d imagine it did make good television, yes. It was a heck of a get-up, if I recall.”
Leviticus – Plus it was edited onto the beginning and end of each video for effect, wasn’t it?
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 11:59 am“Does that matter, Leviticus? Seriously, I can’t see how his attire on FOX is at all relevant. Maybe you can tell me why it is.”
It’s just a misleading prop in his campaign against ACORN. How could that be relevant?
imdw (490521) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:03 pmTomorrow I’m a gonna wear an octopus costume, walk into a coffee shop and beat the crap out of every progressive then leave a note with my address. When the cops show up to arrest me for assault I’ll simply inform them that it was the octopus costume that gave the little beta pansies a beatdown, not me.
moronic leftist logic (682c85) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:14 pmHow could that be relevant?
Ah, the old “Respond to a question with nonsense question of your own” dodge.
How it is relevant is exactly what you’re supposed to be telling us.
Really?
You can’t?
Et tu, Brute?
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:25 pm50, imd-dumbass, why are you incapable of admitting ACORN is an evil, corrupt, and now defunct entity that got exposed as a criminal enterprise worthy of a RICO prosecution?
Oh, I forgot, you are a liberal cultists who can’t accept the concept of a reality where liberals commit crimes and are punished for them.
PCD (1d8b6d) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:26 pmI am to the point with you that you belong in the catagory of radio active garbage with imd-dumbass and timb.
The last few days have not been Levi’s finest as a commenter. But I would not go so far as to lump him in with those other people. After all, he admitted that O’Keefe posed as a pimp. That’s more than any of these other clowns have managed to do.
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:32 pmSeriously, I can’t see how what he wore on FOX is at all relevant. Stop with the sarcasm and explain its relevance.
It’s not at all misleading. What he wore on FOX has nothing to do with the content of the ACORN videos. He could have show up on FOX dressed as Leonardo da Vinci and it wouldn’t have changed what was on the videos.
But nice try.
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:39 pmFriedman, you just make shit up out of thin air. Rarely have I met such a shameless liar.
Patterico (976196) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:42 pmIt’s just a misleading prop in his campaign against ACORN. How could that be relevant?
Comment by imdw — 2/26/2010 @ 12:03 pm
And yet–we have video of how he was dressed as he went into Acorn in he above video…
We have photos of Dan Rather wearing all sorts of clothes throughout his career… I guess that all of of Mr. Rather’s working life is just a series of “…misleading prop[s]” in his campaign against truth.
BfC (5209ec) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:42 pmI’ve got a great idea. I’m going to tell people I’m a lawyer and offer legal advice. When I’m arrested, I’ll tell the police, “But I wasn’t dressed as a lawyer, so I couldn’t have been impersonating one.”
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 12:42 pmFrom Clark Hoyt of the NY Times to Brad Friedman on 2/23:
“I must say, as someone who watched the videos, that your characterization of the way O’Keefe and Giles presented themselves to the Acorn employees — as opposed to what he wore — is not credible.”
Feel the burn, Braddy!
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 1:31 pmDoes the Boehlert tweet qualify for earning the $100? Pretty weasily though. It’s as if Boehlert anticipated the Patterico smackdown that would inevitably follow.
Brad (b4e329) — 2/26/2010 @ 1:46 pmWait, who’s Brad Friedman?
radar (98f691) — 2/26/2010 @ 1:56 pm#39 Holy Crap! I just googled the quote you posted and it’s real. I can’t believe what a fool Brad Friedman is to so loudly proclaim what everyone else (even the NYT!) knows is false. Is he so self-righteous, so delusional, that he didn’t even watch the ACORN videos for himself? He just took ACORN at it’s word? I don’t think the word fool is enough to encompass the scale of the idiocy such behavior exemplifies.
Brad (b4e329) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:10 pmradar – Just another dishonest lefty blogger who has been tirelessly flogging this nonstory.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:10 pmThe closest they came to mentioning “illegality” with respect to the girls was the fact that they may be undocumented.
Priceless. And of course that’s no big deal to the commenter who calls himself “ruleoflaw”.
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:23 pmOh look! Yet another brain dead leftist drops by to embarrass itelf.
usually a lurker (682c85) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:24 pm“they never suggested that they intended to put the underage girls from El Salvador to work as prostitutes.”
ruleolaw – The above statement is blatantly false. Reread the transcript, which talks about the girls turning tricks.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:24 pmSorry, delete that response I made to the deleted comment if you like.
[Wasn’t deleted Subotai, I unapproved it temporarily because it referenced Patterico’s job, which is generally a no-no since he frequently makes it clear that he blogs as an individual. I was too slow on the trigger though and there was more than one response, so I re-approved it and sent Patterico an email explaining why there might be some confusion. I take full responsibility. –Stashiu]
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:27 pmAnother dishonest Bradbot bites the dust. Feel free to delete my response to it above.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:33 pm[…] Patterico posts Boehlert’s latest lame response, here. […]
Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert Silent In Wake Of Patterico’s $100 Dollar Challenge « Nice Deb (55d9c0) — 2/26/2010 @ 2:50 pmCA Penal Code Section 632
(a) Every person who, maliciously and without the consent of
all parties to the communication, intercepts, receives, or assists
in intercepting or receiving a communication transmitted between
cellular radio telephones or between any cellular radio telephone and
a landline telephone shall be punished by a fine not
Does not apply at all lackofcluetolaw.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:12 pmI think around page 20 they talk about the girls “doing tricks”…
I also heard they rolled a stop sign on their way to the ACORN office
SteveG (909b57) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:14 pm“Supposing that Breitbart embellished exactly the way you said. What is disputable about the ACORN employees on the videos?”
I’ve been anticipating Friedman’s (who is he again?) devastating response, but to no avail. Surely he has a smart-assed response at a minimum, no?
GeneralMalaise (c58b20) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:17 pmYou know full well that it is a crime in CA to secretly record a confidential communication without the consent of the other party
Really? Even if the communication you are recording relates to a person committing a crime?
Let’s say I’m having lunch with you one day and you start talking about how you intend to murder somebody. I switch on the voice recorder I carry with me. Do you have right to have that communication kept secret and not be recorded?
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:18 pmAnd since I just received word of a $26K bonus coming my way, I feel a need to bump my kick up from $35 to $60… if it would help mop up E.B.’s little mud puddle.
GeneralMalaise (c58b20) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:20 pmOk, time to move to a new thread.
Subotai (8d44c1) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:22 pmThe following is taken from a comment at The Brad Blog:
When Giles and O’Keefe came into the Baltimore ACORN office they represented to the temporary employees that O’Keefe was a college student hoping to one day run for Congress–a far cry from the pimp & prostitute canard which emerged in the right-wing echo chamber and which then was repeated by the unthinkingly stenographers of the corporate-owned media who mistakenly describe themselves as “journalists.”
Forget the fact that O’Keefe never posed as a pimp. The transcript reveals the extraordinary deception employed by Giles & O’Keefe to secure what they hoped would be damning words from the unsuspecting ACORN employees without actually divulging that Giles was posing as a “prostitute.”
I’ve used “ACORN tax lady,” Giles & O’Keefe rather than the pseudonyms used in the transcript and edited for punctuation.
ACORN tax lady: They pay you with cash. And they are reporting this to the government?
Giles: No who?
O’Keefe: The clients.
Giles: My clients.
Tax lady: No the person that’s paying you.
James: The clients.
Tax lady: The job that’s paying you.
Giles: Well people pay me different things every day.
Tax lady: Well there’s a difference between having a job and having your own business. Okay, so tell me.
Giles: Well before I guess it was a job. There was this guy that people would give me money and I would give money to him. But now…I am trying to get away from that guy.
O’Keefe: I am trying to help her out; maybe give her a place to go where she can perform her work, maybe a house where she doesn’t have to get targeted by this other guy. You know what I am saying?
Tax lady: …Does the business have an ID number?
O’Keefe: No.
Tax lady: Okay. So there is no taxes and nothing being put to government so the government really knows nothing about this business?
Giles: No. They don’t know about me—hopefully.
Tax lady: So you are just starting the business.
As the comment at the Brad Blog suggests, the tax lady was “not the sharpest tool in the shed;” that Giles & O’Keefe seized on that to evasively avoid telling her that Giles was posing as a prostitute until after they secured “tax advice” that they could distort through their voice-over, dubbed video. What a couple of slick hustlers those two were–whispering to one another how they’d get those sound-bites; with O’Keefe blurting out the word “prostitution” for the very first time in the transcript after the tax lady says she’s looking for the code for Giles theretofore undefined “work.”
Shame on them and shame on you for defending their scurrilous, deceptive and illegal “sting!”
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:22 pmA guy that has 13 underage El Salvadoran girls in a house performing tricks is a pimp by any definition.
Oh, wait… the ACORN ladies are so dim, they thought he was talking about running a Cirque d Soliel out of the house…. with expenses for condoms spiraling out of control
SteveG (909b57) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:25 pmOops google gave me the wrong section. Here is the exclusion:
(b) The term “person” includes an individual, business
association, partnership, corporation, limited liability company, or
other legal entity, and an individual acting or purporting to act for
or on behalf of any government or subdivision thereof, whether
federal, state, or local, but excludes an individual known by all
parties to a confidential communication to be overhearing or
recording the communication.
Now I would think that O’Keefe would be excluded since he was an individual that was part of the confidential communication and was definitely known to be overhearing said conversation.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:27 pm“all parties”
SteveG (909b57) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:36 pmfiletofish is either a pathological liar or mentally retarded. They made it crystal clear in that transcript that the underaged girls would be turning tricks.
usually a lurker (682c85) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:39 pmUh and were they blind and deaf? My GOD all parties had to have seen and heard him, don’t ya think? After all he wasn’t invisible or using a stealth generator was he? They directly replied to him didn’t they? Naw, I don’t guess they realized that he was there and talking.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:39 pmrecording
SteveG (909b57) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:45 pmSorry
I’m in a mood…
I think that it means that all parties have to be made aware that they are being recorded.
SteveG (909b57) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:49 pmpeedoffamerican: Here’s what Penal Code section 632 actually says:
“(a) Every person who, intentionally and without the consent of all parties to a confidential communication, by means of any electronic amplifying or recording device, eavesdrops upon or records the confidential communication, whether the communication is carried on among the parties in the presence of one another or by means of a telegraph, telephone, or other device, except a radio, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand five hundred dollars ($2,500), or imprisonment in the county jail not exceeding one year, or in the state prison, or by both that fine and imprisonment. If the person has previously been convicted of a violation of this section or Section 631, 632.5, 632.6, 632.7, or 636, the person shall be punished by a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars ($10,000), by imprisonment in the county jail not exceeding one year, or in the state prison, or by both that fine and imprisonment.
“(b) The term ‘person’ includes an individual, business association, partnership, corporation, limited liability company, or other legal entity, and an individual acting or purporting to act for or on behalf of any government or subdivision thereof, whether federal, state, or local, but excludes an individual known by all parties to a confidential communication to be overhearing or recording the communication.
“(c) The term ‘confidential communication’ includes any communication carried on in circumstances as may reasonably indicate that any party to the communication desires it to be confined to the parties thereto, but excludes a communication made in a public gathering or in any legislative, judicial, executive or administrative proceeding open to the public, or in any other circumstance in which the parties to the communication may reasonably expect that the communication may be overheard or recorded.”
It would not matter that O’Keefe and Giles did not intend for the conversation to be confidential. All that is required for prosecution is that one of the other parties to the conversation (i.e. the part-time ACORN and ACORN housing employees) desired that the conversation be confined to the parties thereto.
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:49 pmoverhearing or recording you obtuse idiot.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:54 pmNo it means that if he is known to be overhearing the private conversation, then the clause would also permit him to record it, since he is a party to the confidential conversation. It excludes him from the penalties of the law that would apply to someone that was not known to them as a participant.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 3:58 pmall i know is that its hard out here for a pimp….
especially lying MFM pimps pushing the usual MFM propaganda spin, memes and wilfully dishonest “news”.
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:01 pmRed, these fools are so desperate to defend their beloved, pimp-enabling, child-rape-supporting, vote-stealing libturd ACORN, that they are grasping at any straw to smear the one who exposed it to the world.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:05 pmThe inability of you wing-nuts to see beyond the ends of your collective noses is truly startling. In the case of peedoffamericanm, he can’t understand that a statute that prevents either eavedroppin or secretly recording a confidential communication means that if you secretly “record” a confidential communication you can be held criminally liable irrespective of whether you were eavesdropping. Help this poor uneducated slob out there Patterico!
In the case of this entire bogus “sting” you want to suggests that if a couple of ACORN employees make an inappropriate response to the O’Keefe/Giles criminal deception, that means the entire organization is a criminal organization; hence it was appropriate for Congress to condemn ACORN, cutting them off from all federal funds–even though ACORN dismissed the few employees who fell for the O’Keefe/Giles.
But consider the recent revelations that female members of the U.S. military were raped by male members of the U.S. military. Does that make the U.S. military a “criminal organization?” Does that mean that Congress should cut off all further funds to the U.S. military because it is simply a band of rapists?
If one were to apply your nonsensical, blinded-by-the-right arguments, then anyone who supported continued funding of the U.S. military is a proponent of rape!
What a sick, uneducated bunch of twits you people are!
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:06 pmpeedoffAmerican–vote stealing. According to the former MA AG, there have been 49 federal, state and local investigations of ACORN. None of them has established that so much as a single vote was ever cast by someone who was improperly registered by someone on behalf of ACORN, and further reveals that it was ACORN who reported the people who made the improper registrations.
We don’t have a problem with “voter fraud.” We have a major problem with election fraud — made possible by the proprietary source codes of e-voting systems which can and have flipped votes wholesale.
You want to protect the vote. Start by prosecuting those Republicans who took part in the theft of prior elections.
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:13 pm“… these fools are so desperate to defend their beloved, pimp-enabling, child-rape-supporting, vote-stealing libturd ACORN, that they are grasping at any straw to smear the one who exposed it to the world.”
We have a winner! They clearly know what is at stake and so they will try to take O’Keefe, Giles and Breitbart down by any means necessary.
Something for the lefties to ponder: Congress is not generally known to work lightning fast to complete anything, but they sure saw fit to quickly de-fund ACORN.
GeneralMalaise (c58b20) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:18 pmRuleolaw, the clause I cited is the undoing of your logic. There is no legal confidentiality to discussion of illegal activities, nor is there any expectation of privacy.
You’d have a hard time prosecuting O’Keefe on the basis of this law.
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:22 pmWe have seen this ruleoflaw nonsense before. Same sh*t, different day.
JD (b42396) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:30 pmIf he broke the law in CA, why hasn’t he been indicted? After all, it has been quite some time since he made these supposedly illegal recordings.
peedoffamerican (2478c9) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:38 pmBy the way, ruleolaw, if you look at the videos, you will see that the doors to the conference rooms where these conversations took place were wide open. That kinda blows any confidentiality or expectation of privacy issue away completely.
But I want to hear how you’d have the legal right to confidentiality when you’re conspiring to commit criminal acts.
Some chump (050674) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:41 pm“peedoffAmerican–vote stealing. According to the former MA AG, there have been 49 federal, state and local investigations of ACORN. None of them has established that so much as a single vote was ever cast by someone who was improperly registered by someone on behalf of ACORN, and further reveals that it was ACORN who reported the people who made the improper registrations.”
So what there is, is evidence that ACORN has been defrauded by the people it hired to register voters. Of course, everyone here can understand why ACORN still has a duty to turn in those voter registration forms even if it feels they may not be legit.
imdw (de7003) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:42 pmIt is cute how these morons persist in this as though O’Keefe going to prison would change ACORN’S disgusting conduct or the fact that everyone now knows about it. By their logic Obama should be on death row for the Rezko land shenanigans. Though I’d be content if he got five years in the pokey buggering tax ceats Rangel and Geithner. That is, if ruleolaw actually thinks anyone here is stupid enough to take his nom de blog or more generally, his mere presence here, seriously.
usually a lurker (682c85) — 2/26/2010 @ 4:57 pmThe “look over there! A squirrel!” tactic goes all the way back to the Lewinsky sticky blue dress situation. The Left knew there was no way to plausibly deny how that DNA must have been deposited, so they lashed out at everyone they thought they could smear in the hope of distracting the public’s attention away from B.J. Clinton.
After twelve years of their rabid attack dog tactics, the Left has lost most of it’s bite. Yet they still keep trying.
November is coming, and the Leftoids can’t stop it.
Brad (b4e329) — 2/26/2010 @ 5:31 pmSome chump, you are as dumb as a rock. A word of advice, don’t come to CA as a private citizen and start tape recording private conversations in the hopes that you will capture something illegal. You might find yourself serving time in the slammer.
lurker, your hero, O’Keefe, has been charged with committing a felony when he entered the offices of a US Senator in order to tamper with her phone system? If he violated the CA Penal Code why shouldn’t he be prosecuted, or do you believe that the law should only apply to Lefties?
As far as Rezko, Geithner — you could throw in Summers, Paulson, Bernanke, George W. Bush, Dick “I authorized torture” Cheney (waterboarding is torture) — I’d be delighted if the entire lot of them were brought before the bar of justice. You break the law, you should be held accountable, irrespective of whether you place a D or an R at the end of your name.
It’s not about right or left. It’s about right and wrong.
What I have a problem with is your incessant effort to unfairly paint an entire organization as “disgusting” on the actions of only a few.
I would not condemn the entire U.S. military simply because a few soldiers commit war crimes. In fact, I served in Vietnam. I don’t regard myself as a war criminal for having served, but I do think that those soldiers who took part in the My Lai massacre were war criminals.
You can’t see a distinction?
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 5:54 pmpeedoffamerica says: “If he [O’Keefe] broke the law in CA, why hasn’t he been indicted?”
How many of the ACORN employees in the videos were indicted, peedoff? Try Zero! Using your logic, this entire flap is a big to do over nothing!
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 6:01 pmruleoflaw continues his conspiracy nut theories I see.
SPQR (26be8b) — 2/26/2010 @ 6:26 pm“The New York Times reported on July 9, 2008, that Dale Rathke, the brother of ACORN’s founder Wade Rathke, was found to have embezzled $948,607.50 from the group and affiliated charitable organizations back in 1999 and 2000.[1] ACORN executives decided to handle it as an internal matter, and did not inform most of the board members or law enforcement, and instead signed an enforceable restitution agreement with the Rathke family to repay the amount of the embezzlement…”–wiki
ACORN is a criminal organization, top to bottom. Always has been, is now, and is going to continue to be so in the future.
Deal with it leftscum.
Of course, no matter what they do, steal, conspire to smuggle minors into the United States for the purpose of using them as prostitutes, whatever…the people in the Obama administration aren’t going to go after them. They will arrest people who engage in uncovering ACORN’s colorful antics (on totally bogus charges), but guys like Dale Rathke, and the scumbags in ACORN’s local offices are going to walk.
Rathke doesn’t get arrested, the people who covered up his stealing don’t get arrested, ACORN employees who willingly conspire to violate federal laws don’t get arrested…but O’Keefe does. That’s justice, liberal Democrat style.
And, that’s just something we’re going to have to deal with.
And, of course, we’ll also have to put up with the liberal trash trying to deflect attention away from ACORN’s various criminal activities by trying to make an issue over exactly what pimp regalia he was wearing at any particular time.
Nature of the beast.
Dave Surls (a224bc) — 2/26/2010 @ 7:10 pmDave, Dave, Dave, imdw has proven that ACORN is nothing but a victim….
ROFL
Yeah, like Al Capone was a victim.
SPQR (26be8b) — 2/26/2010 @ 7:19 pmClaiming that ACORN is the victim of its’ employees actions denies the fact that ACORN hired employees who demonstrated certain character traits and proclivities that ACORN felt were essential in the furtherance of its’ goals.
AD - RtR/OS! (af176b) — 2/26/2010 @ 7:20 pmVictim? Nay!
Director of a fraud of massive proportions? Absolutely!
I see SPOR that whenever it entails a question of Republican participation in election fraud, it amounts to “conspiracy theory.” Whenever it entails allegations that a group who helps to register the poor and minority voters who, most often, do not vote for Republicans, then we must assume “guilty as charged,” for the words “conspiracy theorist” could not possibly be applied to right-wing nut cases, who come up with other gems, like non-existent birth certificates from Kenya and “death panels.”
The word “conspiracy theorist” is, in truth, an unscientific, politically-charged form of denigration to dismiss what you don’t want to hear, irrespective of the evidence to support it.
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 7:25 pmSo what there is, is evidence that ACORN has been defrauded by the people it hired to register voters.
Amazing how imadouchebag continues his flailing at imaginary shadows and fictitious suppositions.
Dmac (799abd) — 2/26/2010 @ 7:26 pmOh, great reasoning AD. So claiming that the entire U.S. military is not guilty of rape when some of its male members rape its female members “denies the fact that” the US military, “hired” those soldiers “who demonstrated certain other character traits and proclivities that” the US military “felt were essential in the furtherance of its’ goals.”
Two words for your logic, AD – Dumb and Dumberer!
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 7:30 pmOf course ACORN is the victim.
If I pay you $10/hour to register people to vote and, instead of going door-to-door, you waltz over to the local cemetery and start copying names; adding phony addresses, phony signatures in the span of 10 minutes; then claim you worked eight hours for which I’m out $80, you’ve just defrauded me out of $80.
I know you right-wingers are a bit slow, but come on! Even you can figure that one out.
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:08 pmStill pounding that psycho claim I see.
Gerald A (a66d02) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:13 pmPCD, it’s not entirely accurate to say ACORN is defunct. I brought up the name-change a few times before it got completed. It’s a game this organization plays. They have gone through several incarnations in their slippery methodology. And COI will not be the last incarnation, either. It’ll only last a few years and then it’ll change again.
It’s a good way for a criminal organization to side-step regulations designed to hamper the criminal organization.
John Hitchcock (f63277) — 2/26/2010 @ 8:59 pmHey Patterico, since the actual transcript of the O’Keefe/Giles trip to Baltimore ACORN office reveals that the felonious duo never claimed that O’Keefe was a pimp, why don’t you send a check in the sum of $100 to your local ACORN chapter. I’m sure Boehlert would agree that this would be an appropriate way for you to make amends for your misreporting.
[Since it reveals no such thing, why don’t you apologize for lying to everyone here? — P]
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:01 pmSoros is busy stuffing C-notes down his thong, why would he want yours?
OxyCon (d3bc7e) — 2/26/2010 @ 9:21 pmFooBar:
Yes, I know what you’re talking about.
https://patterico.com/foo-bars-nit-picks/
I dare anyone to read that and not conclude that I was incredibly patient with a guy who insisted on calling me dishonest and not listening to what I was saying.
I said in that thread that you would interpret it as not holding up my end. I think I went above and beyond, and am content to let the reader judge.
Patterico (976196) — 2/27/2010 @ 1:13 amHurling insults won’t work on me, rule. I’ve been polite to you, I expect the same courtesy in return.
Please explain the legal expectation of confidentiality for criminal conspiracy. Please explain how a conversation in a room whose doors are wide open — where any passerby could hearr — is considered confidential.
Once you do that, then you can start giving advice on what laws O’Keefe may have broken.
Some chump (050674) — 2/27/2010 @ 1:53 amI was incredibly patient with a guy who insisted on calling me dishonest and not listening to what I was saying
Dude, according to YOUR OWN standards, YOU DON’T REALLY KNOW that I was not listening to what you were saying, because you never stated my position to MY SATISFACTION, even though
1) The deal was that we would both state the other person’s position to his satisfaction
2) You made me go first
3) I DID state YOUR position to YOUR satisfaction.
Anyway, my success in stating your argument is pretty good evidence that I was listening to what you were saying.
“Incredibly patient”? You were being exceedingly and inappropriately impatient, because after I stated your position satisfactorily, you were supposed to state mine and then we would see where we were. Once you did that, you were free to try to crush me into oblivion. But you kept trying to shoot down what I was saying before you had even stated my position to my satisfaction, in other words, before you really even knew what I was saying, according to your own standards.
Towards the end of that year end thread, you wrote:
Uh huh. Where is it? Why should Eric Boehlert do this deal with you when you didn’t uphold the deal you made with me?
You acted like it was out of bounds to suggest that you might have intentionally phrased something deceptively unless I had “proof”. Is that your policy on your blog with regards to others? I.e., do you never argue that certain language could have a misleading effect and point out that (even if we’ll never know for sure the speaker’s intention) they certainly had motive to phrase things deceptively on purpose?
Foo Bar (72ba66) — 2/27/2010 @ 6:02 amThis thread turned into a cesspool for the trolls. Maybe if timmy and hacks and TMJ would drop by, it would be complete.
JD (f74695) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:07 amOh please, JD. This entire site is a cesspool for Right-wing trolls. You guys are the only one’s dumb enough to be taken in by Patterico’s propaganda.
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:25 amPatterico @113 – It’s a good thing that early 2009 thread was never all about Foo Bar and he is still just looking out for the interests of your readers. It must be comforting to have such a zealous watch dog looking over your shoulder.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:26 am“Claiming that ACORN is the victim of its’ employees actions denies the fact that ACORN hired employees who demonstrated certain character traits and proclivities that ACORN felt were essential in the furtherance of its’ goals.”
But why does ACORN get ahead by having registration offices be slowed by illegitimate registrants? They want to register people to vote. The fraud perpetrated against them is counterproductive to their goal.
imdw (2aec47) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:29 amTwo words for your logic, AD – Dumb and Dumberer!
I like doucheoflaw’s superior debating skills.
Dmac (799abd) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:31 am“But why does ACORN get ahead by having registration offices be slowed by illegitimate registrants? They want to register people to vote. The fraud perpetrated against them is counterproductive to their goal.”
imdw – Once again, you are asking the wrong forum. Why does ACORN create the incentive for its employees to commit this fraud sytematically on a nationwide basis if there is not some advantage to it, whatever that may be?
Also, we keep hearing, FROM ACORN, that they identify the fraudulent voter registrations before turning them in. Have you ever seen that confirmed by any state officials?
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:36 amI suggest we put Boehlert out there with Janeane Gara-fool and the like where they belong: where noboby pays attention to them. Why bother?
John Casteel (b28715) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:47 amPhony registrations can be used to allow people to vote multiple times, allow unqualified people to vote etc. This is another example of imdw pretending to not understand the topic in order to post vapid trollery.
SPQR (26be8b) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:49 amSPQR – So if the invalid registrations remain undetected, actual voter fraud can occur? SHUT! UP! So with absentee ballots and without voter ID laws actual voter fraud is virtually impossible to detect, which is why Democrats resist ID laws to make elections fair and also explains why people don’t tend to get arrested voting fraudulently, blowing holes in claims that voter fraud does not occur.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/27/2010 @ 7:54 am“You acted like it was out of bounds to suggest that you might have intentionally phrased something deceptively unless I had “proof”. Is that your policy on your blog with regards to others? I.e., do you never argue that certain language could have a misleading effect and point out that (even if we’ll never know for sure the speaker’s intention) they certainly had motive to phrase things deceptively on purpose?”
You must be worn out from all of your contortions, gyrations and mincing about.
GeneralMalaise (c58b20) — 2/27/2010 @ 8:14 amYou say it like mincing is some kind of bad thing.
Dmac (799abd) — 2/27/2010 @ 9:09 amFUBAR should change his name to SNAFUBAR because it fits his grey matter much better. FUBAR is an incomplete descriptor.
John Hitchcock (6186ea) — 2/27/2010 @ 9:11 am“Phony registrations can be used to allow people to vote multiple times, allow unqualified people to vote etc”
But have these phony registrations voted?
imdw (c5488f) — 2/27/2010 @ 9:27 amIs the earth round? Is my head flat?
Comment by imadouchebag
Dmac (799abd) — 2/27/2010 @ 9:33 amTypical ACORN fraud…
“(CBS) The Association of Community Organization for Reform Now or ACORN, and two key officials were charged on Monday with 39 counts of voter registration fraud in Nevada, stemming from allegations that they paid canvassers to submit fake registration forms during the 2008 Presidential race.”
“Along with ACORN, Christopher Howell Edwards, the Las Vegas Field Director and Regional Director Adele Busefink are accused of compensating employees with a payment structure, that according to the complaint, provided an incentive for registrants to fill out phony forms, illegal under Nevada State law.”
“The complaint details what authorities called ACORN’s “blackjack” bonus program, where representatives were paid an additional five dollars if they registered more than 21 voters per shift.”
“Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto who filed the charges told CBS News they are now taking action, to “stop this type of activity, so that in future elections this process will be cleaned up.””
“Of the more than 91,000 people ACORN registered in Clark County, Nevada, which includes Las Vegas, 28,097 were duplicates and 18,947 did not match motor vehicle or social security records.”
That’s not unusual…that’s typical. Happens all the time, all over the country.
And, no matter how many times ACORN gets busted our fabulous government keeps trying to give them taxpayer money.
“Also, we keep hearing, FROM ACORN, that they identify the fraudulent voter registrations before turning them in. Have you ever seen that confirmed by any state officials?”
Sure, they report it all the time. ACORN submits thousands of phony registrations, tells the state officials they’re fradulent, and then the government gives ACORN millions in taxpayer dollars, so that ACORN can submit thousands more fake registrations.
This has been going on for years.
Dave Surls (b02762) — 2/27/2010 @ 9:56 amDave Surls, are you telling me that over 50 percent of the ACORN registrations in Clark County were worthless? Looks like the ACORN people in that county made some mistakes in their process.
John Hitchcock (6186ea) — 2/27/2010 @ 10:29 amIf I pay you $10/hour to register people to vote and, instead of going door-to-door, you waltz over to the local cemetery and start copying names; adding phony addresses, phony signatures in the span of 10 minutes; then claim you worked eight hours for which I’m out $80, you’ve just defrauded me out of $80.
Only if you assume that the goal was to get actual valid voters on the rolls. If the goal is to get lots of dead people on the rolls then you’ve accomplished what you set out to do. If somebody you’ve hired gets caught doing it, you fire them and say “Gee, I don’t know how this could have happened!”. And then keep doing it.
Subotai (f393e7) — 2/27/2010 @ 10:32 amLet’s not forget that 105 percent of voting-age residents of Indianapolis were registered to vote in 2008. Like the article said, that’s quite a feat.
John Hitchcock (6186ea) — 2/27/2010 @ 10:32 amJaneane Gara-fool and bill maher, why do they put these people on as seriuous opinions? Like colbert and jon liebshitz, they all have one vote like us and they are comedians, so just laugh. Or groan.
U NO HOO (aad347) — 2/27/2010 @ 12:04 pmWhere’s the outrage about Brian William’s entrapment of those wannabe child rapists?
Some dupe shows up with a 12 pack of Pabst thinking he’s gonna find a 13 year old behind the curtain.
Where’s the consent form?
I wonder if O’Keefe will get a small fine or a medium one?
SteveG (909b57) — 2/27/2010 @ 12:59 pm#112
I think Soros is shorting Euros out his a$$…
The guy is an accomplished parasite… gotta give him that.
SteveG (909b57) — 2/27/2010 @ 2:14 pmOr maybe he is the currency Ebola virus, I dunno
You acted like it was out of bounds to suggest that you might have intentionally phrased something deceptively unless I had “proof”. Is that your policy on your blog with regards to others? I.e., do you never argue that certain language could have a misleading effect and point out that (even if we’ll never know for sure the speaker’s intention) they certainly had motive to phrase things deceptively on purpose?
Here’s what you’re missing. And because I don’t have your endless patience for nit-picking, this is likely to be the last thing I’ll say to you about it.
I got you to restate my argument. Then you proceeded to prod me to restate your argument in such a way that it didn’t take account of the argument that I had made.
So, for example, let’s assume that you argue that following:
I restate your argument to your satisfaction, and you are now tasked with restating my response.
Yet I continually prod you to restate my argument in a way such that it DOES NOT EVEN TAKE ACCOUNT OF REASONS 1-4.
Why would you bother? That is an exercise in talking past one another.
Once it became clear to me that your argument depended on ignoring the points I had made, it was obvious to me that you were wasting my time. You were not acting in good faith. You were simply asserting that I was trying to “hide” something that I had put out there in plain sight, and your argument in support of your position did not even TRY to respond to the arguments I had made.
That is a pointless exercise. That is not the deal I agreed to.
I’m sure you will claim otherwise. I am not rearguing that pointless nitpicking exercise here. I am content to allow readers to make up their own minds based on the record we developed at the time.
So continue to claim I welched on a deal. The proof is to the contrary and it is in the link above.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 2:34 pmI.e., do you never argue that certain language could have a misleading effect and point out that (even if we’ll never know for sure the speaker’s intention) they certainly had motive to phrase things deceptively on purpose?
If the author himself explains why he phrased things that way, and his reasoning makes sense, I will credit that.
I will not simply be pig-headed and point out his motives and the misleading effect without grappling with his reasoning.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 2:36 pmLet me distill the argument to its essence as I see it, Foo Bar:
The essence of your argument is that I was trying to hide something (however trivial), in bad faith.
I tried to get you to restate my argument as to why I didn’t act in bad faith, and you did.
Then it was my turn to restate your argument, and you INSISTED that I try to come up with a non-snarky way of stating an argument that I had acted in bad faith, without taking account of the argument I had already made that I had not. You insisted that I write with a straight face about all the motivations I might have had to act in bad faith, etc.
Well, fundamentally, those motives are nice and everything, but the premise of the exercise is that you ARE assuming good faith on both sides of the argument. That is why you try to understand and restate the other guy’s argument.
So if your argument is that I acted in bad faith, and I get you to fully understand my argument that I didn’t, then your argument has to include a plausible argument that my argument CANNOT BE ACCEPTED.
If instead, your argument is just: hey, I see you have an argument that you acted in good faith, but there is also an argument that you didn’t. So let’s dwell on making that argument as powerfully as possible, without taking account of the arguments you have offered that you were really acting in good faith.
That doesn’t work. Because part of assuming good faith in your opponent is giving him the benefit of the doubt regarding his motives. If he gives you a plausible reason why he did what he did, that is consistent with good faith on his part, it’s rude to continue to advance an argument that he acted in bad faith unless you can blow his explanations out of the fucking water.
And you couldn’t.
So I lost patience with you. You didn’t confront my arguments and explanations.
OK. Fine. You can just be another troll who refuses to extend the benefit of the doubt to me. But then, why should I waste any more of my short life speaking to you?
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 2:58 pm“Only if you assume that the goal was to get actual valid voters on the rolls.”
And why would you assume that they actually want people to vote?
imdw (6b4e5c) — 2/27/2010 @ 2:59 pm“I think Soros is shorting Euros out his a$$…
The guy is an accomplished parasite… gotta give him that.
Or maybe he is the currency Ebola virus, I dunno.”
I’m surprised Soros is still drawing breath, after what he did to the Russians in the early 90’s.
GeneralMalaise (c58b20) — 2/27/2010 @ 3:04 pmYou insisted that I write with a straight face about all the motivations I might have had to act in bad faith, etc.
Well, fundamentally, those motives are nice and everything, but the premise of the exercise is that you ARE assuming good faith on both sides of the argument. That is why you try to understand and restate the other guy’s argument.
Wrong. This is a conflation of “bad faith” as applied to 2 different areas. The whole debate to begin with was whether it was plausible that you had done something intentionally sneaky. That was clear from the outset. Your very first response to me in that year end thread was “I see nothing misleading in what I wrote.”
That was what we were arguing about. My summary of your argument, which YOU approved, contained the following sentence near the beginning:
YOU approved that summary of your argument, so you conceded that THAT WAS WHAT WAS BEING DEBATED, i.e., whether you had any particular motivation to phrase things as you did.
So if I have to assume good faith as it applies to what you wrote in your blog post (as opposed to only applying to the “state each other’s positions” process) then it’s assumed ahead of time that you win the debate, which makes the whole process a farce.
If you didn’t want to debate at all with someone who was suggesting that you might have written something in a sneaky way, you obviously would not have started up with me at all. I think you wanted to try to show why what I was saying didn’t make sense, though, which is why you kept at it with me.
Now, as we argue back and forth about whether it was plausible that you had done something intentionally sneaky, and we enter this “state each other’s arguments”process, I fully agree that good faith is to be assumed on both sides as it applies to the process. That’s separate from whether it is to be assumed that you wrote the update to your blog post in good faith, though.
without taking account of the argument I had already made that I had not.
False. I am not conceding that your argument (that I restated) succeeded, but in any case it never addressed this point which I had made well before we started this “state each other’s arguments” process. This gist of that point is that you had a motivation to hide the fact that you had very poor familiarity with some of the source material you had already cited, i.e., you didn’t know what you claimed to know.
The debate, as defined in a way you approved, was whether you had any particular motivation to write things as you did. Your argument as summarized by me did not address this, i.e., did not explain why it was implausible. So if I mention it again in my argument, I am not ignoring what you wrote. YOU ignored what I had written, because you never addressed this.
If you had said at the outset something like “I can sort of see why what I did looks bad to you, but trust me, I didn’t do anything sneaky on purpose”, then I would have dropped the whole thing. But you wouldn’t give a damn inch on this point, would you?
At the very end, though, you told me that you thought I should be “charitable”. For someone to be charitable, then that means that there is an uncharitable interpretation which has some degree of plausibility. So that actually was a concession on your part that my interpretation was not ridiculous or completely illogical, just uncharitable. You only conceded that over email, though.
Foo Bar (0a72ed) — 2/27/2010 @ 4:19 pmNow I am confused.
Are we debating whether I had acted in bad faith?
Or whether someone who wanted to be uncharitable could come up with a plausible argument that what I had done COULD BE INTERPRETED as having sprung from bad faith?
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 4:31 pmPlease tell me quite simply which.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 4:31 pmBecause I am willing to concede the latter — at least up to the point where the person claiming bad faith is offered the plausible explanation. Which I provided.
I am not willing to concede the former. Because I did not act in bad faith.
In other words, I can sort of see why what I did looked bad to you. However, I explained that I didn’t do anything sneaky on purpose. And I explained why the big evidence that you relied on was actually consistent with good faith.
And you ignored my explanations and continued to press on with the argument that I had acted in bad faith. And to demand that I restate that argument, as if I had not already made my own.
And I wondered what the hell the purpose of that was.
If it was just over whether you had a not-ridiculous argument, then I would always have conceded that. Up to the point where I gave my explanation. At which point I wanted you to refute it or accept it — not just pretend I hadn’t given it.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 4:36 pmYou’re basically talking about of both sides of your mouth. You’re saying we were discussing whether I had a particular motivation. But, you say, all I had to do was disclaim the motivation, and say that I could see why you thought I did.
But I did disclaim the motivation.
So really, we weren’t debating whether I had the motivation. We were debating whether you had a plausible reason to think I did.
Well, why didn’t you say so, then?
If I engage in this process in the future, this illustates that the first step has to be an agreement about what the topic of debate really is.
Because you’re claiming you would have accepted a “trust me I wasn’t being devious” statement — yet I offered that.
And I didn’t even say “trust me” but also provided reasoning and analogies to prove that my position made sense.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 4:45 pmAre we debating whether I had acted in bad faith?
Or whether someone who wanted to be uncharitable could come up with a plausible argument that what I had done COULD BE INTERPRETED as having sprung from bad faith?
This is a subtle distinction, and I’m not sure if it’s very meaningful. I think someone looking at the evidence appropriately would assign some probabilty to the charitable interpretation and some probability to the uncharitable one.
I said at the outset :
(the word “know” was obviously missing there; “I don’t know whether”, not “I don’t whether”)
… so it should have been somewhat clear from the beginning that I wasn’t going to be claiming to convict you with 100% certainty. I probably should have made that clearer, though.
The debate wasn’t whether you acted in bad faith, per se, but whether it was your interest to act in bad faith by writing in a sneaky way.
At which point I wanted you to refute it or accept it
At that point, what you wanted DID NOT MATTER, because it was your turn to summarize my argument.
Refute it or accept it? If this means that if I can’t prove with complete certainty that you’re wrong and you definitely did act in bad faith, then therefore I’m wrong and you definitely didn’t, then no, I will not concede that.
Look, just as someone trying (sometimes ? 😉 ) to be decent when dealing with someone else, I will accept that you acted in good faith. This does not mean I admit “I was wrong” or “I lose”, though.
Looking at the evidence coldly and rationally, though, it would be reasonable to assign a significant probability to the scenario where you didn’t act in good faith, which you also seem to be conceding now.
Maybe this would have been clearer to you longer ago if you had summarized my argument to my satisfaction…
Anyway, I’ll leave it at that.
Foo Bar (0a72ed) — 2/27/2010 @ 5:12 pmRemember when I said: “Please tell me quite simply which.”
?
Do you think you have done that?
Which were we discussing? Whether I acted in bad faith? Or something else?
Obviously I never could have summarized your argument if it wasn’t clear what issue we were debating. And I still have no idea. Because you won’t say.
I think you’re afraid that if you say clearly, you will somehow be at a disadvantage.
In that sense, you remind me of a certain Eric Boehlert.
What issue were we debating, Foo Bar? Simple question. I’d like a simple one-sentence answer, please.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 5:21 pmAt that point, what you wanted DID NOT MATTER, because it was your turn to summarize my argument.
No, it did matter — if the exercise was about a discussion in good faith.
Because I sure as hell am not going to work to summarize an argument that is EXPLICITLY TALKING PAST THE ARGUMENT I HAVE ALREADY MADE.
And if that is what you were hellbent on doing, then the exercise was always pointless because you entered it in bad faith from the outset.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 5:23 pmLooking at the evidence coldly and rationally, though, it would be reasonable to assign a significant probability to the scenario where you didn’t act in good faith, which you also seem to be conceding now.
If it seems like I am conceding that, I wasn’t.
I was NOT acting in bad faith. Period. No percentage or probability about it.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 5:24 pmWhat I was conceding is that someone who had not heard my explanation and was hellbent on being uncharitable could have constructed a reasonable scenario under which I was trying to act in bad faith.
Once they had heard my explanation, I don’t think they could reasonably think so. But I’d be open to hearing an argument to the contrary. Just not one that ignores my own arguments.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/27/2010 @ 5:28 pmThe fact that you continue to offer a distinction between O’Keefe’s entering the ACORN Baltimore office “posing” as a pimp even though you concede he did not “dress” as a pimp, when the transcript reveals that O’Keefe and Giles said that O’Keefe was a law student who was attending Johns Hopkins University and never said he was a pimp exposes the fact that you, Patterico, are a lying scum bag.
So stop asking that people extend to you the moniker of someone acting in good faith.
ruleolaw (f582e3) — 2/28/2010 @ 9:55 amErnie/ruleoflaw:
He said that he was setting up a house where Giles and underage girls could turn tricks and give him the money.
That’s posing as a pimp.
No matter how many times you insinuate otherwise, you can’t change the facts.
Patterico (c218bd) — 2/28/2010 @ 4:06 pmHey, ruleolaw: you can pose as a pimp without dressing as one. You do understand the difference between the two words, right? Or would you like that explained to you?
Some chump (050674) — 2/28/2010 @ 4:29 pmEXPLICITLY TALKING PAST THE ARGUMENT I HAVE ALREADY MADE.
For the UMPTEENTH TIME, you were satisfied with a summary of your position which said you had:
no particular motivation
To falsify this claim, it suffices to supply a single, plausible motivation. And don’t go off saying “I know what my motivation was, I know what was in my heart, yadda, yadda”. OBVIOUSLY, I can’t get inside your head, so the only thing we could have been arguing about was what was plausible given the evidence (what appeared on your blog) which is available to both of us.
If you give an explanation for why you did what you did which is an innocent one and which has nonzero plausibility, this does NOT “prove” that you had no particular (sneaky) motivation. I do not have to show that your explanation makes zero sense in order to disprove the claim that you had “no particular motivation” to do what you did. I only have to supply a plausible motivation.
I supplied a plausible motivation, which you have never addressed during this long exchange: you may have wanted to hide, from the readers who don’t read the comments, the fact that you didn’t have good knowledge of the source material you had already cited (the statement/report).
I was NOT talking past your argument.
I’d like a simple one-sentence answer, please.
We were debating how plausible it was that you acted in bad faith.
Obviously I never could have summarized your argument if it wasn’t clear what issue we were debating
OBVIOUSLY FALSE. I could have continued to work with you until you got there, but instead you GAVE UP, thereby WELCHING ON THE AGREEMENT.
You proposed this process because you observed (correctly ) that people often talk past each other during arguments because they don’t understand what the other person is saying. Well, what happened here?
1) I completed my end of the process
2) You didn’t complete your end
3) You didn’t understand what I was saying
Why are you surprised???
Do you seriously think that when people get into arguments on the internet that the proposition being debated is always crystal clear and identical in the minds of both people, and it’s only the arguments regarding the proposition that are unclear and result in people talking past each other? Of course not. It’s often the proposition itself which is unclear. Your process could have clarified the proposition being debated as well, if you had bothered to complete the process.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:14 amThere are 94 theses left to go, Martin Luther.
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:38 amYou’re basically talking about of both sides of your mouth. You’re saying we were discussing whether I had a particular motivation. But, you say, all I had to do was disclaim the motivation, and say that I could see why you thought I did.
But I did disclaim the motivation.
Patterico, the feeble logic of this comment is beneath you.
You didn’t say you could see why I thought you did, did you?
Not up until the last day or two.
I said if only you had done X AND Y, then I would have left you alone.
You come back with “but I did do X”.
What about Y?
Cmon, dude!
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 10:43 amNot up until the last day or two.
Aside from implicitly and in email only, anyway.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 10:44 amRule of law, I enter your office and put a .45 between your eyes. Am I not a hitman if I don’t dress in a suit and have the .45 in a shoulder holster?
PCD (1d8b6d) — 3/1/2010 @ 10:50 amIs Foo Bar not a troll no matter if he/she dresses or not behind the keyboard?
PCD (1d8b6d) — 3/1/2010 @ 10:55 amYou’re saying two different things. You’re either debating whether it was in Patrick’s interest to act in bad faith or whether it was plausible that he did so.
You can’t even decide what you are debating on, I am not sure how you can criticize Patrick for not keeping up his end.
Some chump (050674) — 3/1/2010 @ 11:30 amWhat about Y?
You’re not getting my point. This is how I know the discussion is really about Y though you claim it’s about X.
To falsify this claim, it suffices to supply a single, plausible motivation.
No it doesn’t.
See, you refuse to be pinned down about what we were discussing.
I was talking about my motivation — what it actually was.
You pretended to address that but instead addressed something different: whether it’s plausible to argue that I had the motivation.
Different issue. Easier for you to show. Not responsive to my argument.
And don’t give me this crap about how you can’t know what is in someone’s heart. I do it for a living, using a thing called evidence. If someone comes up with an alternate explanation that fits the evidence, I must disprove it or I lose.
Instead, you decided that you would shift the discussion to easier ground for you, and pretend it’s the same ground. It’s not.
Whether I had a bad faith motivation, and whether a plausible argument can be made that I did if that argument ignores my explanation, are two wholly different things.
Patterico (599a77) — 3/1/2010 @ 12:41 pmIf someone comes up with an alternate explanation that fits the evidence
And what was your alternate explanation for using “a” instead of “the”, anyway? I can’t find any explanation in my Patterico-approved summary of your argument, even though I made clear early on that this bugged me more than “statement” vs. “report”. The (1) section in the first paragraph of the summary mentions my complaint about “a” vs. “the”, so I know that you know that this was part of my complaint. You never addressed it in the approved summary, though.
Your argument does not fit the evidence regarding “a” vs. “the”. It doesn’t explain it at all.
When it was your turn, and I was trying to get you to summarize my argument, the “a” vs. “the” issue was going to be a significant part of my argument. By your failure to explain the choice of “a”, you failed to come up with an alternate explanation that fits all the evidence.
You just ignored the “a” vs. “the” issue, for no apparent reason.
Even if you believe the “a” vs. “the” issue is completely stupid and doesn’t make any sense, it was clear that *I* thought it was a significant piece of evidence. So actually, I certainly was making a good faith effort to explain why you had failed to come up with an alternate explanation that fits the evidence, since I deemed “a” vs. “the” to be a meaningful piece of evidence.
So your claim that I was talking past you and ignoring what you wrote when it was my turn to prompt you to summarize my argument is *BS*. You failed to explain something which I sincerely believed to be a meaningful piece of evidence.
Now you’ll probably just start mocking the idea that “a” vs. “the” means anything, even though you know that choice can change the meaning of a piece of prose significantly. Again, though- it doesn’t matter if you think “a” vs. “the” is stupid, for the purposes of determining whether I was making a good faith effort that was responsive to your argument.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 4:08 pmIf we go all the way back to March 2008, you’ll see that “a” vs. “the” was central to my original complaint, and I linked this in my very first comment complaining in the comments of your LAT-year-end, January ’09 post.
So at the start of everything, I had wanted to know why you had chosen “a” instead of “the”. And in my Patterico-approved summary of your argument, you never explained why. So you shouldn’t have been surprised if I was acting like you hadn’t given a full explanation for why you wrote what you wrote. I was acting that way because, in fact, you HADN’T given a full explanation for why you wrote what you wrote.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 4:26 pmAnd yes, I acknowledge that upstream on this thread, I conceded that your explanation for why you wrote what you wrote had some plausibility. Now that I remember things better, I remember that it had some plausibility for “statement” vs. “report” but it never explained “a” vs. “the”.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 4:43 pmThis nit has officially been picked.
JD (40d7f4) — 3/1/2010 @ 5:21 pmDoesn’t that whole exchange read oddly, JD? Brrrr.
Eric Blair (03ba54) — 3/1/2010 @ 5:49 pmI spent an entire comment (comment 8 in the nit picks) giving an analogy to explain a vs. the. You responded to it but never showed you understood it.
I made several efforts to understand and articulate your point but now see why I couldn’t. I was trying to articulate your argument why I had evil intent. You were trying to argue merely that a disembodied motive existed for me to act evilly. The former requires you to grapple with my existing arguments to make the case. The latter does not.
You were claiming to argue one thing but really arguing another. I see now why articulating your position seemed impossible.
It’s not like I haven’t engaged, however.
Patterico (599a77) — 3/1/2010 @ 6:11 pmI spent an entire comment (comment 8 in the nit picks) giving an analogy to explain a vs. the. You responded to it but never showed you understood it.
So what? It WASN’T YOUR TURN at that point to argue ANYTHING. I had summarized your argument to your satisfaction. At that point, I was under no further obligation to show that I understood anything you were saying. YOU were under the obligation to summarize MY argument to my satisfaction at that point. Yet you couldn’t bring yourself to adhere to your own rules. Before the process started, you told me I had to shut up and say nothing further aside from attempting to summarize your argument, and I did, to your satisfaction. When it was YOUR turn, you did NOT do the same, though. You kept trying to interrupt me and shoot down what you THOUGHT I was saying before you had demonstrated that you UNDERSTOOD what I was saying by summarizing my argument to my satisfaction.
This crap about “With your permission” “unless you severely object”, etc. was an admission that you were NOT FOLLOWING YOUR OWN RULES.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 6:41 pmIf you look at the fact that
1) I was complaining about “a” vs. “the” at the very beginning back in March 2008 and
2) The first time you even attempted to address it was AFTER I had summarized your argument to your satisfaction
…. it’s pretty clear that YOU were the one who was talking past ME and not reading what I was saying carefully.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 6:47 pmThe cute thing about the way you behaved is that by interrupting me repeatedly, AGAINST YOUR OWN RULES, you could try to get away with claiming that you had engaged me without ever summarizing what I was saying to my satisfaction and putting that summary back on the main thread, as you had promised you would do.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 6:54 pmYou have now implicitly admitted that your argument, as successfully summarized by me, did not address “a” vs. “the”. Therefore, your argument did not address a piece of evidence I considered important. Therefore, by emphasizing “a” vs. “the” in MY argument, I WAS making a good faith effort at explaining why your argument failed. So you should retract your claim that I was talking past you and ignoring the argument you had made. The comment 8 doesn’t count (not that what you said in that comment made sense, anyway). It wasn’t your turn at that point.
You’ve mentioned what you would do differently next time if you try this process again. Here’s what you should do differently next time:
Explain to the other person that they have to shut up and do nothing but summarize your argument, but that when it’s your turn, you reserve the right to interrupt them repeatedly and try to shoot down their argument before you’ve even demonstrated you understand it.
See how many people try the process in that case.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:05 pmFoo Bar,
You have danced back and forth between saying you were trying to prove I acted in bad faith and trying to prove that a plausible argument could be made that I did.
YOU DIDN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU WERE ARGUING and THAT is why I couldn’t summarize it.
Good day.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:39 pmNote to anyone else: if you’re going to engage in the exercise, do it with someone who understands what the fuck he himself is trying to argue. Otherwise you’ll try 15 times and he’ll keep telling you that you got it wrong by alluding to arguments that have nothing to do with what is supposed to be under discussion.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:42 pmFoo Bar is a liar. How do I prove this? Why, he has a plausible reason to want to lie to discredit me. I can’t see inside his head, and that relieves me of having to produce evidence showing he is a liar. All I have to do is point to a plausible motivation, ignore arguments that show a good faith motivation, and declare victory.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:44 pmYOU DIDN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU WERE ARGUING and THAT is why I couldn’t summarize it.
Completely unresponsive to my allegation that you didn’t follow your own rules. Pretty clearly an admission that you did, in fact, fail to follow your own rules.
So why should Boehlert do your deal, then?
prove I acted in bad faith and trying to prove that a plausible argument could be made that I did.
This is an artificial distinction, in any event. It is perfectly legitimate to argue that someone acted in bad faith by offering a bad-motives explanation that you expect an audience would find *more plausible* than the good-motives explanation that might be offered. No one said I had to *prove* that your explanation had *0* probability.No one said this was a court of law with a “beyond reasonable doubt” standard. I admitted that I couldn’t long before we started this process, when I said that I didn’t know if you had written things the way you did inadvertently.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:50 pm“YOU approved that summary of your argument, so you conceded that THAT WAS WHAT WAS BEING DEBATED, i.e., whether you had any particular motivation to phrase things as you did.”
Foo Bar says: issue is whether I DID have the motivation to be sneaky.
“Now, as we argue back and forth about whether it was plausible that you had done something intentionally sneaky . . .”
Foo Bar says: issue is whether it is PLAUSIBLE that I was sneaky.
THEY ARE NOT. THE SAME. FUCKING. THING.
If you can’t understand that, how the FUCK am I supposed to restate your position?
You don’t even know what your fucking position is because you don’t understand that my intent was what it was. It’s like a crime. At the time of the crime, either the defendant had the guilty intent or he didn’t. You don’t get to prove he did by arguing a plausible scenario that is cancelled by his own equally plausible scenario pointing towards innocence. You have to destroy his plausible scenario or you shouldn’t claim the ability to prove intent.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:53 pmPatterico: “I didn’t follow my own rules because Foo Bar made it impossible to do so.”
Foo Bar: “Ha! You admit you didn’t follow your own rules!”
This is an artificial distinction, in any event.
No, it’s not, and that is your fundamental failure of understanding. My intent was what it was. You purported to be debating what it was, and when that proved too hard you shifted to a different argument: debating whether a plausible argument could be made about what my intent was.
You shifted back and forth from one argument to another and made it impossible for me to restate your argument, and now you blame ME for it.
You are a troll in the classic sense of the word. You are simply trying to waste my time.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:57 pmTHAT is why I couldn’t summarize it.
Anyway, I don’t see how you could conclude that you *couldn’t* summarize it or that it was *impossible* when there were 4 or so versions and rounds of feedback when I was trying to summarize your argument and only 2 rounds when you were trying to summarize mine, before you gave up.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 7:58 pmyou had any particular motivation to phrase things as you did.”
Foo Bar says: issue is whether I DID have the motivation to be sneaky.
False. “had any motivation” here means “had any motivation available to you”, i.e., was there something in the world which could have motivated you to do what you did.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:05 pmPatterico: “I didn’t follow my own rules because Foo Bar made it impossible to do so.”
Anyway, your current position (that I myself didn’t know what I was arguing) was not something you believed at the moment that you gave up on the process. I see no evidence that you believed it at the time. At the time, you claimed that I was ignoring what you were saying. I have now demonstrated that this was not true, because I pointed to a piece of evidence which I sincerely believed to be relevant which you had not addressed.
So “Foo Bar didn’t even know what he was arguing” cannot be an excuse for breaking your own rules, since you didn’t come to this conclusion until the last day or so.
And you have admitted to breaking your own rules.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:10 pmI can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
That is the ONLY important fact here.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:11 pmI can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
You can’t refute someone’s argument in this scenario, either, can you? Yet that didn’t stop you from trying to refute it when, according to the rules, you were supposed to be trying to restate it.
I’m not conceding that I didn’t know what I was arguing about, but let’s stipulate that for the moment.
Even if that were the case, you can at least make as many attempts to state my argument (ill-defined, in this presumed scenario) as I made to state yours, BEFORE attempting to shoot down my argument at a point in the process when it is inappropriate. Yet you did not do so. You bailed out on your own rules and started trying to shoot down what I was saying much earlier than the duration of time and the number exchanges it took for me to summarize your argument successfully.
So you did not show the same commitment to the process I showed.
A reasonable person in your position showing commitment to the process would have hung with it at least as long as I had hung with it, but you didn’t.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:21 pmI can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:32 pmnumber exchanges
“number of exchanges”. And by exchanges here, I mean, “here’s my attempt at summarizing your argument. How’s that?” …” You’re making progress, but you want to discuss X,Y and Z if you want to get my argument right”. Attemtps to shoot down the other person don’t count as legit exchanges.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:32 pmI can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:34 pmI can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
But you can try (under the scenario-not conceded by me- that I didn’t understand what I was arguing about), and you didn’t, at a point in the process when you were obligated to do so.
Since you haven’t responded to this (and instead you’re just stomping your feet and repeating yourself in a non-responsive way), you evidently don’t have a response.
Looks like an implicit admission that you broke your own rules inappropriately.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:36 pmTry this, Patterico. Try honestly explaining your decision-making, AT THE TIME, for why you gave up on the process. Was it because you had a premonition that a year later you would realize I didn’t know what I was arguing? No, of course not.
You explained at the time why you quit on the process and it had nothing to do with me supposedly not knowing what I was arguing. It was because I was supposedly making (to quote you) “an argument that ignores the one I already made?”
I have now shown this to be false, though. I was addressing a piece of evidence you had not addressed in your argument. Therefore, it was legitimately responsive to and critical of your argument.
Therefore, your purported reason for quitting on the process AT THE TIME YOU QUIT ON IT was not legitimate.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:44 pmIt looks like no one will play with Foo Bar. The dialogue reads like Bad Performance Art.
Which I think it is.
Eric Blair (03ba54) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:50 pmThe dialogue reads like Bad Performance Art.
Yes, the last few Patterico comments certainly do- the ones where he repeats his irrelevant mantra in an unresponsive way and thereby implicitly admits that he broke his own rules inappropriately.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:55 pmwhich rule? the “don’t feed the troll” one?
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 3/1/2010 @ 8:56 pmAs to whether I tried, I am content to have people read the above link. I know only at the time that it seemed completely unproductive. Now I know why.
Namely:
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:00 pmI know only at the time that it seemed completely unproductive.
So next time you try this process, you should explain this to the other person:
You’ll make the other person complete his end, but you when you embark on your part of the process, you reserve the right to assess that it’s “completely unproductive” and bail on the process after spending considerably less time an effort trying to hold up your end of the deal than the other person spent completing his task. Oh, and you also observe the right to interrupt him and try to shoot him down along the way.
You also reserve the right to switch your explanation for why it’s “completely unproductive” a YEAR LATER.
Do you think I would have agreed to start the process under these rules?
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:10 pmBlah blah blah blah blah
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:24 pmYou’re just fucking lying now. Plus you never shut up.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:27 pmBut Patterico, the guy is just playing “The Argument Room” bit from Monty Python. The goal is to irritate you and waste your time.
The odd writing style just makes it creepy.
Eric Blair (03ba54) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:33 pmYou’re just fucking lying now
Oh?
I know only at the time that it seemed completely unproductive. Now I know why.
You thought you knew “why” back then, but you were wrong, as I have shown. I don’t know why you’d be so sure now that you’re correct that it was unproductive, given that your reason for assessing that it was unproductive back then has been shown to be incorrect. Your skill in assessing whether it was productive seems to be questionable.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/1/2010 @ 9:38 pmSeriously, dude, the equine is deceased. You are acting obsessive. In fact, watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teMlv3ripSM
Time to move on, maybe?
Eric Blair (03ba54) — 3/1/2010 @ 10:28 pmI can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/2/2010 @ 12:27 amOh — and to respond to your next point:
I can’t restate someone’s argument when they don’t even understand what they’re arguing about.
With that, I declare this done.
Patterico (c218bd) — 3/2/2010 @ 12:28 amHow can you claim that I was attempting to prove with absolute certainty that you had written something in an intentionally sneaky way when I said in one of my very first comments that I didn’t know whether the use of “a” was inadvertent or not?
I said in that comment, LONG, LONG before we started the “process”, that I didn’t *know* whether you did what you did inadvertently, but it was certainly in your interest to leave a false impression.
I predict that you will not engage this point substantively.
Foo Bar (b5085f) — 3/2/2010 @ 12:55 am