Apropos of The Clinton Moment and of Benjamin Rosenbaum’s Corrolaries to Sturgeon’s Revelation, please remember that however smart, perceptive, humane, analytical, wise, empathic or just fucking magical you are, you cannot reliably judge whether somebody is telling the truth. Particularly on television. Particularly somebody who is practiced at self-control and self-presentation. 90% of your judgments may be right, but you have no way of knowing which ones. And you are far more likely to be one of the 90% of people who are right only 10% of the time.
That applies to politicians, to actors, to advertisers and advertisements, to writers and men in the street, to people being interviewed and people interviewing them. You can be fooled. You can be fooled. You can be fooled.
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.
No, I can’t.
HA! Fooled me!
peace
Matt
For the Gentle Reader who’s been cut off from the news for the last seven weeks: “The Clinton Moment?”
I think he’s referring to the fact that, despite the predictions of the pundits, Clinton took New Hampshire, proclaiming herself “the comeback kid.” Or maybe the media did that. Anyway, she beat Obama by 3%. Get some perspective, people!
Oh, right. Momentum.
peace
Matt
If you were to Google for [“clinton moment”] many of the first results (particularly if you Google News) will lead you to articles such as An Emotional Clinton Reflects on How She Does It, complete with video of the Moment itself. Essentially, Senator Clinton teared up a bit and had a bit of a choke in her voice, when asked “How do you do it?” Er, about the running for President.
Many, many people ranging from bozos to bloggers to highly paid pundits have professed to be certain that the Moment was (a) Genoowine E-Motion, or (2) Phoneybaloney from the Land of Phoneybalonia. Certain. And then there was a fuss, and John Edwards, having initially said that he wouldn’t comment on it, was pushed and made a stupid comment and had to retract it, and then after the Senator won the New Hampshire Primary (after leading the national polls for a year) it was All About The Moment.
But the point isn’t restricted to the Senator.
Thanks,
-V.