Democracy

I sympathize with the artist (Stephan Pastis of "Pearls Before Swine") in this being something that absolutely terrifies me.

There is already a good portion of the populace that takes the word of their favorite pundit or news outlet as pure, unadulterated fact without any question or personal research. Forming one's opinion - especially on matters of policy that affect others - based solely on another's word is lazy and dangerously shallow. Ideological laziness amounts to little more than willful ignorance and should be inexcusable in even a mostly-intelligent society, but it tends to be passed off as the norm on both sides. If a member of "the team" or "the party" says it, it must be true. Period.

Take Arizona Senator Jon Kyl, for example - while arguing his case for stripping Planned Parenthood of federal funding before the Senate, he said that abortions accounted for 90% of the organization's services rendered. This statement was run unquestioned and unchecked on most news outlets as part of their budget coverage, but many right-leaning new shows and blogs slanted it as a shocking "ZOMG!! Think of teh childrens!" statement against the women's health organization and its apparently-prolific serial murder of unborn babies by the high percentages. As tends to happen when hot-button issues are raised on either side of the aisle, a reactionary derp-storm ensued. "How dare the federal government use our tax dollars to kill babies!" raged the right. "90 percent - that's like three-quarters! Defund the baby-killers!"

(Editor's note: federal law already prohibited the use of federal funding for abortions, so while the outrage was a moot point to begin with, when has logic and fact ever stopped a good rage? It's the whole "Keep the government's hands off my Medicare!" type of argument again).

Right about a day later, logic had found time to breathe after a severe laughing fit, and it brought some fact-checking to the table. It turns out that while Planned Parenthood does indeed provide abortion services, those services actually accounted for just 3% of services rendered in its most recently-released numbers (2009, IIRC). The majority of the clinic groups services included contraception, pregnancy tests, STD screenings, and women's health services including PAP smears (which, contrary to a Fox News reporter's indication, cannot be done at your neighborhood Walgreens). When contacted for an explanation as to why there was such a chasm between Senator Kyl's numbers and reality, his office replied that the senator's declaration on the Senate floor - given as part of a factually-persuasive declaration of reason to remove funding - was "not intended to be a factual statement."


In normal circles, a statement made with the deliberate intent to not be factual is called a lie. Or if you're one of the internet's famed "1337 h4xx0r$" and trying to get a reaction out of an under-informed observer by making a ludicrous, inflammatory statement which you don't even believe yourself, possibly a troll.



Somehow, I doubt that Kyl looked like this when he left the floor that day.

So, in the absence of "Troll" as an explanation, the senator had two options left as explanations. They are as follows: "Ignoramus" and "Liar."

At best, "it wasn't meant to be a factual statement" could mean that Senator Kyl was making his statement in ignorance. He might genuinely have not known that the numbers were bad. He might have thought that whatever homeschooled seven-year old he has doing his research was really onto something and never bothered to check for himself. Again, ideological laziness, much like his followers - "These numbers fit our argument - let's go with those. Why would we fact-check? They fit our argument!"

At worst, however, he knew he was lying but said it anyway and didn't plan on getting called out on it. It's not surprising, to be honest - when a point needs to be made and facts don't support that point, who has time to bother with facts when there's a chance that a lie will never actually be checked out? Such has been the story of politics from the earliest days of man, and so will it continue for the foreseeable future. For me, though, it makes a great barometer as to who needs to be voted out of office.

Neither option is particularly good for an elected representative to admit to, but seeing as how Senator Kyl has removed his incorrect statement from the Congressional record, I personally lead towards "liar" instead of "ignoramus."

Someone needs to fire his publicist. And someone else needs to fire his senator.