Bill Nye Does Not Speak for Us and He Does Not Speak for Science

EdwardHeisler · 2018-01-31 15:16:21

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Bill Nye Does Not Speak for Us and He Does Not Speak for Science
By attending the State of the Union with NASA administrator nominee Jim Bridenstine, the Science Guy tacitly endorses climate denial, intolerance and attacks on science
By 500 Women Scientists January 30, 2018
Scientific American

Tonight, Bill Nye “The Science Guy” will accompany Republican Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-OK), Trump’s nominee for NASA Administrator, to the State of the Union address. Nye has said that he’s accompanying the Congressman to help promote space exploration, since, he asserts, “NASA is the best brand the United States has” and that his attendance “should not be … seen as an acceptance of the recent attacks on science and the scientific community.”

But by attending the SOTU as Rep. Bridenstine’s guest, Nye has tacitly endorsed those very policies, and put his own personal brand over the interests of the scientific community at large. Rep. Bridenstine is a controversial nominee who refuses to state that climate change is driven by human activity, and even introduced legislation to remove Earth sciences from NASA’s scientific mission. Further, he’s worked to undermine civil rights, including pushing for crackdowns on immigrants, a ban on gay marriage, and abolishing the Department of Education.

As scientists, we cannot stand by while Nye lends our community’s credibility to a man who would undermine the United States’ most prominent science agency. And we cannot stand by while Nye uses his public persona as a science entertainer to support an administration that is expressly xenophobic, homophobic, misogynistic, racist, ableist, and anti-science.

Scientists are people, and in today’s society, it is impossible to separate science at major agencies like NASA from other pressing issues like racism, bigotry, and misogyny. Addressing these issues should be a priority, not only to strengthen our own scientific community, but to better serve the public that often funds our work. Rather than wield his public persona to bring attention to the need for science-informed policy, Bill Nye has chosen to excuse Rep. Bridenstine’s anti-science record and his stance on civil rights, and to implicitly support a stance that would diminish the agency’s work studying our own planet and its changing climate. Exploring other worlds and studying other planets, while dismissing the overwhelming scientific evidence of climate change and its damage to our own planet isn’t just dangerous, it’s foolish and self-defeating.

Further, from his position of privilege and public popularity, Bill Nye is acting on the scientific community’s behalf, but without our approval. No amount of funding for space exploration can undo the damage the Trump administration is causing to public health and welfare by censoring science. No number of shiny new satellites can undo the racist policies that make our Dreamer colleagues live in fear and prevent immigrants from pursuing scientific careers in the United States. And no new mission to the Moon can make our LGBTQ colleagues feel welcome at an agency run by someone who votes against their civil rights.

As women and scientists, we refuse to separate science from everyday life. We refuse to keep our heads down and our mouths shut. As someone with a show alleging to save the world, Bill Nye has a responsibility to acknowledge the importance of NASA’s vast mission, not just one aspect of it. He should use his celebrity to elevate the importance of science in NASA’s mission—not waste the opportunity to lobby for space exploration at a cost to everything else.

The true shame is that Bill Nye remains the popular face of science because he keeps himself in the public eye. To be sure, increasing the visibility of scientists in the popular media is important to strengthening public support for science, but Nye’s TV persona has perpetuated the harmful stereotype that scientists are nerdy, combative white men in lab coats—a stereotype that does not comport with our lived experience as women in STEM. And he continues to wield his power recklessly, even after his recent endeavors in debate and politics have backfired spectacularly.

In 2014, he attempted to debate creationist Ken Ham—against the judgment of evolution experts—which only served to allow Ham to raise the funds needed to build an evangelical theme park that spreads misinformation about human evolution. Similarly, Nye repeatedly agreed to televised debates with non-scientist climate deniers, contributing to the false perception that researchers still disagree about basic climate science. And when Bill Nye went on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show to "debate" climate change in 2017, his appearance was used to spread misinformation to Fox viewers and fundraise for anti-climate initiatives.

Bill Nye does not speak for us or for the members of the scientific community who have to protect not only the integrity of their research, but also their basic right to do science. We stand with others who have asked Bill Nye to not attend the State of the Union. Nye’s complicity does not align him with the researchers who have a bold and progressive vision for the future of science and its role in society.

At a time when our ability to do science and our ability to live freely are both under threat, our public champions and our institutions must do better.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/ob … r-science/

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Bill Nye defended his attendance at the Trump speech declaring: "At the State of the Union address, I hope to hear the President present plans for an ambitious, science-driven space exploration agenda. Space exploration brings out the best in us. It brings the nation together as we solve problems that have never been solved before and learn more about the cosmos and our place within it."

So what did Trump say about NASA and his space exploration agenda in his one hour and twenty minute speech? Not a word. Total silence. Let's see if Bill Nye responds to Trump's failure to address this scientific matter in his State of the Union speech. I hope Nye does.

You can read the statement of Casey Dreier, Director of Space Policy for The Planetary Society, regarding the Bill Nye's attendance at the Trump speech at:

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/casey-dr … union.html

Last edited by EdwardHeisler (2018-01-31 15:22:58)

kbd512 · 2018-01-31 18:39:28

Some of these climate changers really are cult members. I thought that was a bit of stretch, but I can see that President Trump was correct in his assessment of people who hold such bizarre beliefs. They're just regressives claiming to be liberals. These regressives are people who have ceased to act like sane adults. In a society with a functional mental health care system, they'd be confined to rubber rooms and sporting the latest "I love me" apparel. Since they're incapable of dealing with objective reality, they substitute their own deranged beliefs for what is objectively happening in the real world. It would seem that even some scientists are now suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. TDS is definitely more of a problem than I thought it was.

If someone merely shows up to listen to a speech made by our President, they necessarily deny that the climate changes and support racism, homophobia, and xenophobia. That's regressive logic to a "T".

"Your suit is white, therefore you support white supremacy!"

"You drove a car!? You hate the planet! Planet hater! Planet hater! Planet hater!"

That's the mentality of these children inhabiting the bodies of adults. All education and enlightenment is in vain when you act like a spoiled child. "So sad", to borrow a Trumpism.

Anyway, I don't think we could ask for a better President. He's the best regressive detector on the planet. All of the bat guano crazy regressives are coming out of the woodwork. If he did all that by simply being himself, then that's simply marvelous. I no longer have to simply wonder about how nutty these people are, but somehow that's not very comforting.

Not that scientists would know or even care about how our immigration laws work, and Doofenshmirtz certainly doesn't speak for all lawyers, but illegal immigration is not a "civil right". Civil rights only apply to people who are actually Americans. Walking over the US border doesn't make anyone an American. If foreigners cross our borders without our permission, then they should expect to be deported. They can complain to whatever country they came from that their civil rights were violated.

"As someone with a show alleging to save the world, Bill Nye has a responsibility to acknowledge the importance of NASA’s vast mission, not just one aspect of it. He should use his celebrity to elevate the importance of science in NASA’s mission—not waste the opportunity to lobby for space exploration at a cost to everything else."

Bill Nye is a TV personality. His only responsibility is to make money for his TV network. I've seen cartoons with characters in them who claim to be saving the galaxy. That has as much bearing on reality as Mr Nye's TV show. If our regressives were actually so much smarter than everyone else, then you'd think they'd know that what happens on TV has little bearing reality. If the two ever meet, it's only a chance encounter.

Here's another thought for the person who stated that. Maybe Mr. Nye is trying to get the funding required to pursue "NASA's vast mission of real science". If the climate crazies weren't so crazy, they'd be up there trying to make their case better than Mr. Nye ever could. At least "The Science Guy" is smart enough to know that you actually have to talk to people, even people you disagree with, irrespective of who is "right", to get funding for science.

EdwardHeisler · 2018-01-31 20:20:18

Well let's get back to the subject matter and away from the stream of right-wingnut insults, b.s. and nonsense.

So kbd512 .... what did you think of your Presidents comments during his SOTU speech plugging NASA and his "far out" plan for space exploration?

kbd512 · 2018-02-01 01:08:37

In the interest of actually talking to each other instead of talking at each other, I'll make a concerted effort to focus my commentary on things that matter if you make an effort to do the same.

Listening to someone doesn't mean you agree with them or support or condone what they do. It means you're someone who has the maturity to at least hear what other people have to say. I would consider listening to what other people have to say to be a giant leap forward in the general level of discourse.

About "far-out" space exploration plans:

Every President has plugged NASA since the agency existed. We still haven't sent humans to Mars or back to the moon or so much as started a development program that vaguely resembles the type of program required to send humans there. Whereupon any President commits serious funding and Congress provides appropriate oversight to the advancement of our understanding of our solar system, I'll begin to believe that they are serious about space exploration. NASA's human space flight budget needs to just about double to get humans to the moon or Mars in any reasonable timeframe.

The closest we ever came to having the propulsion technology required to send humans to Mars was when our NERVA program completed ground testing and was ready for flight testing. Nixon killed that program and real space exploration died under his watch. STS was an obscenely expensive diversion from real space exploration. Despite opinions to the contrary, ISS was and is a very valuable and necessary test facility. That is simple truth. Chemical rockets lack the specific impulse to get the job done at a reasonable cost and electrical propulsion produces insufficient thrust. Conceptually, some combination of chemical and electric propulsion technologies could get the job done, but we're not there yet. If we had used NTR's, we could actually get humans to Mars, but then they probably would've died there or in transit as a function of the combined reliability of available life support, navigation, communications, and electrical power systems. 1970's tech just wasn't good enough for the stated purpose. If the life support and power tech reliability issues didn't kill them first, then our gross ignorance of the radiation environment and debilitating microgravity exposure surely would. Mars is an exquisite engineering efficiency challenge.

On a personal note, I think NASA's Human Space Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate lacks coherent technology development plans required to achieve much of anything related to real human space exploration. JPL consistently develops reasonable plans and attainable goals for robotic exploration. Perhaps HEO needs to "borrow" some of JPL's management team or use them as advisors. HEO keeps waiting for perfect solutions to complex engineering problems to appear. JPL knows that that will never happen, so they accept that an incremental technology advancement program is the best that they can do. Once you make up your mind to execute a mission, then you use the most reliable tech and the best engineering minds available to do the best job possible with what you have and what you know.

EdwardHeisler · 2018-02-01 15:47:47

kbdf512: You charged in a different discussion string that CNN is controlled and run by communists. You call CNN the "Communist News Network"!!!

Apparently you think that anything to the left of the Ku Klux Klan and other right-wing terrorist organizations are run by communists!

So tell us which band or brand of "communist conspirators" have taken over the Cable News Network. Are they Trotskyists, Stalinists, Maoists, Castroists or old school Bolsheviks?

And how did they pull that off without anyone, excepting you of course, aware of that!

How can any serious person believe any of your political propaganda in light of your constant assaults on the truth and smear jobs?

It it talks like a Trumpeter, lies like a Trumpeter, smears like a Trumpeter and ignores facts like a Trumpeter it is a Trumpeter.

So Mr. Trumpeter I won't waste anymore time responding to your counterfeit patriotism, hateful posts and defense of the bigoted un-American criminal in the White House. Lock him up!

Your wasting bandwidth.

Bye.

kbd512 · 2018-02-01 17:52:25

EdwardHeisler,

You came here to spew your communist propaganda, rather than actually discuss anything, and that's exactly what I thought about you from the moment you started posting your nonsense here.

Since CNN keeps putting self-described communists on TV and the people they hire keep extolling their virtues, why don't you ask them how it is that they came to misrepresent communist ideology to Americans.

How can any serious person believe any of your political propaganda in light of your constant assaults on the truth and smear jobs?

If it talks like a communist, smears like a communist, and ignores facts like a communist, then it's a communist.

I'll continue to waste time responding to your communist propaganda, hateful posts, and defense of your bigoted and un-American ideology. Go visit communist China and observe how what you think you want works in the real world. I've been there multiple times. It's nothing to write home about.

I'm clearly not wasting my bandwidth since my service provider doesn't limit the number of electrons I can fire down the wire.

PS - You'll waste more of your time responding as soon as you read this. You did before and you'll do it again.

EdwardHeisler · 2018-02-04 15:11:03

The latest right-wingnut "communist" nonsense.

Donald "the goofus" Trump Junior yesterday said:

"The problem is rather than being reasonable and coming to the table, they forced themselves further, and further and further left," Trump Jr. said during his "Watters' World" interview. "I mean, they are left of commie right now"

The Democrats are "left of commie"!!!?? So that would make them dark red commynist dogs"?

Trump also believes that left-wing commynist pinko's have taken over most mass media except for the Trump News Network, Faux News.

Trump and other nutcases call CNN the "Communist News Network"! They love Faux News.

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Last edited by EdwardHeisler (2018-02-04 15:12:11)

GW Johnson · 2018-02-04 17:45:24

Be careful guys! I know this is the infamous "politics" thread, but stooping to name-calling and epithets can have consequences. I notice that one such has already been recently banned from these forums. Thin ice, here!

My own recommendation is to get your information from professional mainstream sources. You can always see the editorial bias (it being inherent in human nature), but if multiple sources agree on the basic facts about something, then you can trust that. The far right-wing and left-wing nut-job stuff will not agree with mainstream sources on basic facts. It is well to be aware of what they say, but it is unwise to accept any of it as true.

That being said, what I see thrown at me in this region of the country (Texas) is 99% right-wing. I hardly ever see any left wing stuff. I find that saddening. Conformity is the death of innovation.

As for Bill Nye, I have actually met and conversed with the man. He is no extremist, actually quite the decent fellow. Not agreeing with his position on anthropogenic warming is no reason to denigrate or slander him.

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2018-02-04 17:48:22)

Terraformer · 2018-02-05 12:02:32

Why do think a source is trustworthy, just because it holds a dominant position in the market as a holdover from before the digital revolution?

GW Johnson · 2018-02-05 13:58:09

Not "a" source, multiple sources that agree.

And these have a long tradition of at least attempting to get the facts right. It's not the digital-or-not, it's the traditions and how new hires are trained.

Most of the crap on the internet comes from blog sites and the like, with no pretense to truth, and nobody watching, either. Gives real intense meaning to "caveat emptor".

GW

kbd512 · 2018-02-06 06:16:02

In all the commentary and links here, there's still no evidence that Bill Nye is a racist bigoted sexist xenophobe or that he supports people who are. People who believe otherwise need to rejoin reality with the rest of us. People like Neil deGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye have probably done more for science than the person who wrote that article will ever do. They talk to the President, irrespective of who that happens to be, because they want to establish the dialogue necessary to get funding for great ideas. Partisan simpletons may never understand that, but I do. I write to and call both Democrat and Republican Senators and Congressmen and pretty much anyone else who will read or listen. No clear and concise communications means they have no idea what you're thinking or want them to do. To me, all the protests and marches are little kid stuff, like pitching a fit.

As far as CNN is concerned, they clearly have a socialist agenda to push and they hire people who have described themselves as communists or socialists. I don't know how far one must go before reality sets in, but they're basically socialist agitators who want a one party government system that exercises authoritarian control over the people, they advocate for social justice / income equality / wealth redistribution / whatever other codewords you wish to use for government sponsored theft, suppression of freedom of speech from anyone who dissents, and government control over major portions of our industrial base. I don't watch Fox News because they also clearly have an agenda to push. Too much agenda, too little substance, fast and loose with the facts is a great way to get me to ignore what you have to say. At what point do we call a spade a spade?

Most of the news networks were made to look like the agenda-driven buffoons they truly are when their dreams didn't come true during the last election cycle. It was a glorious day. To my way of thinking, it was just a big "F you" from the people of the United States who are fed up with politicians who say one thing and do another and the lying partisan media hacks who support them. At the very least, President Trump is pretty consistent when it comes to doing what he says he will do. There may be a lot of people who disagree with him, but his focus, determination, and plain language are a refreshing change. I don't have to guess about what he's thinking because he's going to tell me, whether anyone wants to hear it or not, and I think that's great. Bernie is the same way. He may be a socialist, but at least he's honest with everyone else about it and let's you know what he's thinking.

I don't need to listen to media dingbats cheerleading politicians using flowery language to tell us how they're going to try to screw us all over. Plain and simple truth always works best. I just don't care about every little special interest cause under the sun, either. Simple minded people focus on other people, average minds focus on events, great minds focus on great ideas, and evil minds focus on evil ideas. That concept seems to have been lost on a great number of people as of late. President Trump is one man, our government is not one man or woman and never has been, and we routinely elect politicians as schedule and public opinion dictates. The absurdity of this focus on one man seems a bit bizarre to me.

I bet no one here can tell me why they, personally, have a problem with President Trump without making reference to absurd media / political claims that they have zero first-hand knowledge of or how he has negatively impacted their lives. Thinking bad thoughts doesn't count, either, unless you're one of those religious people who thinks other people or "god" can somehow "control" your thoughts and actions. There's a world of difference between believing something and actually knowing it. A belief about someone without evidence is typically called a "prejudice". It shouldn't make a difference what the reasoning behind the prejudice happens to be, but somehow it does in modern politics.

EdwardHeisler · 2018-02-06 11:55:29

kbd512 · 2018-02-06 15:50:29

Well, that's pretty much what I thought. There's no logic behind the temper tantrums, just seething anger about being told "no" by your fellow Americans followed by a lot of childish fit-pitching over a good bit of nothing. I guess that's about as much logic as I can expect from our regressives these days. They used to attempt to work out plausible lies to explain their anti-American behavior, but now I see that that's fallen by the wayside. Like I said before, this is more than a little silly.

SpaceNut · 2018-02-06 18:32:47

That is the problem now that its ok to just lie openly, blantantly and to have no punishment for the falsehoods....then again is seems ok to say that the truth is a lie as well making it now just ideology as a belief system of real or not real.....

This is why this other topic was starts In 365 days, Trump has made 2,140 false or misleading claims as there are to many spouted falsehoods and counting.

Any one remember the covers with the twin towers on the untrusted story rags at the checkout counter, well it was fake at the time its story ran but it became soon real.....so there is not just a bit of truth but maybe a lot once the rocks have been cleared....

kbd512 · 2018-02-06 23:38:45

SpaceNut,

Former President Obama lied openly and often, but nobody in the regressive media bothered to count the number of times he lied because they supported his agenda. You didn't care then about lies told by the President and you don't care now. You care about the fact that someone you don't agree with is in office. I was part of that club for the past 16 years, but a lot less upset over it than you seem to be. You're angry over the election results and so is EdwardHeisler.

Every time President Trump says something the media doesn't agree with for purely partisan political reasons, they tell their mindless true believers that whatever was said constitutes a lie, evidence or lack of evidence unimportant. If my fellow Republicans were as petty as your party has become and continues to be as of late, then the number of false or misleading statements uttered by President Obama during his term in office would've looked largely the same. Counting the same thing the President said in political speeches as lies, which are actually matters of opinion, is an absurdity. Instead, we simply point out when something appears false or misleading and then move on from there. The notion that politicians from both political parties never lie is so absurd and demonstrably false that it's not news. It's just common public knowledge. This is not a game to me, either.

Personally, I think your unhealthy obsession with President Trump is affecting your judgement. At no time when former President Obama was in office was I nearly so upset over what did or didn't do, said or didn't say. The reason is quite simple. I'm an adult. I learn to adapt to and overcome whatever is thrown at me. If the person I want to be in political office isn't, then that's just too bad. I move on with the rest of my life from there.

Here's a parting thought worth pondering, or at least it is to me. The mere fact that you believe something doesn't make it true. Most of objective reality is divorced from what goes on in our heads. That's no less true now than it ever was. When we all come to recognize that fact, that'll be change we can all believe in.

elderflower · 2018-02-07 10:46:29

Can we have some actual examples of Obama's lies? Assertion of multiple lies without supporting, verifiable facts is not sufficient. What did he actually say, when did he say it and what were the actual facts in the case? By whom and how have these facts been verified?
Same goes for Trump, or anyone else accused of lying.

EdwardHeisler · 2018-02-07 14:49:07

elderflower wrote:

Can we have some actual examples of Obama's lies? Assertion of multiple lies without supporting, verifiable facts is not sufficient. What did he actually say, when did he say it and what were the actual facts in the case? By whom and how have these facts been verified? Same goes for Trump, or anyone else accused of lying.

OK. Read the list of Trumps lies and misleading claims at:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics … d73a228d77

Last edited by EdwardHeisler (2018-02-07 14:50:56)

louis · 2018-02-07 20:54:04

Difficult one for Ed: Alex Jones (Infowars) has come out in full support of Musk and Space X declaring them to be part of anti-globalist project. His US intelligence analyst (who appatently had been close to Cape Canaveral during the launch) agreed.

EdwardHeisler · 2018-02-07 21:31:58

louis wrote:

Difficult one for Ed: Alex Jones (Infowars) has come out in full support of Musk and Space X declaring them to be part of anti-globalist project. His US intelligence analyst (who appatently had been close to Cape Canaveral during the launch) agreed.

AAhhhhh .... Infowars. LOL The National Enquirer of alternate facts and reality.

Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang meets with Tesla CEO Elon Musk in Beijing

Elon Musk made an unexpected visit to China this week. Late on Tuesday night, China’s official news agency tweeted a photo of the Tesla chief chatting with Vice Premier Wang Yang, one of the country’s top officials in charge of the economy, in what a close watcher of China’s automotive industry says may go down as a breakthrough meeting.

Tesla (tsla, +2.70%) is riding high in China. Sales there tripled to more than $1 billion last year, the company said in March. Vehicle exports to China rose 376% year-over-year in the first two months of 2017, according to researcher JL Warren Capital.

But Tesla remains far from making China its biggest market, which Musk had predicted could someday happen. The $1 billion in China revenue in 2016 compared to $4.2 billion in the U.S.

Which is why Musk’s latest photo opportunity is important. This is the first time the powerful Vice Premier Wang has ever met an automotive CEO like Musk alone, said Li Anding, Xinhua’s former automotive reporter who now consults automakers on releases in China.

“Wang usually meets with groups of people,” Li said. The one-on-one meeting sends a message of Tesla’s importance in China, whose politicians consider the California company a role model for the country’s new electric car companies, as many vehicles suffer from long charging times and a poor driving experience, he explained.

Li also predicts that the meeting means Tesla is moving closer to signing a joint venture with a Chinese automaker to produce cars locally. Today, 25% tariffs on Tesla’s imported cars inflate its sticker prices, despite the company charging the same for cars in China as it does in its home country. This stands in contrast to some of the German luxury makers, which have been accused of ripping off and overcharging consumers. A joint venture would likely improve Tesla’s affordability in China.

Li says it’s tough predicting the timing of a joint venture. But Tesla is in the midst of meeting potential partners from different Chinese cities, according to one high-level official from China’s auto lobby who spoke to Fortune. Musk’s meeting with Wang, a former leader of Guangdong province, throws fresh speculation on its potential partner, as Guangdong is one of China’s many automotive hubs.

Musk has appeared in lots of photos lately. But his latest shot coming out of China might be Tesla’s most important sighting in a while.

http://fortune.com/2017/04/27/elon-musk-china-tesla/

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Elon Musk met with Erdogan to discuss Tesla's and SpaceX's cooperation with Turkish firms
Reuters
Nov. 8, 2017

ANKARA, Nov 8 (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Tesla Inc chief executive Elon Musk met on Wednesday to discuss cooperation between Tesla, SpaceX and Turkish firms, Turkey's presidential spokesman said.

Musk, who is in Turkey to attend the Global SatShow in Istanbul, met Erdogan and Turkey's transportation and industry ministers at the presidential palace in Ankara.

Presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said Musk and Erdogan discussed potential joint operations between Tesla Inc, Musk's SpaceX company and Turkish firms, as well as the launch of Turkey's Turksat 5A and 5B satellites.

"We also exchanged views on what sort of joint operations Turkish firms could have with the SpaceX and Tesla companies," Kalin was quoted as saying by the state-run Anadolu news agency.

Turkey aims to launch the Turksat 5A satellite in 2020 and the 5B in 2021. In October, Airbus submitted the best bid in a tender to build the Turkish satellites.

Kalin said an agreement would be signed with Airbus on Thursday, and Musk would also be present at the meeting as a subcontractor.

Musk's SpaceX plans its first trip to Mars in 2022, carrying only cargo, to be followed by a manned mission in 2024.

Kalin also said Erdogan and Musk had discussed electric cars, days after Turkey unveiled plans to launch a car made entirely in Turkey by 2021, which the president cast as a long-harboured dream of the Turkish people.

http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-mus … ey-2017-11

kbd512 · 2018-02-08 19:23:29

Elderflower,

Gee whiz? Really?

He lied about not supporting a single payer system, to what end I have no clue. If this could actually work here, I would be in favor of giving it a whirl at this point. All the stupid crap Obama and team tried didn't work because they ignored reality to get his signature piece of legislation passed and we haven't tried single payer yet, so why not? Nothing else is working. What's the worst that would happen? It might cost more money? Since when have we cared about that? We'll print more.

If you like your insurance, you can keep your insurance. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. The (Un)Affordable Care Act would reduce insurance costs. Our insurance costs tripled and now we also pay thousands of extra dollars out of pocket for drugs and services that were once covered. We're not alone, either. That was the central complaint from virtually everyone I know and small businesses like the one I used to work for were simply unable to hire more people as a function of what they were mandated to provide to new employees. People who never paid a dime into health insurance to begin with may or may not have received coverage, so we didn't even get full coverage for everyone while paying double to triple the cost for the same or worse health insurance. That doesn't seem like a good deal to me, and only political partisans would disagree. If I had to pay triple, but everyone received coverage, then maybe that's still a good deal because I can afford to pay. Triple the cost and we still didn't cover everyone? "No deal!", as President Trump would say.

Those statements were repeated over and over again on national television and were committed to YouTube for posterity. It was a big bright shining lie and people who were already paying for health insurance suffered while those who were irresponsible benefited. That's a recurring theme with the Democrat Party. Punish the people who do what they're supposed to do through theft, claim it's not robbing Peter to pay Paul (which is their favorite scheme and nearly always what they're up to), and then they lie their rear ends off about all the supposed benefits that never materialize in real life.

He lied about preventive care saving money, not that anyone capable of basic math couldn't figure that one out.

Then there were more lies that followed about how many people were actually being covered, what it would cost, who was paying, etc.

Obama blamed the increase of the deficit under his watch on Bush and other related lies. Democrats have an unstated but religiously adhered to policy of never taking responsibility for what they do. "The last guy spent us into oblivion, so now I need to spend more to get to the far side of oblivion." Yeah, that nonsense.

There were related lies about the Romney and Ryan health care plans and budgets, but that was just standard partisanship and campaign trail lies.

He repeatedly claimed that the health care mandate was not a tax. It just happens to be money collected by the IRS. We all know the IRS doesn't collect taxes. No matter what SCOTUS says, the Internal Revenue Service or IRS is our federal tax collection agency and money deducted from paychecks to pay for the health care mandates are taxes, plain and simple. Please don't tell me SCOTUS never gets things wrong. Citizens United, anyone? A corporation is a person. Remember that little gem of judicial turpitude.

He lied about not using executive authority to push his amnesty agenda for illegal aliens and his attempts to legislate using executive orders were rebuffed by SCOTUS no less than three times. Congress makes law, not POTUS.

He lied about not knowing what the IRS was doing to his political enemies. Lois Lerner was having weekly meetings with POTUS. It was so blatantly obvious that they immediately stopped when Congress found out about it. He's either utterly incompetent or the people who work for him don't do what he tells them to do, which is also a sign of incompetence and an inability to lead.

He lied about American manufacturers were creating new jobs under his watch.

He lied about the US doubling exports.

He lied about reducing our debt and that his budget proposals would not add to the debt. Every President and member of Congress has lied about this at one time or another, so I give him a pass on this. It's like claiming the sky is purple. It's still blue for people who can see normal color range.

He lied about not increasing taxes. Again, pass on this one. Everyone does it, everyone lies about it, and political partisans blame each other.

He lied about where the bulk of his campaign contributions came from. They came from major corporations and wealthy donors, same as every other politician, including President Trump.

He lied about excluding lobbyists from policy making positions. There are lots of other people we could hire, but for some reason we just can't get rid of these people. The money imbalance thing I've sparred with RobDyck over may have something to do with that. Unfortunately, he refuses to see the big picture.

He lied about bringing the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. He started more wars instead, as if somehow we needed more of those. Since he criticized his predecessor for doing it, this was the last thing I expected him to do. Basically, we never left. Why can't we just declare that place a lost cause? I like the determination of our military, but watching young kids bleed out or get blown to bits is sickening. People I know and actually care about are crippled for life because of people who can't write their own name in their own language. Wanna hold a "protest" over something, why not this insanity? I was in the military for six years and I still don't understand why we're over there. We're not going to accomplish anything and that's for damn sure.

Anyway, here are their score cards:

Barack Obama's file

Donald Trump's file

I'm not particularly upset over either record. All politicians lie. The more politicians talk, the more they lie. If you think otherwise, you're only fooling yourself. Former President Obama was the best teleprompter reader we've had in living memory, but whenever he went off-script he tended to lie a lot. President Trump tends to not use a teleprompter, so he tends to lie a lot.

Rather than choosing to fixate on specific lies or count the number of times they repeat the same lie, I pay attention to what they lie about. What I care about is what their lies cost people based upon what they're trying to sell to people. If anyone else here has any business sense, they'll fixate on what lies cost us money and ignore the BS political agenda lies. For people who are high functioning adults, this is not that difficult. For people who never really grew up, it's next to impossible.

elderflower · 2018-02-09 03:45:45

That is a list of assertions by your self. They may be repeated from other assertions that you have heard. They do not answer the criteria that I posted.
Looking at your links: The scores clearly indicate that Trump is responsible for more untruths than Obama, as a percentage. All politicians will tell half truths and try to divert attention from unfavourable circumstances, that isn't the same as asserting that X is true when it demonstrably isn't.

kbd512 · 2018-02-09 15:20:45

Elderflower,

Nice try, but I watched this stuff on TV when former President Obama said it and those statements were later proven or already proven to be demonstrably false, so yes, it did happen and he did lie. Eventually, I determined it wasn't worth my time sitting and listening to politicians lie to everyone and I stopped watching the news and Congressional testimony as a result, which was all I watched on TV to begin with.

You asked for a list of lies told by former President Obama and I provided a partial list of the lies he repeatedly told to the American people. Those were recorded for posterity, they were uttered in front of a slew of news cameras, and you can go hear them for yourself on YouTube, courtesy of recordings from the major news networks. I already know you won't because you're deliberately ignoring what you don't want to see and hear and making false claims that I asserted things which were actually proven.

This is why the Democrats lost the last Presidential election. They're not even honest with themselves. Maybe you or the rest of the Democrats think they can fool everyone all the time, but that simply doesn't happen. That is precisely why Donald Trump is President. Stop lying to yourself first and then work up to being honest with everyone else.

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-04-10 06:05:25

Bill Nye, the Sellout Guy

https://www.realclearscience.com/2022/0 … 26114.html

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