NOM

I've been reflecting on political scene again, and came up with a prospective political credo. "Make Lying Un-American Again." But when I break it down it is discouraging.
"Again" is unrealistic- when was lying ever Un-american? Am I being too negative?
"Lying" is.... realistic? Can we survive, let alone compete in this world if complete, flawless honesty is our standard. Most of you would recognize that even the LDS Church found such a standard unsustainable. Apparently, even their God would agree. We can blame them for that, but.... I for one can't condemn them. I lie myself, even when trying to avoid it.
"American/Un-American" is a varied, even contrasting of number of ideals. What makes American and her people great? Can we agree on even one thing?
this turned out more negative than I intended. I'll just say, "Take care of yourselves out there, and try to find room to love others, even if its just some others.

Which part of "America" are we talking about here?

Argentina?

Venezuela?

Greenland?

The challenge is that people can't tell truth from fiction. I think it's more obvious and in your face these days but people have always had that problem.

No doubt there are bad actors that intentionally lie. Then you have misinformed people that lie unintentionally. Then there's the people with pathologies that say whatever they need to believe to soothe their egos.

People also consider their information sources as golden but all their sources are really doing is selling their own opinions back to them.

The challenge is that both red and blue camps believe it's the other side that's lying.

I think with marketing they always try to go for positive messaging. That's how a plan to burn the country to ashes gets repackaged as "Make America Great Again."

nibbler wrote: ↑Thu Aug 07, 2025 9:53 amThe challenge is that both red and blue camps believe it's the other side that's lying.

I think herein lies the biggest problem. Each side lies and lies a LOT. Bill Clinton claimed he did not have sexual relations with that woman. G. W. Bush claimed that there were large amount of WMDs in Iraq. Obama said that you can keep your health care plan if you like it. Trump said he would make Mexico pay for the Wall. Biden lied about his family business dealings. They all do it. But each party only want's to acknowledge the lies the other side says. No one wants to admit to their own issues.

In the end, I think the problem is the current 2 party system is fundamentally broken. For both sides, their #1 goal is gaining and holding on to power. They want more and more money for themselves and their political machine and will do anything they feel they need to to make it happen. The other party is a convenient target to push their tribalism. The more us-vs-them they can push, the more they can push the fear the other guy and therefore the more money cay can collect. Nowhere in their playbook do they actually care about the people they are representing. Only how much money they can get from them. If you think about it, the current system is setup to encourage them to lie. If the lie bring in more money, then all the better.

A lot of the current system just comes down to who can raise the most money will win a given seat. So to bring honesty back to the US, we need a way to completely change the political process. What that is? I don't know. Maybe campaign finance reform including maximum $$ that a person may spend on a campaign. Maybe a ban on all campaign financing and all candidates will be given the same amount from the government, no more allowed. I welcome better ideas.

But right now, the system is not setup to hold people accountable for their lies, but actively encourage them.

Just a reminder, this discussion should be in the Coffee Shop.

Just a couple of quick responses, but then we should probably pick it up over there, if we want to keep the discussion political.

1) My motto is Make America Good Again

2) Enjoy the days when you can even begin to tell the difference between actual evidence and made up slop. I like watching videos of robots, for whatever reason. The other day I searched YouTube for "humanoid robot" and about 90% of the results were AI-created slop. Not just AI images, but they seemed to be written, narrated, and animated with little or no human intervention. I have seen similar things that pretend to be actual senate hearings, legal trials, etc. with high level politicians, or even talk show altercations, but they are entirely fictional and AI generated. This stuff is already influencing a lot of Americans, even though it is randomly generated in China or Russia, or just people fishing for clicks, and usually not too hard to spot (for now). For example, without a solid background in archaeology how are you supposed to determine which amazing new archaeological discoveries on YouTube aren't just made up clickbait? I expect that in a year of two the internet could be so deeply imbued with this crap that it might be practically useless for learning anything factual. I hope I'm wrong. How long till we see how to videos that will have you blowing up your water heater or ruining your car engine because they are AI generated nonsense?