Quantitative and Qualitative Failings
Arguments about Trump often go like this.
Me: Trump simply has no regard for the truth. It's irrelevant to him.
My interlocutor: As opposed to the countless GOP politicians who have spent the last decade casting doubt on climate science?
Me: Well, right, but Trump is worse.
Trump's ascent has forced me to think a fair amount about the line-drawing we do between expected levels of dishonesty and corruption and unacceptable levels. It can get pretty uncomfortable! Here's an example of what I mean:
Trump probably thinks all media organizations are as corrupt as the National Enquirer. Would explain a lot.— Brandt (@UrbanAchievr) February 16, 2018
This is an insightful tweet. And the National Enquirer really is much worse than mainstream media organizations. There's a huge quantitative difference, and it encompasses lots of flat qualitative differences as well (for instance, no mainstream newspaper would pay sources, since this tends to encourage exaggeration or outright lying). But to point this out is to invite mockery ("Oh, I suppose the New York Times never puts profits ahead of truth-seeking?"). The same thing happens with the FBI, or the courts, or the Democratic Party, or whoever. None of these institutions is perfect, and if Trump is just worse as a matter of degree, then what's the big deal?
I have no satisfying answer. The obvious move is to claim that at some point a quantitative difference turns into a qualitative difference, but this is obviously a subjective claim that an unsympathetic audience need not accept. Note that part of the dynamic here is that a lot of people have axes to grind with these institutions (Glen Greenwald being the obvious example when it comes to the Democratic Party and liberalism/left wing politics in general), and to them Trump presents an irresistible opportunity to gain advantage against institutions that they have long sought to destroy. But of course, that doesn't make them wrong! It just makes them eager for any opportunity to boost Trump at the expense of, say, the Democrats.
So at the end of the day this turns into another exhausting argument of the kind I described in my previous post, where the imperfection of human institutions ends up serving as a shield for Trump whatever he may do.
I have no satisfying answer. The obvious move is to claim that at some point a quantitative difference turns into a qualitative difference, but this is obviously a subjective claim that an unsympathetic audience need not accept. Note that part of the dynamic here is that a lot of people have axes to grind with these institutions (Glen Greenwald being the obvious example when it comes to the Democratic Party and liberalism/left wing politics in general), and to them Trump presents an irresistible opportunity to gain advantage against institutions that they have long sought to destroy. But of course, that doesn't make them wrong! It just makes them eager for any opportunity to boost Trump at the expense of, say, the Democrats.
So at the end of the day this turns into another exhausting argument of the kind I described in my previous post, where the imperfection of human institutions ends up serving as a shield for Trump whatever he may do.
posted by James | 11:03 AM
2 Comments:
The Krug Man speaks
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/15/opinion/republicans-bad-faith-krugman.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fopinion&action=click&contentCollection=opinion®ion=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=6&pgtype=sectionfront
Not sure why it's important to be able to claim a qualitative difference at this level of abstraction (i.e., Trump is qualitatively more dishonest than other people/institutions). Seems you can get plenty of mileage out of simply showing how much worse he is (e.g., than Bush).
That said, I don't think it's conceptually difficult; it's just difficult because people are crazy and stupid and our media environment is toxic and dysfunctional (which also of course makes it difficult to get mileage out of the powerful "quantitative" arguments). For instance, I think it's easy to come up with examples of how Trump's statements are qualitatively (i) incoherent, (ii) ignorant, (iii) without regard for the truth unlike those of an ordinary liar who is painfully aware of it, and/or (iv) pathologically narcissistic. Like, if you're remotely reasonable, his qualitative badness is obvious after listening to him ad lib for more than a couple of minutes.
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