5,090
edits
Blatant Lies/Real Life/Politics: Difference between revisions
m
→Venezuela
No edit summary |
m (→Venezuela) |
||
| (9 intermediate revisions by 2 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
{{trope}}
Politics is ''built'' on lying. As ''[[Adolf Hitler]]'' is quoted as saying,<ref>he actually lifted it from an old army manual</ref> "great masses of people fall to [[Big Lie|a great lie]] much easier than to a small one". Really, it's hard to find politicians who don't use blatant lies, as evidenced by all of the major scandals and hypocrisy going on . There is an expectation that politicians that don't represent big parties don't lie, but it's as wrong as anything else; take a look at [[British Political System|British politics]], where Deputy Prime Minister [[Nick Clegg]] is so vilified for breaking a promise, you'd think he'd actually [[The Invention of Lying|invented lying]].▼
▲== This Doesn't Concern Politics Or War At All ==
▲Politics is ''built'' on lying. As ''[[Adolf Hitler]]'' is quoted as saying,<ref>he actually lifted it from an old army manual</ref> "great masses of people fall to a great lie much easier than to a small one". Really, it's hard to find politicians who don't use blatant lies, as evidenced by all of the major scandals and hypocrisy going on . There is an expectation that politicians that don't represent big parties don't lie, but it's as wrong as anything else; take a look at [[British Political System|British politics]], where Deputy Prime Minister [[Nick Clegg]] is so vilified for breaking a promise, you'd think he'd actually [[The Invention of Lying|invented lying]].
{{TOCright}}
== Australia ==
== Canada ==
* At least one politician decided to tell people things were getting better during the 2020 [[COVID-19 pandemic]] when things were actually getting worse. [https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-covid-19-stay-at-home-order-lockdown-1.5872521 In Ontario, Canada]: October 6: "We are flattening the curve" (the daily average was 611 new cases); October 28: "We see the curve going down" (as the daily average neared 900); December 15: "Because of the guidelines we put in … we're seeing a plateau per se" (the daily average was 1,927 cases).▼
== China ==
* Even with hundreds of images and videos of it circulating the Internet today, the Chinese government denies the
== Germany ==
* The NPD, the German Nationalist Party (who totally aren't admitted [[A Nazi by Any Other Name|Neo-Nazis]]). [[Sarcasm Mode|It's not like they]] organise [[Torches and Pitchforks|Skinhead-marches]], propose mainly anti-democratic edicts, promise even the most extreme of popularist actions ("[[Monkey Dust|Kill the paedophiles!]]"), attend [[WW 2]] re-enactments dressed as Axis forces, engage "former" street brawlers and ''terrorists'' as candidates, strive to expel Islamic religion from Germany, plan to cut the funds for Jewish communities once elected, attend murals and honour guards of SS-, SA- and other fanatical Nazi organisations' members ([[Suspiciously Specific Denial|as well as the birth and death days of well-known Nazis]]) throughout Europe, and hide the questions "An out-fashioned German [[Adolf Hitler|first name with 5 letters]]", "The abbreviation for National Socialism", "Famous politician of the 20th century, also known as the 'Peace Pilot'<ref>Rudolph Hess</ref>" in the crossword puzzles of their party papers. Or do they?▼
* "Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten."<ref>"Nobody has the intention to build a wall."</ref> Said by [[East Germany|East-German]] Politician Walter Ulbricht in June 1961. Two months later, the Berlin Wall was built.▼
** This was also a [[Suspiciously Specific Denial]], because while border tensions, in general, were being discussed, nobody in the conversation mentioned a wall until Ulbricht did. In any case, this quote was later attached to the wall itself whilst under construction for extra hilarity.▼
== Iraq ==
* During the 2003 US Invasion of Iraq, Iraqi information minister Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf (a.k.a. "Baghdad Bob" or "Comical Ali") became famous for statements like "The cruise missiles do not frighten anyone. We are catching them like fish in a river." or "There are no Americans in Baghdad." (while an [[Tank Goodness|Abrams]] is rolling down the block on the screen behind him).▼
** And before that, "Baghdad Betty" tries to use this to demoralize American soldiers in the 1990 war. [[Hilarity Ensues]].<ref>[http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/baghdad.asp Bart Simpson? Orly?]</ref>▼
== Liberia ==
* Charles D.B. King, president of Liberia, claimed a [[Landslide Election|landslide victory]] of 234,000 votes from an electorate of 15,000 voters. No, those numbers aren't reversed. He set the record for the most crooked election of all time.▼
== Libya ==
* Most of what deposed [[Libya]]n dictator [[Muammar Gaddafi]] said. Two particularly memorable examples come to mind: He claimed "My people love me" while opening Libya to international journalists, saying this while protests were wracking the country, army units were turning against him, and he's basically making his image worse even as he tries to make it better. Also, his suggestion that the rebels are actually drunk/hallucinating/Al-Qaeda/American/Israeli/Zionist/terrorist/mercenary/imperialists who are all high. [[Sarcasm Mode|Of course, none of those labels
== Mexico ==
* In Mexico, 1968, students were accused of being communists. The reality? The U.S.A.'s chief of the C.I.A. in Mexico, Winston Scott reported daily of the "Communist threat", yet there was no proof of that. He reported poorly and ordered an investigation to see if Chinese, Cuban, or Soviet agents were behind the plot and were giving the students weapons (which they would've used against the army in the [[wikipedia:Tlatelolco Massacre|Tlatelolco Massacre]]). You can pretty much guess what happened.▼
== North Korea ==
* In general, any country that has [[People's Republic of Tyranny|"people's" or "democratic"]] in its name isn't. North Korea, possessing what is generally considered the most oppressive government on the planet, has the official name of Democratic People's Republic of Korea.▼
* Underneath the Korean Demilitarized Zone, at least four tunnels large enough to file a division of soldiers through per hour have been discovered with their entrances on the North Korean side. The North claims they were digging for coal, but no coal has ever been found through those tunnels (which have been dug through granite), and the tunnels were even painted black to give the appearance of coal. Further, these tunnels run north to south, have no branches
== Philippines ==
* Joseph Estrada's ads need special mention. A former Philippine president who had been proven to have been stealing money, tried to declare martial law, was forcefully impeached then imprisoned, and as of this writing, is now currently running for the position of President of the Republic of the Philippines for 2010 with the tag line "I didn't finish my presidency".▼
== Turkey ==
* "[[Would Be Rude to Say Genocide|The Armenian Genocide never happened]]."▼
== Venezuela ==
* The infamous "Hugo Chávez arrived on his own foot at the Caracas Military Hospital" government statement merely days before his death in early March 2013, when he has been so sick he didn't attend his own inauguration ceremony in January and the presidential elections that preceded said inauguration was advanced to October 2012 instead of the traditional December because his illness was progressing too fast for Chavez to have a traditional re-election campaign.
== USA ==
* [http://www.politifact.com/ Politifact] is built on the premise that politicians lie and sets out to fact check most notable statements, and the most blatant lies tend to be graded as "pants on fire". It even won the 2009 Pulitzer for it. There are, however, questions of bias: from the right, as Republicans are graded as lying three times more than Democrats; and from the left, for trying to bring those to parity when there may not be an equivalence.
** Of note was Jon Kyl's "not intended to be a factual statement" about Planned Parenthood's abortion services (he claimed 90%, when it's actually 3%) was not as bad as the Democrats claiming that Republican proposals would add $12,500 to Medicare (it's actually $6,250).
** This reached to their 2011 Lie of the Year: Democrats claiming that "Republicans voted to end Medicare", which was immediately criticised from both sides; the staunchly conservative [https://web.archive.org/web/20150102122724/http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/286301/re-mediscare-2011-s-lie-year-robert-verbruggen National Review]) that a) it can be argued that the plan effectively ended Medicare as it's known, and b) it was pure campaign material and couldn't be dismissed simply as a lie because of the previous point.
▲* The NPD, the German Nationalist Party (who totally aren't admitted [[A Nazi by Any Other Name|Neo-Nazis]]). [[Sarcasm Mode|It's not like they]] organise [[Torches and Pitchforks|Skinhead-marches]], propose mainly anti-democratic edicts, promise even the most extreme of popularist actions ("[[Monkey Dust|Kill the paedophiles!]]"), attend [[WW 2]] re-enactments dressed as Axis forces, engage "former" street brawlers and ''terrorists'' as candidates, strive to expel Islamic religion from Germany, plan to cut the funds for Jewish communities once elected, attend murals and honour guards of SS-, SA- and other fanatical Nazi organisations' members ([[Suspiciously Specific Denial|as well as the birth and death days of well-known Nazis]]) throughout Europe, and hide the questions "An out-fashioned German [[Adolf Hitler|first name with 5 letters]]", "The abbreviation for National Socialism", "Famous politician of the 20th century, also known as the 'Peace Pilot'<ref>Rudolph Hess</ref>" in the crossword puzzles of their party papers. Or do they?
* Any time any politician promises to do something (cut costs/taxes or raise growth or level of services) for nothing. They might even be sorta honest, in the sense that they're also lying to themselves that they can do it for more than a few years before things increase again. That said, it's worth noting that many of the things politicians say that ''seem'' like Blatant Lies in hindsight aren't technically lies. This is due to the fact that politicians have a habit of making hasty promises to secure voter support, then realizing later that they had misjudged the situation. For example, [[George H. W. Bush]] ran on "no new taxes", but was forced to do so to control the deficit, and cost him a second term.
** An article in ''US News & World Report'' during the 1988 election said that despite their promises, whoever won (Bush or Dukakis) would have to raise taxes despite his promise. Bush replied in a letter to the magazine stating that he definitely would not raise taxes.
▲* "[[Would Be Rude to Say Genocide|The Armenian Genocide never happened]]."
▲* "[[Richard Nixon|I'm not a crook. I earned everything I've got]]."
▲* During the 2003 US Invasion of Iraq, Iraqi information minister Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf (a.k.a. "Baghdad Bob" or "Comical Ali") became famous for statements like "The cruise missiles do not frighten anyone. We are catching them like fish in a river." or "There are no Americans in Baghdad." (while an [[Tank Goodness|Abrams]] is rolling down the block on the screen behind him).
▲** And before that, "Baghdad Betty" tries to use this to demoralize American soldiers in the 1990 war. [[Hilarity Ensues]].<ref>[http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/baghdad.asp Bart Simpson? Orly?]</ref>
▲* Joseph Estrada's ads need special mention. A former Philippine president who had been proven to have been stealing money, tried to declare martial law, was forcefully impeached then imprisoned, and as of this writing, is now currently running for the position of President of the Republic of the Philippines for 2010 with the tag line "I didn't finish my presidency".
▲* In general, any country that has [[People's Republic of Tyranny|"people's" or "democratic"]] in its name isn't. North Korea, possessing what is generally considered the most oppressive government on the planet, has the official name of Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
▲* "Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten."<ref>"Nobody has the intention to build a wall."</ref> Said by [[East Germany|East-German]] Politician Walter Ulbricht in June 1961. Two months later, the Berlin Wall was built.
▲** This was also a [[Suspiciously Specific Denial]], because while border tensions in general were being discussed, nobody in the conversation mentioned a wall until Ulbricht did. In any case, this quote was later attached to the wall itself whilst under construction for extra hilarity.
▲* In Mexico, 1968, students were accused of being communists. The reality? The U.S.A.'s chief of the C.I.A. in Mexico, Winston Scott reported daily of the "Communist threat", yet there was no proof of that. He reported poorly and ordered an investigation to see if Chinese, Cuban, or Soviet agents were behind the plot and were giving the students weapons (which they would've used against the army in the [[wikipedia:Tlatelolco Massacre|Tlatelolco Massacre]]). You can pretty much guess what happened.
▲* Underneath the Korean Demilitarized Zone, at least four tunnels large enough to file a division of soldiers through per hour have been discovered with their entrances on the North Korean side. The North claims they were digging for coal, but no coal has ever been found through those tunnels (which have been dug through granite), and the tunnels were even painted black to give the appearance of coal. Further, these tunnels run north to south, have no branches, and are sloped upward as it moves south so that standing water doesn't form within them and stagnate.
▲* Even with hundreds of images and videos of it circulating the Internet today, the Chinese government denies the Tianamen Square massacre ever happened.
▲* Most of what deposed [[Libya]]n dictator [[Muammar Gaddafi]] said. Two particularly memorable examples come to mind: He claimed "My people love me" while opening Libya to international journalists, saying this while protests were wracking the country, army units were turning against him, and he's basically making his image worse even as he tries to make it better. Also, his suggestion that the rebels are actually drunk/hallucinating/Al-Qaeda/American/Israeli/Zionist/terrorist/mercenary/imperialists who are all high. [[Sarcasm Mode|Of course, none of those labels contradict each other whatsoever.]]
* Senator John Kyl claimed abortion accounted for 99% of Planned Parenthood's services on the floor of the Senate while trying to push through a budget plan to defund it. When called out on this, his office gave a press release that indicated his rant was "not intended to be a factual statement", especially as Planned Parenthood's balance sheet showed helping people with STDs, counselling, and contraception being a bigger focus for the company.
** When this was corrected, two political commentators rattled off the other, supposedly less involved, things that Planned Parenthood does, like pap smears, writing it off as the kind of stuff you can get at Walgreens.
** Ruthlessly mocked by [[Stephen Colbert]] [http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/381282/april-11-2011/pap-smears-at-walgreens here]. [[Memetic Mutation|It wasn't intended to be a factual statement!]]
▲* Charles D.B. King, president of Liberia, claimed a [[Landslide Election|landslide victory]] of 234,000 votes from an electorate of 15,000 voters. No, those numbers aren't reversed. He set the record for the most crooked election of all time.
* While travelling to Argentina to visit his mistress (whom he later proclaimed his soul mate), going off the grid for days at a time and using government funds and transportation to do so, former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford claimed that he was "hiking the Appalachian Trail". For added hilarity, during the alleged hiking days, it was [[Naked People Are Funny|a highly-popularized nude hike]].
* Following the killing of Osama Bin Laden, former Bush Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, when asked if waterboarding or other [[Enhanced Interrogation Techniques]] used on captured insurgents led to Bin Laden's killing, he [[Suspiciously Specific Denial|simply denied that waterboarding was ever done]]. The next day, he said waterboarding was vital in ascertaining the information.
* [[Bill Clinton
** [[Exact Words|Prior to making that statement, he managed to get the person asking the question to define "sex" in a way that what he did with that woman was not "sex"]]
* "My Twitter account was hacked" (Anthony Weiner)
▲* [[Australian Politics|There will never, ever be a GST]].
* [[Sarah Palin]] didn't misspeak. [[The American Revolution|Paul Revere]] really did ride to warn the British to not away Americans' guns.
* The ever popular "It's George Bush's fault", which has been used by many a politician for everything from the attempted Time Square bombing to the BP Oil Spill to Osama bin Laden hiding out in Pakistan. Granted, Boy George wasn't exactly the greatest of Presidents, but come on, it's 2016 and the phrase is still tossed around!
** Blaming the previous government isn't a new concept though: while Bush still was in office there was a bit of "It's Clinton's fault" years after he left office, and the current ruling coalition in Britain use Labour's responsibility for the (strength of the) recession as a shield against criticism in the same way.
** Regardless of
** Many inconveniences and general irritations of Americans were created by George W. Bush. For instance, the TSA has overtaken "airline food" as the ubiquitous air-travel related target of comedians. The person who created TSA was... {{spoiler|George W. Bush /spoiler}}. Of course people are still going to be kicking his name around.
* [[Donald Trump]] made over 20,000 false or misleading claims as President of the United States as of July 2020, [https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/13/donald-trump-20000-false-or-misleading-claims according to fact-checkers at ''The Washington Post'']. And he continued to do so in the months leading up to the 2020 election, including repeated claims that the [[COVID-19
** And then on January 6, 2021, [https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/politics/2021/01/06/what-trump-said-rally-speech-spark-u-s-capitol-storming/6568337002/ he told a rally "And after this, we're going to walk down there, and I'll be there with you"] before doing nothing to prevent that crowd from storming the Capitol buildings. He was not right there with them.
▲* At least one politician decided to tell people things were getting better during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic when things were actually getting worse. [https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-covid-19-stay-at-home-order-lockdown-1.5872521 In Ontario, Canada]: October 6: "We are flattening the curve" (the daily average was 611 new cases); October 28: "We see the curve going down" (as the daily average neared 900); December 15: "Because of the guidelines we put in … we're seeing a plateau per se" (the daily average was 1,927 cases).
{{tropesub-subpagefooter}}
[[Category:Banned On TV Tropes]]
| |||