Why is it OK for politicians to lie?

kinger101

CLAPTON wrote: »

but would have been a lie wouldn't it?

My scenario was fictional and hypothetical. Johnson had hard facts and chose to "distort" them. I hope you can see the difference. We don't know if my scenario would have been a lie. Neither of us can read Andrew Marr's thoughts.

stator

Someone who tries something different and answers questions truthfully gets slaughtered by the media who are far too good at destroying people like Corbyn. Only the slimey gits like Cameron survive by plausible deniability.

Yolina

My 2p worth is that they are:
- all as bad as each other
- don't give a toss about anyone but themselves
- make a right mess but never clean up after themselves
- the media are just as bad

The worst bit? IT WORKS and people believe them.

prowla

Conrad wrote: »

A far greater more sinister deceit was Camborne ordering the Treasury to consider negative only modelling outcomes. A dispicable abuse of power that the foolish sucked down hook line and sinker

Well, that backfired - I simply didn't believe anything the Remain camp said.

Carl31

the whole politics thing is weird, i think its just a historic thing thats 'accepted', its never really been question

Politics needs shaking up, why do they stand in a room and hurl abuse at each other? how it that a good use of our tax money

I often look at politics and the UK as a business. If managers acted the way politicians do at work, they would be sacked in minutes, i think the same should apply

mayonnaise

Conrad wrote: »

A far greater more sinister deceit was Camborne ordering the Treasury to consider negative only modelling outcomes. A dispicable abuse of power that the foolish sucked down hook line and sinker

Time will tell if these models were overly negative.
Early days still.

[Deleted User]

A big difference between the crisp advert and political propaganda is that 50% of the population actually want to hear it. Politicians garner support by telling people what they want to hear (even when it's self contradictory sometimes).

Andy_L

Carl31 wrote: »

Politics needs shaking up, why do they stand in a room and hurl abuse at each other? how it that a good use of our tax money

Its media selection bias. They don't spend much of their time hurling abuse , however PMQs makes good(ish) telly whilst productive constituency work & select committees don't

HornetSaver

The Conservatives won the General Election because they were more effective at being dishonest in England than Labour.

Labour won the Welsh election because they were more effective at being dishonest there than the Conservatives.

Taken as a pair, those are uncontroversial statements - I'm not taking a politically slanted position towards one side or another, simply commenting on campaign effectiveness and the strength of individual, disingenuous pledges and statements.

The same holds true of the referendum debate. Regardless of whether the facts of the argument lean towards Remain or Leave (I personally would say Remain, many equally intelligent people would say leave), the latter's lies were more believeable than the former's lies.

Malthusian

Firstly, an ASA-type organisation would have approved the Leave bus. The ASA rules on the accuracy of what an advert actually claims. Unlike a politician, they would be able to see that "We send £350m a week to the EU. Let's fund the NHS instead" is not the same as "We send £350m a week to the EU. Let's spend that on the NHS instead." The second sentence is deliberately worded so that it does not refer back to the £350m figure. Like everyone else I agree the poster was ill-advised but only because we know there are so many people willing to pretend to be illiterate if it puts their opponent on the back foot.

Secondly, the ASA is fairly toothless anyway because all it can do is order that an advert "does not appear again in its current form". By the time it's made a ruling the advert has already been seen, and probably generated extra publicity by having the complaint to the ASA reported on. PaddyPower among others are masters at generating free publicity by running adverts they know will get banned by the ASA.

There's a good chance a PSA could encourage lies / misleading campaigns by politicians because the benefit of the initial lie would be compounded by the extra publicity generated by the complaint process, and the opportunity for the politician to swan around saying "look at me, I'm being oppressed, I'm saying what Big Government doesn't want you to hear".