Does Anyone Still Care About Objective Truth?

In today’s world it seems like the driving force in any conversation, discussion, not to mention argument is to WIN, not to search for and perhaps even find the TRUTH. 

Facts are out the window.  It is all about NARRATIVE.  That is, what is the story one wants to tell that will serve the teller’s purposes – that purpose most often being to win.  The end seems to always justify the means.  Lies are not prohibited; challenging lies is an impermissible attack. The teller’s story must be believed so the teller can win; questions are not for discussion but rather seen as attacks.

Mature discussions used to also include some element of humility which resulted in actually listening to the assertions of the other side and accepting questions about one’s own beliefs and assertions with a humble dignity and acknowledgement that they might be wrong or open to revision.  Both sides were not only willing to listen to verified facts but were also unwilling to assert as true or factual opinions or allegations that were not verified or that came only from “unidentified sources.”

Not so today.  Humility gets in the way of winning.  It is inconsistent with the assertion that one is absolutely right, no matter what.  No matter what the facts might be or what a full evidentiary examination might prove.  Egos seem unable to take any sort of challenge.  It is all about winning and in order to “win” too many people think that they must be right no matter what and any contrary fact or point of logic must be repelled and denied.

This is at least in part why people believe that they are justified in denying the First Amendment rights of others.  This is at least in part why people assert that information published by news outlets that do not concur with their Left or Right leanings are simply not worth reading, even if they provide verifiable facts on a topic.  This is why when one narrative is repeated by other outlets that have the same leanings that those who accept that narrative believe that it has been verified and not just repeated. 

This is how false allegations take wing.  Opinions become fact.  An unverified statement by an unidentified source becomes truth.  In reality, neither is so, and yet we let such narratives ruin the lives of so many people:  think about the Kavanaugh hearings for example; think about a justified – and there are some – police shooting where the officer is crucified rather than appreciated for doing his or her job; think about FISA warrants to spy on American citizens and on a Presidential candidate that were granted on what have now been proven to be false statements.  These are just a few of the more egregious false narratives that far too many are willing to accept simply because they support the triumph of their own narrative. 

It is all about winning.  But once upon a time it was more about finding an objective truth.

There was an interesting commentary in the Wall Street Journal on Aug. 30 by Tony Woodlief titled “Free Speech Absolutism Killed Free Speech.”  In it he argues that too much free speech has led to the cancel culture.  Essentially his position is that when we have open speech and the full exchange of ideas (which were originally believed by Mill and others to be the way to ferret out the objective TRUTH), that no idea is refutable, and ultimately leads to the belief that no truth exists. 

“When no dogma can finally be put to rest, it becomes easier—almost obligatory—to do whatever we like. Ideas are evaluated, not based on their reasonableness or coherence, but by how much they tickle the ears of the in-crowd. Harder truths become offensive. The only intolerable citizen, in such a regime, is the one whose belief in truth compels him to attack beliefs he believes to be false even if his attacks disturb the equanimity of the establishment. His criticism becomes too hurtful—even a form of “violence.” For the safety of the community, he must be cast out.”

This well describes a reason for such things as free speech being driven from campuses, threats and attacks directed towards those who do not support the favored position, acceptance of unverified facts or opinions and “news,” etc. 

But this reasoning is flawed.  It is not free speech itself that leads to this place of dogma over truth.  Rather it is the current inability or unwillingness of people to use their critical thinking skills – to use reason as well as emotion in assessing the speech that they hear.  As Mr. Woodlief writes, “Mill believed heretics should be heard, not put in charge of classrooms and permitted to create despotic speech codes. Everybody should be allowed to express his views, but that doesn’t require us to empower and elevate people who would afford themselves the right to speak and take it from everybody else.”

When did we decide that we are no longer allowed to question speech put forth if it might be in the least bit upsetting to the mob of public opinion?  I think there are two areas that are in large part responsible for this:  A loss of shared values and a loss of an educational system that teaches us to think.

Both require not just listening, but listening and then holding the ideas and ideologies presented accountable.

As Mr. Woodlief states, “the classroom is not a fiefdom and students are not a teacher’s ideological playthings.”  It is the responsibility of educators to not present one viewpoint alone, but to present several and then help the students to conduct their own inquiry and evaluation into those viewpoints – questioning the adequacy of sources, the completeness and objectivity with which facts are presented, etc.  It is the job of educators to teach students how to assess a variety of informations and then make up their own minds.

Yet too often educators try to instill their beliefs into their students by presenting only their ideology.  Academics and those who hold themselves out to be scholars have an ethical responsibility to promote free and open inquiry as well as practice intellectual honesty themselves.

Combined with the loss of critical thinking in the classroom has come a change in what Americans value.  We have become a “feel good” society.  Everyone must get a trophy; no one should be made to feel uncomfortable -ever; if it makes you feel good, do it; etc.  Questioning someone’s point is seen as an attack, not on the point being argued, but on the person.  We have lost the ability to distinguish that.  We have silenced our reason for our emotions. 

When everyone is right, when everyone expects the trophy, we essentially silence both our humility and our critical thinking ability.  It is not free speech that is the problem, but our inability to listen to that free speech without feeling threatened and without the ability to assess the many ideas we find in the marketplace and hold them accountable.

We have lost the belief in an objective truth; it has been replaced with a belief in individual narrative truth.  When that is the prevailing belief, there will be no assessments of ideologies as part of the search for that objective truth.  Instead, truth will become the fickle assertion of the mob majority and opposing ideas will be silenced, not because the ideas in vogue are not refutable, but because we are afraid to refute them.

Only when, and not until, we relearn the humility of putting a shared search for objective truth above a personal desire to win, only then will we find the civility and tolerance that once existed in this country and be able to use it to overcome the hate and blindness to reason that is destroying us.

Two Worlds

That we in America are co-existing in two different worlds is really no surprise to anyone who has been paying attention at all for the last few years, and certainly since Donald Trump was elected to become President Trump (President for at least one of those worlds; the other refusing to accept him as President).   But, this all really struck me again today as I listened to the House Judiciary Committee’s latest episode of the Impeachment Show.

Today we had staffers – staff counsel – commenting on the hearsay and opinion testimony that had been provided to Adam Schiff’s Star Chamber segment of the Impeachment Show.  It was so clear as I listened to the two different interpretations of the evidence (which we will remember is not first hand accounts of the “offense” under consideration, but accounts of what someone was told by someone else who heard it from someone else who may or may not have first hand evidence).  So, rather than coming closer to the truth we become further and further removed from reality.

But, it is interesting to listen to how both sides hold some of the same buzz words and phrases dear and use them to explain what is wrong with the other side.  For example, each side proclaims how the other does not care about America and is destroying our country by disregarding the Constitution. 

In my opinion, it is ludicrous for the Democrats to proclaim that President Trump does not care about America.  Who in recent memory has done more for our country and its people?  The economy is good, unemployment is low, those disaffected groups whom the Democrats have always pandered to are experiencing far better conditions than under the Democrats who would keep them dependent and depressed. 

There is hope in the country for many who have lost or at least not seen hope for many years.  America is blossoming after having been told for years that we should be ashamed and hopeless.  This is the President’s doing, so it is hard for me to understand how people can say he does not care about America.  But, they live in a different world where they look at life through different glasses.  Glasses that are a complete mystery to me.

The Democrats proclaim that President Trump is all about using his position for self-gain.  Again, I do not see what they see.  The President is trying his hardest to make America great again, for all its people.  He donates his entire salary, making nothing for the hard work he puts in.  His businesses as well as those of his adult children are if anything losing due to being under constant attack by Democrats and the media.  I do not see the self-gain that they see in their world.

As far as disregarding the Constitution, I see the Democrats as the ones who are shredding it daily and since the moment that President Trump was elected.  It is they who refuse to accept the will of the people, who believe that they have a right to overturn the results of an election because the people’s choice is seen by them as not the one that the people should have made.  Indeed, they are disdainful not only of the choice, but of the people themselves.  They have sought since 2016 to overturn the election and remove the President.  Yet, in America, under our Constitution, the losers must accept the will of the people if our democracy is to continue.  At least, that is the reality I know, though apparently not theirs.

Beyond overturning the people’s electoral voice, the Democrats have consistently attacked the President and his supporters and appointees with star chamber like proceedings that deny fairness and due process to those involved whom the Democrats are attacking.  We witnessed this in the Russia probe, in the FISA warrants, and most disgustingly in the Kavanaugh hearing to name just a few.  And, of course, in the current proceedings in which Adam Schiff seems to think he is a king who can do as he pleases, violate House rules, and deny all due process in order to reach a goal that he has already chosen.

Moreover, it is the Democrats who would silence every voice that opposes them.  It is they who are not tolerant and supportive of the diverse views that our democracy demands.  It is they who spew hate at everyone who does not join them in their hatred of the President while at the same time claiming that it is he who is hateful.

Meanwhile, how has the President thwarted the Constitution?  In our system of laws, he has gone to the courts, not made proclamations by fiat in response to seemingly unfair and unjust demands by the likes of Adam Schiff and his gang of Impeachers.  He follows the process.  Perhaps that is why so many of the unelected diplomats who thought they were in charge were so infuriated when the President removed them or at least some of their power.  Apparently, they had forgotten that the people elect the President whose duty it is and who holds the power to make the policy decisions that they thought it was their right to make.  Again, they seem to live in a different reality than do I.

What I see are politicians set in their ways and in love with their power who are angry that President Trump is not willing to support their continued disregard of the country and its people.  They are now dug in and determined to remove him.  Removal is their only goal and they are willing to shred the Constitution and even the country to do so. 

And so, they tell their stories of how the President is destroying America.  How?  Perhaps by not leaving so that they will stop their destruction?  They tell stories of the President’s (and his supporters’) evils – racist, hateful, etc.  How?  The President’s economy is helping minorities, raising them out of the depressed, hopelessness that has been their gift from Democrats.  He enforces laws equally, not based for or against someone on their identity. 

And, returning to the specifics of the current Impeachment Show,  the president has a duty to investigate fraud that may have been perpetrated on this country by another nation or by individuals within this nation who held power and used it for their own personal or family gain.  So, when the President told Ukraine that we (our country) wanted them to investigate both the 2016 election interference and the possibility that the then Vice President’s son had in some way benefited from the Vice President’s power and position, President Trump was doing his job.  That the then Vice President happens to now be a presidential candidate should not preclude an investigation into what might be at best an unethical act during his vice presidency. 

And, here is what I really don’t understand:  it is pretty clear that the then Vice President in some way used his position for his or his family’s personal gain.  There is no evidence that the current President has done so.  Yet the Democrats would have us ignore the facts, ignore possible ethical violations by the Bidens, and instead claim that it is President Trump who is doing so.  It is like the pop psychology assertion that we see others through our own eyes.  That is, the Democrats seem to be projecting their own behavior upon the President.

It is like Truth and Untruth in 1984: “Reality exists in the human mind and nowhere else.”  And, we clearly have two realities coexisting in this country.  I would label them as follows:  The one based on emotion and the belief that if you say and believe it enough, then it will be true.  I assign this to the Trump-haters and the Impeachers.  The other reality based on reason and logic I assign to those who demand real facts and evidence, not innuendo, supposition, and narrative based upon personal feelings.

For some Truth is simply what they want it to be.  They ignore real facts that contradict their fanciful and personal narrative.   This is the approach of The Impeachers.   They, in my opinion, are not rational.  Theirs is not Truth, but UnTruth, an UnTruth designed to suit their own personal ends.   Orwell writes in 1984, “There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.”  I hope that there are enough of us willing to cling to the reasonable, rational, and factually supportable Truth so that we can keep the country from not only going mad, but from the destruction that the continuing attacks of the Impeachers will cause.

Stacking Opinions

Just a few quick notes on the House Judiciary Committee hearing held today, Dec. 4.   I am not going to again go into lengthy discussion about the ridiculous nature of this Impeachment Show, but rather simply reflect on what we saw today.

First, today we saw not just opinion vs. opinion, but rather opinion based upon opinion vs. opinion based upon opinion.  That is, we had four law professors who have heard no evidence but who have heard or read opinions of others about what they feel about various actions of the President, give their legal opinions about whether those opinions they read/heard about those facts create a basis for impeachment.  Yes, it is ridiculous, isn’t it?

Let’s understand:  lawyers and especially law professors enjoy examining the law and rendering their opinions about it.  OPINION is the operative word here.  In the law, issues are issues because they have more than one possible solution.  Legal minds form opinions and put that opinion forward.  It may or may not be the opinion that will be adopted in a particular case.  Think of any simple court case.  The plaintiff or prosecution puts forth its opinion that the defendant has done something wrong.  The defense puts forth its opinion that defendant is innocent or not at fault.  Opinion vs. opinion.  A legal decision – guilt, acquittal, liability, or no liability will require fact, not opinion.

Opinions cannot be proven.  They are simply one person’s view about events.  They are not necessarily right or wrong.  As one of my law professors was fond of saying, there are no right answers, only wrong ones.  The wrong ones he referred to were those that were not well supported by facts and by clear and logical reasoning.

Legal scholars will not all agree on the meaning of a law nor on the proper resolution of a case.  This is why, for example, so many Supreme Court decisions are not unanimous.  More than one well-reasoned interpretation can be put forward.  So, while a law professor may sound very authoritative in proclaiming his or her opinion, it is not a fact, it is not a law, and it is not even necessarily correct.  If not grounded in evidence or if not soundly and logically supported, it might very well be wrong.

At the hearing today, however, we saw many Democrats asking their witnesses what was their opinion about the law (remember, that is not a definitive definition but simply one opinion about the law), then taking that law as fact, then asking the witness if the “facts” as defined by one of the earlier Intelligence Committee witnesses’ opinions, met the current witness’s interpretation of “impeachment.”  So, we have the Democrats starting with an opinion and calling it fact, then taking a professorial interpretation of law and calling it actual law, and then getting a professor to assert that the fact/opinion that he has only been told about meets his definition of law (which is really just his interpretation/opinion) and using that as a basis to impeach the President.  Yes, it really is that ridiculous.

But what troubled me today more than anything is what the appearance of these four professors told me about the future of the law and justice in this country.  Three of the four have well documented biases against the President and have been actively and monetarily involved in various campaigns against President Trump since he has been in office.  They clearly were letting their own biases color and determine their legal opinions about impeachment.  If that is what they are teaching their students, then there is little hope for the future of fairness and justice.  Witness Turley was the only one of the four who was able to render objective opinions that happened to not favor impeachment even though he himself is not a Trump supporter and is critical of many of his policies and actions.

It is that ability to divorce one’s own feelings from one’s legal analysis that is critical to justice.  To be clear, Professor Turley’s opinions are, just as those of the other witnesses, nothing more than opinion.  They are not fact.  They are not law.  But the difference is that they are based on objective examination of the relevant source materials and supported by sound legal reasoning.  While I am sure that the other professor-witnesses are also capable of such reasoning, it was fairly clear that they had not engaged in such objective analysis in this case.  There may well be logical support for their opinions, but that was lacking here because those opinions were so obviously based upon their personal hatred of President Trump. 

Professor Turley urged us all to “divide rage from reason.”  That is, there is so much hate that it is preventing the reasoned approach that is necessary for an impeachment consideration.  But it goes beyond that.  The rage, the hate that consumes the Democrats is preventing a reasoned approach to nearly anything in this country and especially to the continuation of our form of government.

So, I was deeply saddened to see the hatred overcome the three Democrat professor witnesses whose credentials should have made them able to distinguish rage from reason and hold heir personal opinions at bay while considering scholarly legal analysis, especially when that analysis may be used to affect the future of our nation and whether or not an election should be overturned.

These are legal scholars.  I expect them to understand the gravity of the undertaking when they are asked to testify about impeachment.  I expect them to understand that when they engage in scholarly discourse about the Constitution or law or past cases that they are expressing their opinions only and that they are not judges rendering decisions on facts that they have not even examined.  Yet if they are willing to accept and engage in such over biased reasoning then Lady Justice has surely lost her blindfold and the concept of a fair and unbiased hearing within the justice system is at serious risk.  This is simply not OK – for those who seek justice and for our Country which depends upon our judicial branch of government as one of the three pillars that sustain us and our freedoms.

So, the Impeachers have now built a case by stacking opinion upon opinion with no clear factual foundation.  Such a structure must surely collapse – hopefully before it takes the entire country with it.

The Impeachers also seem to be perhaps moving away from their focus group determined term of “bribery” and back toward the Mueller report – the report that took 2 years along with taxpayer dollars to investigate another ludicrous charge.  It was determined there was no obstruction there.  Yet obstruction seems to be back again.  Along with idiotic analogies to Nixon, suggestions that the President wants to be king (using the President’s minor son as the butt of a joke about this), and most anything else the President has done or said as meeting their witnesses’ opined definition of impeachment. 

Really, the only thing that is constant, the only thing that is substantiated by clear and convincing evidence, is the continuing rage and hatred of the Democrats toward Donald Trump.  It is time that everyone follows Professor Turley’s advice and “divide rage from reason.”  Then, and only then, can we move forward with the business of the country.