Trump voters incapable of acknowledging a fact even when it is staring them in the face

[none]

but liberal american dot org says republicans are lying....how could it be ???
I know it's a little snarky but I couldn't resist

 

[Bomb#20]

By any reasonable measure unemployment has gone down.

People keep asserting that, and not providing evidence for it. How do you square your claim with the graph in post #5? Help me out here.

(It should be noted, by the way, that the twenty-year trend of potential workers bailing out of the job market is actually more like a sixty-year trend, with the first forty years obscured by the greater number of women bailing in as it became socially acceptable for them not to be housewives.)

The indicators that show us unemployment is down are the same indicators we've always used to determine the unemployment rate.

So? "That's the way we've always done it" is not an argument for that being a reasonable way to do it; and it doesn't make the claim any more compatible with the graph I posted.

Critics need to tell us why that indicator has been considered fairly accurate all these years...except for during the Obama administration.

Are you seriously suggesting that before 2009, nobody ever pointed out that defining a 30-year-old living in his parents' basement who never makes any attempt to go out and get a job and instead spends his days playing video games and getting high as "not unemployed" is deranged?

 

[LordKiran]

By any reasonable measure unemployment has gone down.

People keep asserting that, and not providing evidence for it. How do you square your claim with the graph in post #5? Help me out here.

(It should be noted, by the way, that the twenty-year trend of potential workers bailing out of the job market is actually more like a sixty-year trend, with the first forty years obscured by the greater number of women bailing in as it became socially acceptable for them not to be housewives.)

The indicators that show us unemployment is down are the same indicators we've always used to determine the unemployment rate.

So? "That's the way we've always done it" is not an argument for that being a reasonable way to do it; and it doesn't make the claim any more compatible with the graph I posted.

Critics need to tell us why that indicator has been considered fairly accurate all these years...except for during the Obama administration.

Are you seriously suggesting that before 2009, nobody ever pointed out that defining a 30-year-old living in his parents' basement who never makes any attempt to go out and get a job and instead spends his days playing video games and getting high as "not unemployed" is deranged?

If he's not going out and looking for work, then for all intents and purposes he might as well be considered 'employed' for all the difference it makes to the labor market. You also might as well include the trust fund kids who spend their whole lives dicking around and spending daddies' money as "Unemployed" if you're going on that logic. Except you wouldn't because everyone would agree that to do so would be deceptive.

 

[Bomb#20]

Other than proving the OP, what is Bomb20 asserting here?

How do you figure I'm proving the OP?

What I'm asserting is that Ravensky offered non-evidence and fallaciously tried to pass it off as evidence.

Apparently the idea is that unemployment has been going up for 60 years. By now, the numbers of unemployed should exceed 100% of the population.

Show your work.

If the "down" segments of the graph are actually hiding an upward trend, then the upward sections of the graph must indicate wholesale firings of entire population segments.

What graph are you talking about? If you're talking about the one I posted, I didn't say the "down" segments are hiding an upward trend. I said the up segments are hiding a downward trend. This will become obvious if you go find a version of the graph that shows separate curves for men and women. There aren't any sustained up segments in the male curve. The female curve goes up with the women's lib movement until it's close to the male curve, and thereafter tracks the male curve downward.

 

[Bomb#20]

So your theory is what? That Trump voters are too stupid to understand that people who have given up looking for work aren't fully human, and therefore when the government doesn't count them as unemployed, and is thus able to report a falling unemployment rate, it's correct?

Speaking of "reckless disregard for the truth..."

It's called "sarcasm". Look it up if you aren't familiar with the concept. I could have expressed the same point by saying to Ravensky "You are basing your accusation on an equivocation fallacy. The government's definition of unemployment and Trump supporters' definitions of unemployment are unlikely to be interchangeable. The government's definition is unreasonable." But that would have been boring and easy to ignore.

 

[Bomb#20]

Bomb #20 called them stupid in an argument...

That's a gross failure of reading comprehension on your part. I did not call them stupid. For you to think I did is a rookie mistake. Go get an SAT study guide and try to relearn what you must have known as a college freshman.

You won't do this of course, because you're too arrogant and too hostile to take constructive criticism from me. So don't take my word for it. Go show my question to some other professor and ask her if it means I was calling them stupid.

 

[Bomb#20]

People keep asserting that, and not providing evidence for it. How do you square your claim with the graph in post #5? Help me out here.

(It should be noted, by the way, that the twenty-year trend of potential workers bailing out of the job market is actually more like a sixty-year trend, with the first forty years obscured by the greater number of women bailing in as it became socially acceptable for them not to be housewives.)

Ever hear of baby boomers retiring? The decline in the labor force participation rate doesn't prove unemployment!

Look at the graph again. It's the labor force participation rate specifically of 25 to 54 year-olds.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Speaking of "reckless disregard for the truth..."

It's called "sarcasm". Look it up if you aren't familiar with the concept. I could have expressed the same point by saying to Ravensky "You are basing your accusation on an equivocation fallacy. The government's definition of unemployment and Trump supporters' definitions of unemployment are unlikely to be interchangeable. The government's definition is unreasonable." But that would have been boring and easy to ignore.

Yes Bomb#20, we all know your rude posts are used internally to justify some preachy political end you have.

I'll just add that you're going to have to prove Trump supporters are consistently using some other definition over long periods of time in a way that makes them feel objective.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Bomb #20 called them stupid in an argument...

That's a gross failure of reading comprehension on your part. I did not call them stupid. For you to think I did is a rookie mistake. Go get an SAT study guide and try to relearn what you must have known as a college freshman.

You won't do this of course, because you're too arrogant and too hostile to take constructive criticism from me. So don't take my word for it. Go show my question to some other professor and ask her if it means I was calling them stupid.

You presented an implicit argument and within the text of that argument you labeled them as stupid. That doesnt mean you believe they are stupid, but it is what you did. Don't be so defensive that you take his words out of the context of your own post.

 

[credoconsolans]

By any reasonable measure unemployment has gone down.

People keep asserting that, and not providing evidence for it. How do you square your claim with the graph in post #5? Help me out here.

(It should be noted, by the way, that the twenty-year trend of potential workers bailing out of the job market is actually more like a sixty-year trend, with the first forty years obscured by the greater number of women bailing in as it became socially acceptable for them not to be housewives.)

The indicators that show us unemployment is down are the same indicators we've always used to determine the unemployment rate.

So? "That's the way we've always done it" is not an argument for that being a reasonable way to do it; and it doesn't make the claim any more compatible with the graph I posted.

Critics need to tell us why that indicator has been considered fairly accurate all these years...except for during the Obama administration.

Are you seriously suggesting that before 2009, nobody ever pointed out that defining a 30-year-old living in his parents' basement who never makes any attempt to go out and get a job and instead spends his days playing video games and getting high as "not unemployed" is deranged?

No, I'm saying that before these people weren't considered sufficiently numerous to affect how the rate is calculated. Obviously such people are offset by those who are employed but under the table.

Critics need to explain to us why this factor is now considered of extreme importance in the Obama adminstration when it wasn't previously.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Ever hear of baby boomers retiring? The decline in the labor force participation rate doesn't prove unemployment!

Look at the graph again. It's the labor force participation rate specifically of 25 to 54 year-olds.

What I find funny is that apparently these days, participating in several interviews for a single position (as in one job at one company) is completely normal these days. People may find it harder to work because some companies have become extremely picky. I think I was lucky and was the last group to enter the workforce before corporate management lost their minds.

 

[KeepTalking]

Blah blah blah. Blah blah, blah. Blah blah blahblah, blah blah. Blah.

Hey Bomb#20, did you read the following post by RavenSky? Because it sure as hell looks like you sailed right past it, and it is the post you need to read, since it shows exactly how irrelevant your participation in this thread has been.

Seriously, read this post:

They say whatever they think will make "their side" look better. I don't suppose they have any way of reconciling that assertion with the data on the graph, eh? Maybe Bomb#20 can explain why the graph looks the way it does, showing unemployment rising when Repugs are in control, and dropping when Dems are in control. He has asserted that the parts of the graph showing declines in unemployment are actually rises in unemployment due to non-participation and dropouts. But the same data sets are used in the parts of the graph that show unemployment rising under the Pugs. So that must mean that those segments show a totally BALLISTIC rate of unemployment increase, right?

What Bomb #20 is blathering on about (as if it changes anything) is the differences between U3 vs U6 measures of labor. The U3 measure is and always has been the number being referred to when government and news reports talk about "unemployment". "U3 is the official unemployment rate." The *real* rate. Bomb knows or should know this.

Unfortunately, ever since President Obama was elected, Faux News and the right-wing bloviators have hoodwinked their audience into believing that the U6 is the *real* "unemployment" rate. It isn't. But even if Bomb wants to believe that it is, so what. The U6 has ALSO decreased during President Obama's terms in office. It is down to 9.30% as of November 2016 from 14.20% as of January 2009 when G.W. Bush handed over the economy he trashed.

So no matter which of the "U's" Bomb or the Trump supporters want to look at, it remains a fully factual statement that unemployment decreased during the Obama administration, and that the 67% of Trump supporters who insist "that unemployment increased during the Obama administration" are just fucking wrong. (Not cursing at you. Just gobsmacked at the fact-denying Trump supporters, and very very concerned about how badly they are going to destroy this country in the next 4 years)

Here is a very neutral source of information on the topic of unemployment measures, complete with really cool graphs: http://www.macrotrends.net/1377/u6-unemployment-rate

And here is a rabidly partisan article shredding the bullshit right-wing idea Bomb is trying to pass off as intelligent contribution to this discussion: http://www.liberalamerica.org/2015/11/11/raw-data-unemployment/

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

To complete the discussion on different ways of measuring unemployment, let me just add that Trump does not use either U-3 or U-6, but instead U-NonExistent. He uses an almost* literal definition of unemployment to be adults who are not working.

“The unemployment number, as you know, is totally fiction. If you look for a job for six months and then you give up, they consider you give up. You just give up. You go home. You say, ‘Darling, I can’t get a job.’ They consider you statistically employed. It’s not the way. But don’t worry about it because it’s going to take care of itself pretty quickly.”
— Donald Trump, remarks at an rally in Des Moines, Dec. 8, 2016

...
...

During the campaign, Trump frequently said the unemployment rate — then hovering around 5 percent — was really 42 percent. He earned Four Pinocchios for that claim. The problem was that he was counting every single adult American who did not have a job, regardless of whether they wanted one. So he said the “unemployed” should include people who are retired, are students or are stay-at-home parents. That’s obviously absurd.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...the-unemployment-rate/?utm_term=.5c82ac5a602b

*So finally in my own bit of sarcasm, let me say
Donald Trump's unemployment number, as you know, is totally fiction. If you are a baby or a 16 year old and you work, he doesn't consider you. You just don't exist. You go to work but Trump doesn't care. You say, ‘Mommy, I have a job.’ He considers you statistically non-existent or worse unemployed. It’s not the way. But don’t worry about it because Trump is just politicking in the ordinary way he does to push the mushy middle rightward.

 

[Elixir]

How do you figure I'm proving the OP?

I do believe you are being coy here - your other posts belie the notion that you are actually that obtuse.
" incapable of acknowledging a fact even when it is staring them in the face" is exactly how you are behaving, pretending that there is no evidence of decreased unemployment under Obama, when every measure - INCLUDING the repugs' favorite metric - shows that it is a fact. A fact that has been put in front of your face and you still deny it. OP validated, thank you!

What I'm asserting is that Ravensky offered non-evidence and fallaciously tried to pass it off as evidence.

Oh really? Please do point out how this is wrong:

The U3 measure is and always has been the number being referred to when government and news reports talk about "unemployment". "U3 is the official unemployment rate." The *real* rate. Bomb knows or should know this.
Unfortunately, ever since President Obama was elected, Faux News and the right-wing bloviators have hoodwinked their audience into believing that the U6 is the *real* "unemployment" rate. It isn't. But even if Bomb wants to believe that it is, so what. The U6 has ALSO decreased during President Obama's terms in office.

Are you contesting both metrics? If so, it's time to pony up with some rationale for doing so.

Apparently the idea is that unemployment has been going up for 60 years. By now, the numbers of unemployed should exceed 100% of the population.
If the "down" segments of the graph are actually hiding an upward trend, then the upward sections of the graph must indicate wholesale firings of entire population segments.

What graph are you talking about?

http://talkfreethought.org/showthre...em-in-the-face&p=361629&viewfull=1#post361629

Please do explain why it's "non-evidence" - and be SURE to provide EVIDENCE to back up your claim. (Note: Your barenaked assertion that it's "not evidence" is not evidence.)

 

[laughing dog]

Bomb #20 called them stupid in an argument...

That's a gross failure of reading comprehension on your part....

. It is a matter of record that you wrote in post #5 “That Trump voters are too stupid to understand that people who have given up looking for work aren't fully human,”. Your partial quote of mine (post #48) omits salient points. The entire post reads
“ Bomb #20 explicitly injected the term stupid even though Ravensky did not call them stupid. Bomb #20 called them stupid in an argument even if he does not think they are stupid. ".

So your response is either a function of
1) gross intellectually dishonesty,
2) a gross failure of reading comprehension, or
3) meltdown-induced hysteria.

Frankly, given your posting history, I’d chose 3 but your mileage may differ.

You won't do this of course, because you're too arrogant and too hostile to take constructive criticism from me. So don't take my word for it. Go show my question to some other professor and ask her if it means I was calling them stupid.

You wrote what you wrote. I did show it to a few other professors and they agree with me.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

<snip>

So you went on and on and on, yet failed to show that anyone other than Bomb #20 brought the characterization of Trump supporters as "stupid" into this thread. So I stand vindicated in my original statement, and you can drop your useless misdirected finger wagging now. It is tiresome.

Bye bye

No, you did not stand vindicated. You claimed Bomb#20 called them "stupid". That is false.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

To complete the discussion on different ways of measuring unemployment, let me just add that Trump does not use either U-3 or U-6, but instead U-NonExistent. He uses an almost* literal definition of unemployment to be adults who are not working.

“The unemployment number, as you know, is totally fiction. If you look for a job for six months and then you give up, they consider you give up. You just give up. You go home. You say, ‘Darling, I can’t get a job.’ They consider you statistically employed. It’s not the way. But don’t worry about it because it’s going to take care of itself pretty quickly.”
— Donald Trump, remarks at an rally in Des Moines, Dec. 8, 2016

...
...

During the campaign, Trump frequently said the unemployment rate — then hovering around 5 percent — was really 42 percent. He earned Four Pinocchios for that claim. The problem was that he was counting every single adult American who did not have a job, regardless of whether they wanted one. So he said the “unemployed” should include people who are retired, are students or are stay-at-home parents. That’s obviously absurd.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...the-unemployment-rate/?utm_term=.5c82ac5a602b

So, we see... Trump is a fucking idiot, who seems to be as informed as the typical Fox News viewer. Nope... no need to attend those PDBs, he wouldn't understand them anyway.

 

[Elixir]

To complete the discussion on different ways of measuring unemployment, let me just add that Trump does not use either U-3 or U-6, but instead U-NonExistent. He uses an almost* literal definition of unemployment to be adults who are not working.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...the-unemployment-rate/?utm_term=.5c82ac5a602b

So, we see... Trump is a fucking idiot, who seems to be as informed as the typical Fox News viewer. Nope... no need to attend those PDBs, he wouldn't understand them anyway.

I've already pointed out that the reason he doesn't attend those briefings is because it makes him uncomfortable to listen to shit he has no chance of comprehending...

 

[braces_for_impact]

Unfortunately, this is the age of fake news. I think a lot of people really don't understand what that means.

News flash: there's always been spin. There's always been opinion masquerading as fact. There's always been suspect and misleading information. In any healthy democracy, the people can and should treat government statements, statistics and explanations with skepticism. Unfortunately, we have entered an age that is positively Orwelian with regards to information. Really, we have many wonderful people to thank for this, but it's mostly FOX news and the Republicans that never bothered to correct the record no matter how rooted in conspiracy group-think, prejudice or bigotry the claims were, as long as they personally benefited from that misinformation. The monster Frankenstein has created has escaped, and now even they can't control it. They're currently breathing a sigh of relief because once again they have personally taken power because of it, but make no mistake, it's NOT under their control, and it will only get worse.

This kind of thinking is pernicious, and not many realize how widespread it is, but it's everywhere. It's on FOX news. It's on AM radio. It's in their churches, and of course it's on the Internet. I've been listening to it escalate for years, and it really is out of control. Everything is part of a grand liberal conspiracy theory, and it's some of the craziest shit you never wanted to hear. The media is in on it. The executive branch is in on it. The courts are game, most of the legislature is in on it too. So are all government agencies. Statistics mean nothing. Science and facts mean nothing. It involved foreign governments. When conspiracy is everywhere, there's no room for reality. It's more than some fake news stories on Facebook, or an Onion post gone awry. It's more than a Russian site that started a rumor intentionally in order to advance an agenda. Much of it is Alex Jones level shit, and there are FAR more believers than anyone cares to admit.

It's not a sign of a healthy democracy. It's the sign of roots that are sick, and so the tree is dying.