"I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

[David G]

Among the many excuses public figures make when they screw up, “I misspoke” is among the worst

http://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21721897-among-many-excuses-public-figures-make-when-they-screw-up-i-misspoke-among?fsrc=scn/fb/te/bl/ed/imisspokeaweasellyphrase

Public figures’ claims of “misspeaking” are inherently suspicious. Most people don’t need to point out a mere typo: these are usually obvious in the moment, and forgiven without explanation. It seems far more common that claims of misspeaking are a kind of bait-and-switch, swapping a major sin—lying, being indefensibly clueless or saying something offensive—for a minor one, a claim of having tripped over the tongue as over a carelessly tied shoelace.

In April, Mr Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer, said that not even Hitler had used chemical weapons on his own people. He later apologised—and in an article about the flap in The Hill, a reporter accidentally misidentified Mr Spicer: “When asked to clarify those comments, Hitler misspoke again by saying Hitler did not use gas against his country’s people.” The mistake was online for about 20 minutes before being corrected. Talk about a typo.

[Jimmy W]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

...“When asked to clarify those comments, Hitler misspoke again by saying Hitler did not use gas against his country’s people.”...

Hitler misspoke?

[Phil Y]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

Probably a typo.

[Peerie Maa]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

Classic brain fart.

[Ian McColgin]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

My old fave was the bland, "Mistakes were made." But now . . . cavfefe.

I've always found truth a bit elusive at every level. As a child I always had an excuse for homework not done or chores neglected. I always had an alibi ready when my parents uncovered yet another of my many domestic crimes, like leaving a good Ditson saw out in the rain. And as I entered the turmoil of adolescence I discovered in the writings of Bertrand Russell, H.G.Wells, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and others the range of emotional life from the glories of free love to the pleasures and pains of sometimes shallow promiscuity -- all wrapped up rationalizations that discretion might become secrecy might really be deception.

By the time I was fourteen my teachers realized that my ambition to be a scientist would be undone by my mental compulsion towards philosophy - philosophy being a sort of intellectual/emotional disability that causes one to see problems and contradictions in almost everything. Epistemology can provide many excellent excuses . . .

People who claim (even believe) to only care for truth are self-deceived idiots. Some of them might gain a bit of insight were they to read "Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error" by Kathryn Schulz, but most people really have deep problems when facing their own wrongs.

Many of us live in the sociopathy of lying about anything and never admitting a wrong. I had a friend like that, now dead and surprisingly not at the hand of a jealous husband or an aggrieved lover. He was talented, interesting, a good businessman in many ways, and utterly trustworthy if you trusted that what he said might be accidentally true and then only in a rather poetic sense. Understand that and avoid dependency of any sort and he was delightful like Tchaikovsky's music, lovely and at bottom empty. Don't expect what's not there.

We all understand the value of deception whether it's a quarterback sneak, a battlefield rouse, or getting a great boat for really short money because the seller just didn't know. Deception is a essential to all human activity. But people who never admit an untruth - it matters not whether it's simple error or lie or typo or thinko - are people who have no moral ground at all. They really miss the whole point of being human. Cavfefe is their mantra.

[Gerarddm]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

I don't know if deception is essential to all human activity, but it certainly can be said to be
inherent. In way, it is societal grease at best, and at worst is a corrosive sublimate.

Incidentally, I have a healthy amount of contempt for those who use ' misspoke'. You either !ied, or screwed up. Fess up cleanly, it is good for the soul.

[B_B]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

Still more accurate than "I was misquoted" or "someone hacked my twitter"

[John of Phoenix]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

Ian:
He was talented, interesting, a good businessman in many ways, and utterly trustworthy if you trusted that what he said might be accidentally true and then only in a rather poetic sense.

Speaking of poetic, that's some great prose. Uhh...

[John of Phoenix]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

My experience in Iran taught me all I ever need to know about what is commonly referred to as "saving face". You could never know what was truth and what was pure fantasy.

[CWSmith]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

In April, Mr Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer, said that not even Hitler had used chemical weapons on his own people. He later apologised—and in an article about the flap in The Hill, a reporter accidentally misidentified Mr Spicer: “When asked to clarify those comments, Hitler misspoke again by saying Hitler did not use gas against his country’s people.” The mistake was online for about 20 minutes before being corrected. Talk about a typo.

Talk about digging the hole even deeper! Does Spicer think that the Jews who were gassed (chemical weapons) were not adequately German?

[Ian McColgin]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

There is something worse than "I misspoke". It's Trump digging the hole deeper in his tiff with the Mayor of London. Claiming that what the Mayor actually said is really a mealy mouthed cop out is really just Trump doubling down on the same sort of racist lying that he used in his Birther days. Cavfefe on. Being Right is never being wrong.

[skuthorp]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

The question re Trumps tweets is are they to be considered 'official Presidential Statements'? And if not what are they?
Surely 'translations', what the President really meant, by his lackeys to the press do not carry the weight of statements directly to the nation by the man himself?
And if they are 'official Presidential Statements' what are the wider implications?

[John of Phoenix]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

And if they are 'official Presidential Statements' what are the wider implications?

The guy is Psychotic.

[Jim Bow]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

I always cringe when the apology begins, "If I have offended anyone ..."

[Jim Mahan]

Re: "I misspoke" -- typos & thinkos

The problem with the Bill Maher use of the N word, is not that he uttered it per se, it is that since he did, you have to believe that even though he apologized and seemed sincere, you know he would use it when not in public or in the company of those who are normally offended, no matter what their color, and so the conclusion has to be that he actually may be racist enough to harbor the word in his vocabulary.

We are all susceptible to 'mispeaking,' but not the way it typically gets used by pols, but by brainfarting and having feet of clay. Everyone is complex and no one is just one thing. The most virtuous have said things they wish they hadn't. It isn't necessarily an indictment of character. OTOH, tmp has never mis-spoken; every off thing he has ever said was calculated, on the fly, for effect, for the emotional response it will evoke, not for any exchange of information or ideas.