Indeed. I remember a telling moment when some respected pol tore into Edward Teller during a hearing: “Two years ago you said so-and-so-and-so; but you just said such-and-such-and-such. How do you explain the discrepancy??” “Very easily”, said Teller. “I have changed my mind”.
A luxury no politician can afford, apparently. What we get instead is a dispiriting spectacle of otherwise respectable people lying (“I never held that position”) or talking nonsense (“When I said I’d never vote for such-and-such, I hadn’t made up my mind”).
All the Republicans who tried to get rid of insurance protection for pre-existing conditions, and then, during the campaign, ALL OF A SUDDEN were in favor of it all along, and you can look it up, deep deep deep in the fossil record! (Of course, most Republicans are fossils……)
Interesting, the number of commenters who think Obama’s switch to supporting gay marriage was a real change of opinion. It almost certainly wasn’t. His state legislative campaign in the 1990s said he was pro-gay marriage. That’s almost certainly been his real opinion all along, but state and national-level politics required him to either lie or lose.
I’m saying this while considering him the best president since FDR, but I’m not going to close my eyes to what was a political reality in Illinois and most of the country at the time, and how Obama reacted to it by deciding there were some things he had to lie about in order to generally do the right thing.
!['Tom The Dancing Bug' Turns 20: Ruben Bolling's Award-Winning 2017 [Interview]](https://assets.gocomics.com/uploads/blogs/blog_image_large_4068_7479_Tom_The_Dancing_Bug_20th_Anniversary_201706271720.jpg)
Darsan54 Premium Member about 6 years ago
Gawd forbid we ever let politicians look at the situation and change their minds. And if they do, we still criticize and condemn them.
roaming26-37 about 6 years ago
Figure one, haha!
Rubin, well done :-)
wolfiiig about 6 years ago
Amen! (I think).
Linguist about 6 years ago
Mississippi is still burning !
cocavan11 about 6 years ago
No, “fiscalist” is clearly a typo. The term is “most facile.”
AndrewSihler about 6 years ago
Indeed. I remember a telling moment when some respected pol tore into Edward Teller during a hearing: “Two years ago you said so-and-so-and-so; but you just said such-and-such-and-such. How do you explain the discrepancy??” “Very easily”, said Teller. “I have changed my mind”.
A luxury no politician can afford, apparently. What we get instead is a dispiriting spectacle of otherwise respectable people lying (“I never held that position”) or talking nonsense (“When I said I’d never vote for such-and-such, I hadn’t made up my mind”).
AndrewSihler about 6 years ago
Jeest. I must have missed the memo about mandatory gay sex. (Is heterosexual sex “mandatory”? I must have missed that memo, too.)
Godfreydaniel about 6 years ago
All the Republicans who tried to get rid of insurance protection for pre-existing conditions, and then, during the campaign, ALL OF A SUDDEN were in favor of it all along, and you can look it up, deep deep deep in the fossil record! (Of course, most Republicans are fossils……)
jpozenel about 6 years ago
Well, theoretically, they do represent us.
BrianSchmidt about 6 years ago
Interesting, the number of commenters who think Obama’s switch to supporting gay marriage was a real change of opinion. It almost certainly wasn’t. His state legislative campaign in the 1990s said he was pro-gay marriage. That’s almost certainly been his real opinion all along, but state and national-level politics required him to either lie or lose.
I’m saying this while considering him the best president since FDR, but I’m not going to close my eyes to what was a political reality in Illinois and most of the country at the time, and how Obama reacted to it by deciding there were some things he had to lie about in order to generally do the right thing.
Thanks to Ruben for reposting this comic.