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originally posted in:Sapphire
1/17/2013 6:58:02 PM
17
Just for the sake of argument, what makes you so sure that it did happen? Because you saw it on TV?
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I'm just going off the idea that something this massive and involving innumerable different entities (media institutions, government agencies, community involvement, public access to evidence) would be impossible to cooperate in any manner that would fool people. It's one thing to cover-up something, but it's something else to create an entirely fictitious event and sell it convincingly and convince everyone. The fact that people aren't convinced that an event as real as Newtown shows how hard it is to make the horse drink once it's led to water.
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I suspect (and, frankly, hope) that you're right. But, just in case some here are unaware, allow me to introduce you all to the concept of the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Lie]Big Lie[/url].
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The US government can't keep it's diplomatic cables secret, it can't keep the personal email of high ranking officials secret, and the most power general in the world turned director of the CIA couldn't keep an affair quiet. They couldn't keep Abu Ghraib under wraps, the friendly fire death of Pat Tillmen quiet, rendition, use of torture, helicopters firing on Iraqui citizens, or a book flushing at Guantanamo bay quiet. These are all things very powerful people wanted to keep quiet, but couldn't even though few people were involved. You would have to totally suspend disbelief to think for a second thousands of people with competing interests would work together to cover up something that would be so damaging to the other side. Especially now that everyone has concealable communications devices and people can publish anything to mass audiences in seconds via the internet. Just not possible in this day and age.
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Edited by RighteousTyrant: 1/18/2013 3:07:49 PMThe problem with this reasoning is that you're basing it on a sample (secrets that were not kept) from an unknown population (all secrets kept and unkept). You have no way of knowing if the conclusion you're drawing from your sample is applicable to the population. In other words, yes, the gov't screwed up on these 8 secrets you've listed, but we do not know if that represents a failure rate of 100%, 1% or 0.0001%. So to say that these 8 screw-ups show the gov't is completely incapable of keeping secrets is just not warranted (to be fair, nor can one conclude that the gov't is hiding a lot of stuff from us, either; it's simply inconclusive).
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Think of it this way: If a person cannot do simple multiplication, what are the odds they could do the calculations to land a rover safely on Mars? If the government has been shown frequently incompetent at being able to hide secrets even among small groups, you cannot reasonably expect they can keep secrets that involve thousands of people, some of which have very strong motive to disclose those secrets for personal gain. The very nature of our press, democracy, and ease of communication makes it nearly impossible. All the thousands of press workers reporting the story (some of which would rather hang Obama than see him president) would have to be in on it, the supposed actors pretending to be parents, teachers, and town residents. The police involved, the hospital workers. To thinks it is all a purposely orchestrated hoax is total insanity.
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[quote]If the government has been shown frequently incompetent at being able to hide secrets even among small groups[/quote]But as I said, this hasn't been shown. You have no justification to consider that "frequently". Frequently as compared to what? Again, we don't know if those secrets not kept represent the norm or an abnormality. Plus, the gov't can and does keep some secrets (see: classified information), many of which are likely to involve people who would stand to gain from public disclosure, as well. Hence why I think claims like this should be evaluated individually, rather than rejected out of hand because "the gov't can't keep secrets".
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You don't have to know the absolute record to know that they screw up several small cover-ups a month, and that shows it is unlikely they are capable of pulling off a massive one that would involve thousands of people. It just isn't realistic. The same people that made the video also say 9/11 was an inside job, we didn't land on the moon, and aliens crash landed at Roswell. These are the fantasies of lunatics, not rational thought. There is no coherent motive, and these things would have to be kept quiet over generations by people who would rather see each other hanged than work together. It just doesn't make sense. If Obama faked Sandy Hook, why wouldn't Republicans who would have to be involved like Fox News or the NRA rat him out? If George Bush bombed the trade center, why would Obama continue the lie? Why wouldn't any of the unknown actors involved take they payday to come out to tabloids? What journalist would refuse the recognition of breaking such a story? None of it makes any sense.
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Achilles nailed it.
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This point exactly proves how easy a cover up would be just as well.
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Edited by Obi Wan Stevobi: 1/18/2013 1:27:50 PMHow are examples of absolute incompetence when trying to keep small secrets quiet proof of how easily they could keep a huge conspiracy quiet?
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Electronics can easily fake anything you want. Entire lives. People like Petraeus could have completely shut down what happened, but he chose not to. It would have come up as a stupid conspiracy just like this. Dude, no one said anything for how long? Half an hour's worth of evidence has just been put on display. It was silent for a month.
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Edited by Myth of Tyrant: 1/17/2013 7:23:05 PMThe thing is, that didn't appeal to a sense of truth and objectivity. Anyone who was slightly versed in (what was then) contemporary history and politics could have seen that what he was claiming was inaccurate. The "Big Lie" just preyed off racism, bigotry, and general paranoia. Whereas anyone can do the slightest bit of research can see that there is vastly compelling evidence that Newtown actually happened more or less how it has been reported since the start, barring any on-the-scene and early reporting errors.
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The big lie about the Jews worked because people chose to believe the propaganda rather than question it. If one thinks the tragedy at Sandy Hook happened just because they saw it on TV (or the Internet or newspaper), and isn't willing to entertain the questions of whether it happened or not, then how can one be sure that they aren't committing the same grave error as 1930s Germans? We must ALWAYS be willing to question what we are told, even if that makes us consider uncomfortable possibilities. That's all I'm saying here. :-)
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Partly, but also because it's a consistent message. After the beginning where there was some confusion, the story was the same on pretty much every news source.
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And the media confusion is what drove a lot of this. First it was reported he shot them with handguns and there was a rifle in the car. Then it turned into him having an assault rifle and it was a shotgun in the car. Then you have that idiotic coroner who gave some of the dumbest news interviews I've ever seen, cracking jokes about having dead kids in his office. If the media wouldn't jump at any rumor and report it as fact than this probably wouldn't have escalated into a big of a deal as it is.
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I completely agree, the news is so desperate to get the news as quickly as possible so they can outperform there competitors by having the most facts first. It's the same reason why Fox News and CNN both reported that the Supreme Court struck down Obama Care and took them a couple of minutes to correct themselves. That's why when something like this happens, I just follow the general idea and not the details, because I know the media needs some time to get the story straight.
