Paul Ryan Marathon

[bruce3404]

Funny thing is that if he would have said "I ran 4:00", I would have been impressed, not so much by the time, but by the fact that he completed his race. But lying by over an hour? Should be placed in the Rosie Ruiz file of marathon lowlights.

[lonewolf]

Something to think about:
Are there degrees of ignominy between misspeaking/prevaricating/embellishing/lieing about something of no importance in the grand plan of the universe vs. something of great consequence?

[kuha]

Something to think about:
Are there degrees of ignominy between misspeaking/prevaricating/embellishing/lieing about something of no importance in the grand plan of the universe vs. something of great consequence?

So you want to pick nits? I will ask you: Why did he lie about this so quickly, so smoothly, so reflexively, and so effortlessly? Almost as if it is a natural default mode.

[lonewolf]

I have no idea and that is not the question.

[jazzcyclist]

Something to think about:
Are there degrees of ignominy between misspeaking/prevaricating/embellishing/lieing about something of no importance in the grand plan of the universe vs. something of great consequence?

When it comes to politicians and other people from whom we should expect candor, I make no distinction between prevaricating, equivocating, dissembling, embellishing, omission and lying. However, I do make distinctions about the subject matter. Lying about athleteic accomplishments isn''t as bad as lying about military service. I don't hold misspeaking against anyone, but by misspeaking, I mean brain farts or unintentional jumbling of facts. Obama saying that he had visited 57 states or that his great uncle help liberate the Auschwitz Concentration Camp when it was really Buchenwald Concentration Camp is what I would call misspeaking.

[kuha]

I have no idea and that is not the question.

I don't either but it seems like a rather important question in the great scheme of things.

But, back to your question above: your attempt to excuse and downplay this bit of lying is an explicitly and entirely political act.

The REAL point is a simple one: He lied. It is a fact that he lied. He lied about something WE, collectively here, care about and understand. The larger meaning of that fact is up to us. But our view of it cannot and will not change the fact that Ryan lied.

[jazzcyclist]

Here's a great column on this subject by a right-winger from eight years, when John Kerry was accused of telling a marathon fib.

I am married to a long-distance runner. As any similarly situated spouse or significant other will tell you, runners are statistics freaks. Over the course of our 11-year-marriage (and nearly three years of courtship beforehand), I have had to listen to the stories behind every race and notable run my hubby has undertaken–from the fun runs he ran as a kid to every college steeplechase race to every community 5k and 10k race he has run in Los Angeles, Seattle, and the D.C. area. I have had to hear time and again about the training regimens before the races, the weather conditions on the day of each race, what was eaten before each run, and, of course, the times of each run.

But that’s not all. Runners aren’t only obsessed with their own times and performances. They’re obsessed with everyone else’s times and performances, too. My hubby, like most serious runners, is a font of running trivia. Want to know what the splits were for the winner of the Chicago Marathon in 1985? Or who the most recent American distance runner to win an Olympic medal was? Or the name of the first female finisher in the Boston Marathon in 1980? You get the idea.

So, anyway, the b.s. detector of my husband and many other runners went crazy when Kerry told sports reporters that he had run the Boston Marathon. This is a significant athletic achievement, if true. There is no official record of him having run, however, and the November issue of Runner’s World reports that “he doesn’t recall his time…”

http://michellemalkin.com/2004/10/08/jo ... athon-man/

Give credit to Runner's World for their willingness to expose the Pinnochios on both sides of the aisle.

[spinoza]

Something to think about:
Are there degrees of ignominy between misspeaking/prevaricating/embellishing/lieing about something of no importance in the grand plan of the universe vs. something of great consequence?

Certainly: lying about the former gives one much greater insight into the nature of one's character than the latter. There may be reasons, good reasons indeed, to lie about things that touch on matters of great consequence. Consider, for example, Churchill. He was prepared to lie about the latter, understanding the moral context and alternatives. Churchill, however, was not the kind to lie about the trivial, when there are no motives other than the personal. Ryan, of course, is no Churchill. More generally: those prepared to lie about the trivial are those without any moral grounding at all. The sort I'd never want as a friend, or a teacher to my son, or as any kind of a leader. Potential president of the U.S.? Give me a break.

2:44.12, Trails End, 1971. My only marathon, and much more proud of it than before Ryan. Just think: I did something that a serious candidate for the vice presidency of the U.S. couldn't, but which was an achievement significant enough to him that he was prepared to pretend that he did.

[Marlow]

those prepared to lie about the trivial are those without any moral grounding at all. The sort I'd never want as a friend, or a teacher to my son, or as any kind of a leader.

Tough crowd.
I lie to my students all the time. I present them with a logical argument, whose premise I know to be false, then I say, "Right?", and when they agree, I say, "NO! Stop taking what I say at face value!"

I say all sorts of things in class: truths, half-truths, little white lies, big whoppers, outrageous things - just to see what they will do with them. Lies are all around us and we need to challenge each and every one of them. But . . . and why I take exception to your statement above, when my wife tells me how handsome I am, certainly merely a 'trivial lie', I don't think she lacks character, just a sense of aesthetic misperception.