Ted Koppel and the False Premise, Part II

By Robert Ringer

What got me thinking about my interview with Ted Koppel on ABC News Nightline many years ago was watching how Sarah Palin was sandbagged by the media throughout the presidential campaign — particularly when her cerebrally deficient handlers threw her to the media wolves: Charlie and Katie.

Charlie Gibson’s now-famous question — “Do you agree with the Bush Doctrine?” — tongue-tied Sarah Palin for a second. And well it should have, because it was based on a false premise! Alert the media: There is no such a thing as the “Bush Doctrine.” The so-called Bush Doctrine can be just about anything you want it to be. There was no reason for the question other than to make Palin look bad. Why play games?

To her credit, she recovered quickly and fired back at Gibson, “In what respect, Charlie?” That caught him off guard, and he staggered against the ropes for several seconds. Then, instead of answering her question, he came back with, “What do you interpret it to be?” He sounded (and looked) like a stern college professor asking a student a trick question.

Up to that point, my scorecard had Sarah Barracuda ahead on points, with Gibson reeling and trying to stay on his feet. But when she blurted out “His world view,” she opened the door for him to press on with this nonsensical subject that was completely irrelevant to the presidential campaign.

Having been through this kind of Gotcha Garbage many times myself — and having the advantage of watching the Gibson-Palin interview in the comfort of my living room — I found myself wishing I could slip her a note. The answer I thought she should have given Gibson was something like, “First of all, there is no such thing as the Bush Doctrine. The term means different things to different people. Second, I’m not here to take a test on George Bush. I’m here to talk about what John McMush and I plan to do for this country.”

The point is that the premise of Charlie Gibson’s question — that there is such a thing as a “Bush Doctrine” — was false. But Gibson decided that Palin had flunked his little quiz, and he proclaimed that the Bush Doctrine is that America has the right to “anticipatory self-defense.” So, why play games? Why not just ask the woman, straight out, if she believes the U.S. has the right to anticipatory self-defense?

The lesson we should all draw from this is that as we make our way through the coming years of endless, deadly doublespeak, we must keep reminding ourselves to carefully check a person’s premise before answering his question. I find that when it comes to questions regarding politics, most of them are based on premises that are false. And it’s simply not possible to give the right answer to a question based on a false premise. For example, suppose someone responds to your stated belief that wealth redistribution is wrong by asking, “So, you don’t care what happens to the poor, the sick, and the homeless, right?”

First of all, the premise that wealth redistribution does, in fact, help the poor, the sick, and the homeless is false. In fact, I would argue that it makes them worse off — especially over the long term. Second, the premise that there is a correlation between a belief in redistribution of wealth and compassion for the poor, the sick, and the homeless is also false.

Politicians are notoriously prolific truth twisters. While they work hard at trying to make the world believe they are acting in the best interests of their constituents, their real purpose is obfuscate the truth to achieve their own ends.

They accomplish this by conditioning our minds to accept false premises, which are cemented into place by the government-controlled education system. A classic example of this is the widely accepted notion that the president and Congress not only have the power, but the ability, to perform such miraculous tasks as “getting the economy moving” and “creating jobs.”

The premise that a president can affect the economy in a positive way is ludicrous on its face, yet the vast majority of voters accept it as a premise. The reason for this can be found in French philosopher Michel Montaigne’s observation that “Men are most apt to believe what they least understand.” The vast majority of the population knows nothing about macroeconomics (and some would argue that the same is true of most professional economists), so they are ripe to believe almost anything — especially if it sounds like it’s going to put dollars in their pockets.

But this is not just true for politics and ideology. You have be alert to being asked questions based on false premises in your business and personal life as well. One of the games people love to play is to use their personal opinions as premises. Oftentimes, what this really means is that they use their conclusions as premises! The latter is known as an a priori argument.

I find that the best defense against being taken in by false premises is knowledge. Whenever my knowledge comes to my aid in refusing to acknowledge a false premise, it reminds me of Leonardo da Vinci’s words: “The noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.”

Above all, be vigilant about checking your own premises. The path to success is paved with correct premises, because they, and they alone, lead to correct conclusions. Thus, you have to constantly defend yourself against false premises on two fronts: (1) Those that others would use against you and (2) those you might be tempted to use yourself.

To the extent you succeed at these two objectives, you, too, will experience the noblest pleasure — the joy of understanding.

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