People of Britain: Congratulations Are In Order

You have now joined ferret owners, sidewalk artists, hot dog vendors, publicly funded attorneys for poor people, low-income community college students, museum curators, a couple of innocent black men shot dead by the police, the sections of the New York City charter governing rules of succession to the mayoralty and, of course, Hillary Clinton, as objects of Rudy Giuliani’s demagoguery and wrath.

You may by now have heard the story. In a radio ad that his campaign prepared for New Hampshire voters, Giuliani tells listeners that he was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2000 and goes on to say: “My chance of surviving cancer - and thank God I was cured of it - in the United States: 82%. My chances of surviving prostate cancer in England: only 44% under socialised medicine.”

The numbers are false. The actual five-year survival rate in Britain is 74%, which is still lower than America’s.

It turned out that Giuliani’s numbers were from a seven-year-old article in a conservative policy journal. The article was written by his own healthcare policy adviser, who admitted that his comparison was a “crude” interpretation of a study by a respected health policy group. The group, in turn, said the article’s author had grossly misused its numbers.

That’s about as red-handed as anyone in politics gets caught these days. But when asked if the campaign would continue to use the figure, a Giuliani spokeswoman said, “Yes, we will.”

[link (emphasis mine)]

Isn’t that sort of thing called lying? What would Pat Robertson say?

Politics means never letting the truth stand in the way of telling a good story….. or gaining White House type power.

Trackposted to Nuke’s, Perri Nelson’s Website, Rosemary’s Thoughts, Right Truth, Pirate’s Cove, Leaning Straight Up, The Amboy Times, High Desert Wanderer, Right Voices, Gone Hollywood, and The Yankee Sailor, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

This entry was posted by stageleft on Thursday, November 8th, 2007 and is filed under US Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

11 Responses to “People of Britain: Congratulations Are In Order”

  1. balbulican on November 8th, 2007 at 1:56 pm

    Heh. I’m afraid a depressingly large percentage of Republicans have simply lost their capacity to tell truth from lies. Or their interest. Heck, if you can swallow the notion that Iraq in 2001 posed a danger to the US, what’s a few thousand imaginary prostate cancer victims?

  2. Regional blogs » People of Britain: Congratulations Are In Order (Stageleft:. Life on the left side) on November 8th, 2007 at 3:45 pm

    [...] сообщения от Stageleft:. Life on the left side тут… Posted by @ 12:47 pm :: Review Comment RSS :: Trackback [...]

  3. Treehugger on November 8th, 2007 at 4:00 pm

    Seriously, elections are no longer about issues, ideas or especially truth. They are about image - who has the best attack ads that resonate with the average voter who doesn’t have the time or interest to do any research on their own. Most already identify themselves in one of two camps anyway. Who looks best with the flag waving in the background with the hot apple pie on the table in front of them. Who is the most “American”?

  4. stageleft on November 8th, 2007 at 5:46 pm

    Aye, I flipped on the Weather network when I got home from work to see what mother nature had for store for us and was presented with a Conservative Party of Canada attack ad. Nothing of substance, just the usual few images and sound bites taken out of context and strung together by some party hack - my first thought was. “the Liberals finally grew balls during my bus ride home, there’s gonna be an election “, and then, as Comrade Google News patiently indicated otherwise it dawned on me, there’s no election, we’ve simply become Americans, and Harper is either

    (a) rubbing it in just because he can
    (b) more insecure than he and his party let on

    - I chose (c), all of the above

    On the one hand it’s sad to see what we’ve become politically, on the other I almost hope it continues, even grows, and that the pointless stupidity of it all drives even more people away from the polls next time around.

  5. Unpartisan.com Political News and Blog Aggregator on November 9th, 2007 at 1:01 am

    Giuliani: Focus On My Record, Not Kerik

    Republican Rudy Giuliani said Thursday he’d made a mistake in recommending his New York City police

  6. Treehugger on November 9th, 2007 at 8:43 am

    Yep, I know exactly where you are coming from. We are just as bad in Canada with this sort of thing.

  7. Rosemary's Thoughts on November 9th, 2007 at 12:35 pm

    Thanks and Praise from Iraq, by Michael Yon

    I find this quite amazing and encouraging. Do you think we’ll ever see this on the evening news? Yes. Sadly, me neither. It does not fit the mold of the sectarian civil war. That is why it is so important that we have people such as Michael Yon on th…

  8. Rosemary on November 9th, 2007 at 12:43 pm

    I had no idea that ad was not accurate. I still believe that the fair market (notice I did not say, ‘free’?) is a better way to go when it comes to anything the gov’t is not supposed to have their have greedy little paws upon! lol.

    How have you been? It’s good to know that you found me. I was having a little difficulty when I moved back to my original site, but it’s been fixed. Have a great day.

  9. Rosemary on November 9th, 2007 at 12:54 pm

    PS. I wasn’t really paying attention, because I do not plan on voting for him in the primary. I have only so much time. I am voting for Duncan Hunter, if you would like to check him out. He is a stand up guy for the Conservative Party who has no testicles, yet. For shame!

    I feel about my party the same way you feel about yours. When are they going to realize that they work only on the good graces of us? I hate it when they are so polite to each other on tv, ‘My esteemed collegue…’…blah! ;)

  10. Rosemary on November 9th, 2007 at 12:59 pm

    pss. sorry to take up so much space, but I must correct this. It is the party that has no testicles, not Duncan Hunter! He is a former Marine. His son will be coming home this month after his 3rd tour, 2 in Afghanistan and 1 in Iraq.

    Thank you for allowing me to make that correction. Have a great weekend!

  11. Throbbin on November 10th, 2007 at 6:51 pm

    What gives? I had a post here, disappeared…

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