Washington Pulled Apart By Partisan Divide Over 'facts'
Faizan Hashmi Published December 14, 2019 | 08:30 AM
Washington, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 14th Dec, 2019 ) :In Washington these days, there are facts, alternative facts and disputed facts.
It also seems like there are Democratic facts and Republican facts.
The acrimonious impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump have put the spotlight on the stark partisan split in the nation's capital over where the truth lies.
"There's always been a divide between liberals and conservatives in the United States over opinions," said Richard Hasen, a professor of law and political science at University of California, Irvine.
"Where things have changed is that there's now much more disagreement along party lines as to basic facts." Democrats and Republicans tend to diverge on more and more subjects including, for example, whether climate change is real and whether Russia or Ukraine interfered with the 2016 US presidential election.
"On each of these things polling shows a divide between Republicans and Democrats as to what the state of the world is," said Hasen, author of "Election Meltdown: Dirty Tricks, Distrust and the Threat to American Democracy." "That's why some of us think of this as kind of a post-truth era." Trump rose to political prominence by peddling the lie that former president Barack Obama was born in Kenya and Democrats accuse the Republican leader of turbocharging the polarized environment with fabrications.
The Washington Post maintains a Fact Checker database of "false or misleading claims" made by Trump since taking office. It was last updated on October 9 at which time it listed 13,435 examples.
- 'Alternative facts' - Trump's senior aide Kellyanne Conway coined the term "alternative facts" just days after he took office while defending the debunked White House claim that the 45th president's inauguration crowd was larger than Obama's.
As for the facts surrounding impeachment, Trump insists his July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was "perfect." Democrats say it was anything but -- that asking the Ukrainian leader to open an investigation into Democrat Joe Biden was an abuse of power and grounds for removing Trump from office.
"People can literally read the same words and think they are saying something entirely different," said David Barker, a professor of public affairs at American University.
"Trumpists have T-shirts that say 'Read the Transcript,'" Barker said. "Well everybody on the other side says 'We've read the transcript and that's the whole problem.
'" Defending the president in the House Judiciary Committee, Georgia lawmaker Doug Collins, the ranking Republican, said the impeachment case boils down to a set of "disputed facts." "The very nature of the fact that I say I disagree and you say you don't is a disputed fact," Collins told committee Democrats. "It'll be the first impeachment that is partisan on facts that are not agreed to." Barker, co-author of the book "One Nation, Two Realities: Dueling Facts in American Democracy," points to the role played by "tribal differences" between Republicans and Democrats.
"We don't shop at the same stores, we don't drink the same beer, we don't eat in the same restaurants," he said. "We don't listen to the same music, we don't go to the same movies and we don't live anywhere remotely near each other anymore.
"All of those changes in our lifestyle, these tribal differences, have led to this situation where we don't believe information anymore unless it comes from someone within our tribe," he said.
"You can fact-check them all day long," Barker said, "and it's just fake news to them." - Social media fog - Americans may once have looked to newspapers, television and magazines to get their facts but that is less the case in an increasingly partisan media environment.
A new Pew Research Center survey found that Republicans are far more skeptical of the news media than Democrats.
Forty percent of the Republicans surveyed who approve of Trump's job performance said journalists have "very low" ethical standards. Just five percent of Democrats hold that view.
"We're also in the midst of a technological revolution in which the intermediaries that have served as arbiters of the truth have now been undermined by the rise of social media," Hasen said.
"The way we get our feeds on social media we tend to share messages that reinforce what we already believe," he said. "People live in different factual universes." This poses problems to good governance now and going forward.
"A democratic republic really cannot function this way," Barker said. "People talk about a marketplace of ideas. Well we have a marketplace of reality."Hasen warned that partisan disagreement over what constitutes a fact can have potentially ominous consequences such as when it comes to "people's willingness to accept election results.""I'm very worried about this upcoming election," he said of the November 2020 US presidential vote.
Related Topics
Recent Stories
Punjab CM Maryam Nawaz in police uniform at Chung police center
Currency Rate In Pakistan - Dollar, Euro, Pound, Riyal Rates On 25 April 2024
Today Gold Rate in Pakistan 25 April 2024
Mired in crisis, Boeing reports another loss
Session Awarding Ceremony 2024 held at Cadet College Muzaffarabad
Austrian ski great Hirscher to make comeback under Dutch flag
Pakistan, Japan agrees to convene 'Economic Policy Dialogue'
FM Dar conveys deepest sympathy on torrential rains devastation in UAE
Spain PM Sanchez says weighing resignation after wife's graft probe
Tennis: ATP/WTA Madrid Open results - 1st update
Long-lost Klimt portrait auctioned off for 30 mn euros
Osaka seals first win on clay since 2022 in Madrid
More Stories From Miscellaneous
-
PDMA predicts gusty wind, rain with thunder, hails
2 days ago -
Iranian president Raisi given guard of honour at PM House
3 days ago -
Intellectuals, writers accolades Naseer Mirza on his literary contribution
4 days ago -
Bahawalpur Adabi Sangat hosts memorable mushaira
4 days ago -
Cattle farming vital to alleviate poverty in rural areas
4 days ago -
Pakistan: A land of tourism, archeological wonders
4 days ago
-
Transforming education sector: from job hunters to job creators
6 days ago -
Amjad Bobby remembered on 19th death anniversary for timeless contributions to music
10 days ago -
Legendary actor Nadeem’s 26 films released on Eid-ul-Fitr days in 50 years
11 days ago -
Besant Hall Cultural Centre to celebrate evening with Sanam Marvi on 26 April
11 days ago -
Radio Bahawalpur presents program “Eidi Shidi”
14 days ago -
Radio Bahawalpur to broadcast Eid programs
16 days ago