This is quoted wholesale from a friend’s Facebook post. The “bias toward coherence” is a brilliant term for what reporters who cover Donald Trump are facing.
Tom Nichols, conservative pundit and scholar, writing recently in the Atlantic:
“Donald Trump’s public events are a challenge for anyone who writes about him. His rallies and press conferences are rich sources of material, fountains of molten weirdness that blurp up stuff that would sink the career of any other politician. By the time they’re over, all of the attendees are covered in gloppy nonsense.
“And then, once everyone cleans up and shakes the debris off their phones and laptops, so much of what Trump said seems too bonkers to have come from a former president and the nominee of a major party that journalists are left trying to piece together a story as if Trump were a normal person. This is what The Atlantic’s editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, has described as the ‘bias toward coherence,’ and it leads to careful circumlocutions instead of stunned headlines.
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“Reporters might listen to Trump and then understandably be reluctant to start typing stories that must feel like spec scripts for The West Wing pieced together by a creative-writing circle:
‘The former president, lying about abortion laws, said women murder their own babies in the delivery room. He megalomaniacally claimed that he gets bigger crowds than anyone in history, and compared himself to Martin Luther King Jr. He descended into fantasy by telling a story about surviving a helicopter emergency that never happened with a man who wasn’t there.’
“Instead, The New York Times ran this headline: ‘Trump Tries to Wrestle Back Attention at Mar-a-Lago News Conference.’ The Washington Post said: ‘Trump Holds Meandering News Conference, Where He Agrees to Debate Harris.’ The British paper The Independent got closer with: ‘Trump Holds Seemingly Pointless Press Conference Filled With False Claims,’ but CNN went with ‘Trump Attacks Harris and Walz During First News Conference Since Democratic Ticket Was Announced.’
“All of these headlines are technically true, but they miss the point: The Republican nominee, the man who could return to office and regain the sole authority to use American nuclear weapons, is a serial liar and can’t tell the difference between reality and fantasy.
“Donald Trump is not well. He is not stable. There’s something deeply wrong with him.”
Here is the original Tom Nichols piece in The Atlantic: “The Truth About Trump’s Press Conference/His obvious emotional instability is frightening, not funny.”
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Your friend’s Facebook post, and the commentary in The Atlantic, deserve rebuttal found in a quote from my own friend, a person of far greater wisdom: Ralph Waldo Emerson
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. — ‘Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.’ — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.”
? Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance: An Excerpt from Collected Essays, First Series
Everyone can be conned apparently, even Ken. Trump is an abomination as is the Republican Party.. evidently it’s easy to dupe the ignorant. Thanks, Ian, America is not doing well with either main party.
I also think the term “bias toward coherence” is brilliant! Each time I express complete astonishment at the latest outrage promulgated by either party, I get plenty scolding from my family for being so naive. Now I know that I have a bias toward coherence! All politicians lie. It’s hard to take anything either party’s leaders say seriously and Biden is no better than Trump. Whether intentionally or by exaggeration, he is a serial liar and plagiarist going back decades to his time in the Senate.
I have a masters degree in Mathematics and Ph.D. in Philosophy. I have spent my life using logical reasoning to prove how a theorem can be derived from axioms, or how a moral or aesthetic conclusion is grounded in fundamental assumptions. So I clearly have a “bias toward coherence.” The concept of coherence or consistency is the essence of an axiomatic-deductive system which all academic disciplines aspire to achieve, including not only “objective” fields like mathematics, physics and economics but also “subjective” fields like “political science” or even art-history or music composition. But I recognize that the bias toward coherence is, like any other bias, a prejudice in need of overcoming. Despite my background I recognize that political action and warfare are sometimes inherently irrational, comparable to the Buddhist quest for enlightenment, or teaching techniques used by Zen masters, judo or fencing instructors — surprise, sudden unexpected shifts of balance; recognizing the immanent presence of transcendent but ineffable wisdom. Whew! Maybe it’s time now for a nap! To sleep, perchance to dream. “He ‘elele ka moe na ke kanaka”: Pukui ‘olelo no’eau: Dreams are messengers to people [from the gods and ancestors] [despite the dreams’ often chaotic ambiguity].
Thank you! I had to read this 3 times and with each reading I understood a little more. I would normally agree about bias being something to overcome, but in this instance I think I will hang on to my bias toward coherence. It’s the only thing I’ve heard so far that helps me understand why I haven’t given up yet and continue to try to make sense of the current political and social nuttiness.
I’m so disappointed Ian. From brilliant “Reporting” on the Miske case to this National Enquirer-worthy article.
Excellent summary of how much of the news has failed to report on the sheer disjointed craziness and lies in Trump’s speeches and posts. It has been so disheartening to see so many fall under the spell of the barrage of his lies, name calling, continual disinformation, talking our nation down and often encouraging the worst in our society. Our schools must do a better job of teaching critical thinking and how to always verify news and information from more than one trusted source. Thank you for sharing your friend’s post.
Does it make sense to you or not? Your choice is your bias. Or you may withhold choosing and ignore whatever mumbo jumbo is before you.