Ben Carson Wins Stupidest Comment Re 7th GOP Debate

No sooner does man discover intelligence than he tries to involve it in his own stupidity ~ Jacques Cousteau (6/11/1910 to 6/25/1997) a French naval officer, explorer, conservationist, filmmaker, innovator, scientist, photographer, author and researcher who studied the sea and all forms of life in water.

Note: This commentary concerns the 7th Republican Party presidential debate, which was held on 1/28/2016 in the Iowa Events Center in downtown Des Moines IA. This would be the debate that Donald Trump refused to attend because it was hosted by Fox Nooz and Megyn Kelly returned as one of the 3 moderators

Stupid comments during a GOP debate? Obviously there have been MANY (and there will be many more). But I'm speaking about extraordinarily stupid and not the normal stupidity intelligent people have come to expect from Republicans. Stupidity such as Cruz stating that Obama has "degraded" the military (when, according to the Mises Institute, a Libertarian source, the military has not withered away under Obama). Or even stupidity such Marco Rubio claiming that President Obama and Hillary Clinton wanting to let Syrian refugees into the US without vetting them.

But in regards to the truly stupid? People insist that Ben Carson is smart because he's a retired neurosurgeon, but I wonder if he's an idiot savant. During the 3rd GOP presidential debate, he made it clear that he did not understand what GDP means (DSB #27). And, as we all know, there have been many more stupid remarks from Carson.

GQ (AKA Gentlemen's Quarterly) with their article titled "What If Sarah Palin Were a Brain Surgeon?", is on the right track here, I think. When I heard this comment from Carson I had to rewind my DVR because I thought I must have misheard him.

Chris Wallace: Dr. Carson, I'd like to ask you about that issue (question just asked of Ted Cruz). Where are you on the mandatory ethanol standard? Should government be in the business of picking winners and losers, or should it be left to the marketplace? Ben Carson: I'm very much against the government being involved in every aspect of our lives. ... we are blessed with tremendous energy in this nation. We need to be talking about new sources of energy. 70 percent of our population lives bicoastally. What about hydroelectric power? We can develop that...

Bicoastal means "occurring or existing on two coasts, or on both the east and west coasts of the US"... so Carson is talking about people who own more than one home and fly back and forth between them? Although it's more likely he meant to say "by the coast"... but this is also wrong. Not quite as absurd as the first interpretation, but still wrong. (the closed captioning, btw, read "bicoastally" and not "by the coast" or "by coast").

According to a 9/9/2015 Washington Post article "nearly 40 percent of Americans live near the coast". LiveScience says "half of US population lives in coastal areas". Both stats (obviously) fall far short of the 70 percent claim made by Carson. If that is what he meant. Perhaps he really does think that 70 percent of Americans own multiple homes (with at least one home located on each coast)?

I'm not the only one who heard this idiocy, btw. As I always do before authoring a commentary, I first check if anyone thought of it first. Turns out someone did. If you're saying "no, there is no way he could have said that"... check out Josh Barro on Scoopnest. WTF is Scoopnest? Damned if I know. Looks like some kind of Twitter competitor. Point is, I'm not the only one who heard this absurd claim from Carson.

Runner up for stupidest comment of the night goes to Jeb Bush for a "factoid" included in his response to a question by Bret Baier. (This comment, btw, took place earlier in the debate than the Carson one).

Bret Baier: It's hard for anyone with your pedigree to avoid being called establishment. Isn't that part of the problem in this race, that 3 others on this stage are splitting the mainstream Republican vote? And thereby possibly handing this nomination over to an anti-establishment candidate? Jeb!: ... Look, I'm establishment because my dad, the greatest man alive, was president of the United States, and my brother, who I adore as well, is a fantastic brother, was president. Fine, I'll take it. And I guess I'm part of the establishment because Barbara Bush is my mom. I'll take that too.

Along these same lines, Randal Paul said that his dad was "the most honest man in politics that we've seen in a generation" (he said this after the claim from Jeb concerning his dad). OK, so I don't think I believe Ronald Paul is quite that honest, but (regarding to this obvious "dad off" between Jeb and Randal)... doesn't being the greatest man alive trump (no pun intended) being the most honest (even if it's "in a generation")? Although Randal only claimed that his daddy Ronald is the most honest man IN POLITICS. Some people (I think) would say that's a low bar.

I wasn't the only person who heard (and decided to comment on) Jeb's assertion that his father is "the greatest man alive". Although, this apparently is not the fist time he's made this claim. Headline Politics notes that "Jeb was speaking at the Detroit Economic Club" when he replied (in response to a question implying his last name was a negative) that "George W. Bush has been a great president and that... George H.W. Bush is the greatest man alive".

Right. I think we all would acknowledge (even many Republicans) that the last name "bush" is a negative. BTW, I'd be willing to overlook Carson's statement as him misspeaking. President Obama misspoke when he stated that he had visited 57 states on the campaign trail (Beaverton OR 5/9/2008) and Republicans have been citing his "stupidity" on that issue for his entire presidency.

Snopes: The actual intent behind Senator Obama's misstatement is easy to discern... He was trying to express the thought that in all the time he had spent on the campaign trail so far in 2007-08, he had visited all (48) of the states in the continental U.S. save for one (i.e., "one left to go", excluding Alaska and Hawaii), but in his weariness he slipped up and started off with "fifty" instead of "forty". (Note the long pause in the video clip between the words "fifty" and "seven".)

But is there a logical explanation for Carson's claim that "70 percent of our population lives bicoastally"? He probably was referring to how many people live near one of our two coasts, but, as I already pointed out, 70 percent is way off. I don't expect any clarification on this statement, however. Remember that that there hasn't been any explanation regarding his historically inaccurate (and totally absurd) claim that the biblical Joseph built the pyramids to store grain (which is, apparently, his "personal theory"). Fact is, he stands by it.

And, what about his assertion that homosexuality is a choice "because a lot of people who go into prison go into prison straight - and when they come out, they're gay"? Or how about the doozie about ObamaCare being worse than slavery? I mean, even if you're not a fan of the ACA, you've got to admit that it falls far short of being that bad (Source: Ben Carson is plain nuts: The 7 most stupefying statements by the GOP's favorite neurosurgeon).

But all this stupidity is not surprising if you believe (as I do) that Conservatism is a mental illness. And there is also the fact that "having a low IQ score makes you more likely to vote conservative" (5 Scientific Studies That Prove Republicans Are Plain Stupid).

I do not, of course, believe ALL Republicans are stupid. Some who vote Republican do so because they're rich and don't want to pay higher taxes. And Republican politicians, while they may not be stupid themselves, have GOT to realize that they're pandering to low-intelligence voters. This, I am convinced, is the likely explanation for Donald Trump (who, as many on the Conservative side have pointed out, has tended more toward the Democratic side in the past).

But Carson? Sure, he might be "smart" as far as neurosurgery goes. But he's very clearly not that smart in other areas. Or qualified to be president. Not that there is any chance of him ending up in the White House (given the fact that that article I referenced earlier concerning the scientific studies that link low IQ and Conservatism also link low IQ and racism).

SWTD #319

Is A "Real Black" A "Thug" In Conservative Repub-World? Also, Is Ben Carson A Pathological Liar?

Ben and Candy Carson terrific. What about a real black President who can properly address the racial divide? And much else ~ Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) tweet from 10/8/2015.

So what would make Ben Carson a "real Black president", while Barack Obama is not "real"? Does Obama not being "real" based entirely on him living outside of the United States for a number of years during his childhood, or is it something more than that?

The following excerpt from the 11/5/2015 airing of The Stephanie Miller Show might shed some light on why, and in what ways, Ben Carson would be "real", whereas Obama isn't. (Note: what follows was minorly edited by me for clarity).

SM: Carl in Texas. You're on with the crew. Hello Carl.

Carl: Someone was talking about Ben Carson possibly being a sociopath. But if we all recall, when the Oregon shooting happened, he spoke with bravado about attacking the gunman. [Ben Carson on Fox & Friends said "Not only would I probably not cooperate with him, I would not just stand there and let him shoot me. I would say: 'Hey, guys, everybody attack him! He may shoot me but he can't get us all'"].

Then, when people said "you don't know what you'd do if someone pointed a gun at you", he came up with this story about what happened in the "Popeye's organization". [Ben Carson, appearing on Karen Hunter's Sirius XM Radio program said "I have had a gun held on me when I was in a Popeye's organization. Guy comes in, put the gun in my ribs. I just said, 'I believe that you want the guy behind the counter'"].

When people said he was a coward he came up with the story about the rocks and the bricks and the baseball bats... ["As a teenager, I would go after people with rocks, and bricks, and baseball bats, and hammers. And, of course, many people know the story when I was 14 and I tried to stab someone", Carson said... on the 10/25/2015 airing of Meet the Press].

SM: Yes. He was stabby.

Carl: CNN went to his hometown and organized some of his neighbors and school friends. Not one of them knew anything about any of this. They said that when he was in school he was a nerdy bookworm.

SM: Oh... so he was inventing some street cred for himself. A thug story.

[End 11/5/2015 Stephanie Miller Show Excerpt]

If this story of Ben Carson's troubled youth makes him a reformed thug, is that what is makes his "Blackness" "real"? Also, is this how White Conservatives view Black people; by which I mean the "real" ones are all thugs and some of them (the GOOD ones) are "reformed"?

Is Obama, on the other hand, not a "real Black" but "mixed race"... because his mother was White and because his White grandparents raised him (and in Hawaii, of all places)? Yeah, I think that while the primary factor regarding why Obama isn't "real" is due to his time living outside the US, these other things are also a factor.

Including the lack of a "thug story", which Ben Carson seems to be trying to create/relate. Because being a reformed thug is a positive in the eyes of White Conservatives. Because it shows that embracing "personal responsibility" can transform a typical Black person... someone who, as Conservatives put it, reside mainly on the Democrat plantation where they lazily rely on "free stuff" instead of developing a work ethic.

Obama, on the other hand, became a community organizer, which, in conservative minds, meant he organized lazy Blacks to beg for "free stuff". (However, even though Obama, as someone organizing lazy Blacks to beg for free stuff places him in with the majority of African Americans who reside on the "Democrat plantation", this ABSOLUTELY does not cause his Blackness to be real).

Anyway, as for Carson's "thug story" and it making him a "real Black", there are questions as to whether EITHER of these incidents (the one where he stabbed someone or the one where he encountered a gunman in a Popeye's) actually happened.

Ben Carson's Stabbing Story Is Full of Holes (excerpt from the 10/27/2015 Daily Beast article by Gideon Resnick) In one version of the story, Carson attempts to stab a bully with a large camping knife he had been holding. In another, he pulls a pocketknife on his friend while listening to classical music at the friend's house. So which is it?

In the many different version of the stabbing story, the basic facts are the same, but the particulars are quite different. That Carson is relating differing versions of this story says to me that he might be making it up.

As for the incident that Carson claims took place in the Popeye's fast food restaurant, or the "Popeye's Organization" as Ben calls the chain... it might not have happened either.

Was Ben Carson Really Held at Gunpoint? (excerpt from the 10/8/2015 Daily Beast article by Olivia Nuzzi & Gideon Resnick) The candidate's not-so-harrowing tale about his encounter with a gunman at a Baltimore Popeyes is tough to verify. Almost too tough. ... throughout his several published books and three autobiographies, Carson doesn't appear to mention the story once. When The Daily Beast reached out to Carson's... central advisor, Armstrong Williams, he said... [the story] appeared in Carson's 2006 book, Take the Risk, [but] there is no story about a stickup at Popeyes in Take the Risk.

Also, as pointed out on the Daily Kos "Baltimore police say they can't confirm or debunk Dr. Ben Carson's Popeye's robbery story". But that's because they might not have filed a police report. Or so Carson advisor Armstrong Williams claims. Despite Carson's story including the line "he left the store running before the police got there".

So, is Carson lying? Some say yes, he's a liar. I say I don't know for sure... but I certainly think there is enough evidence to conclude that he MIGHT be a bald-faced liar.

Lying so he'll come off (in the eyes of White Conservatives) as "authentically Black"... unlike the current president. According to Carson "growing up in inner-city Detroit gave him the sophistication to know that the [Popeye's] gunman wasn't going to murder him but was just looking to rob the place".

"Sophistication" being code for "street smarts", I'm guessing. As a "real" Black man he'd have to have street smarts, no? Yeah, I don't know. To me, this strategy (if this IS Carson's strategy) doesn't sound like it would work. Or I would conclude that, if not for Rupert Murdoch's tweet.

Although, even if this (likely) faux "genuine" narrative convinces Conservative voters that Ben Carson would be "a real black President who can properly address the racial divide", I seriously doubt that this will translate to votes. (Although it IS translating to book sales, as evidenced by the fact that Carson "suspended" his campaign to go on a book tour).

Video1: Straight outta Carson: Republican candidate releases campaign rap. An actual Ben Carson campaign ad that will air for two weeks in Miami, Atlanta, Houston, Detroit, Birmingham, Jackson, Memphis and Little Rock.

Video2: Remix of Ben Carson campaign rap. NOT an actual campaign ad, but a "remix" by Slate that includes many absurd comments from Carson.

SWTD #317