It can be frustrating trying to argue with a left-winger for a number of reasons. Many of them are ignorant of a lot of things, from history to logic to economics. Many don’t understand cause and effect, such as the fact that raising taxes on certain goods and services will result in less of those goods and services being provided, or the fact that having sex will lead to babies. And many are taken in by social media posts that make grandiose claims about the ability of the government or of rich Americans to provide for the needs of the country.
There’s perhaps no better example of that than a recent clip from MSNBC that went viral. NBC’s Brian Williams was interviewing Mara Gay, a member of the New York Times’ editorial board. The two were discussing the vast amount of money at play in politics today, in particular the amount of money that Michael Bloomberg spent on his failed Presidential bid.
Gay brought up a tweet she saw on social media, in which feminist author claimed that with the $500 million Bloomberg spent on ads for his campaign, he could have given each of the 327 million people in the US $1 million and still had plenty of money left over. Gay said of the tweet: “It’s true, it’s disturbing.” Williams, who has a penchant for tall tales, stated: “When I read it tonight on social media, it kind of all became clear.”
Now as anyone with at least basic knowledge of division knows, 500 million divided by 327 million is $1.53, not $1 million. The fact that an error of this sort was allowed to make it to national TV, that no one among the dozens of people on the set caught this error before it made it onto live TV, is not just an embarrassment, it’s a reminder that the mainstream media doesn’t care about facts, truth, or correctness. It just wants to push its narrative, which is to support the demonization of capitalism and free enterprise. In case you needed another reason to ignore the mainstream media’s spin, this is it.