What I have noticed recently is a rather shameless admission by many in politics that not only have they been lying but ultimately that "truth" doesn't matter.
In politics truth doesn't matter as such and never have. Politics is about getting it your way not about being right. It's about interest and choices.
The idea that politics is or should somehow be based on facts is misguided. We have science for facts what we choose to do with those facts is were politics come in.
> The idea that politics is or should somehow be based on facts is misguided.
> We have science for facts what we choose to do with those facts is were politics come in.
The second sentence explicitly contradicts the first one. By your second one you are saying that politics is based on the facts that science provides. Or rather, should be.
Ideally I'd expect politicians to pick and choose "facts" that suit there arguments (or on a rare occasion actually have their arguments informed by data) and to ideally reference the sources so they can be checked by anyone who cares.
Is that an "elite" approach then?
Of course, what I describe above is an ideal - politics is a mucky business and the essence of a democracy is essentially that we get to choose between the liars. However, what I do have difficulty with is the idea that reasoning from actual factual data or scientific hypotheses has no role in politics.
But thats the problem. You can have two argument which are both true but politically only one of them can win. This is why we argue.
Not because we are uniformed but because our perspectives are different and our perspectives are different because it affects us differently.
And so the real danger here is to go along with this romantic notion that facts used to be more meaningful when in fact it was only that perspectives were more aligned than they are today.
The idea that politics is or should somehow be based on facts is misguided. We have science for facts what we choose to do with those facts is were politics come in.