A suggestion for Trump (or for anyone): when answering a “gotcha” question, go process instead of content
You may recall that I’ve written about the content/process distinction before, particularly here:
When I was studying interpersonal communication and how to track an argument, one thing that was very much emphasized was the difference between content and process. Content is just what it sounds like: the subject matter about which two people (let’s say, a married couple) are arguing. “Did you do the dishes last night?” Process is everything else—for example, the emotion with which something is said, the type of vocabulary used, tone, repetition, body language, and the unspoken subtext.
Some of the most confusing disputes are the ones where one person begins an argument on the content level and the other person introduces a process rebuttal at some point. It can be especially tricky when someone switches back and forth between one level and the other in rapid succession. In the heat of the moment, the other person can fail to notice it, so that the person doing the switching gets at least one step ahead of the other.
That’s about arguments. But the same is true for interviews or any question-and-answer process.
Once you understand the distinction between content and process, you can notice it constantly. For example, when Trump responded to questions at the Helsinki news conference, one of the problems as I see it is that he sometimes went content when he should have gone process. In this case, “process” would have been to have called the press on the nature of the question itself.
If you go back and look at the transcript of the press conference or read my post on the subject, you’ll see that most of Trump’s more talked-about remarks were made in the context of answering questions rather than during his prepared statements. And some of those questions were “gotcha” questions—as was the entire situation concerning the indictment of 12 Russians right before Trump’s meeting with Putin.
It had been obvious to anyone paying a particle of attention that the timing of the indictments was no accident. A trap was being set and Trump would be left with no good response to the inevitable questions about the subject that would be asked at the Trump-Putin press conference.
Here’s one exchange I’m referring to; the question asked of Trump was this:
Just now, President Putin denied having anything to do with the election interference in 2016. Every U.S. intelligence agency has concluded that Russia did.
What — who — my first question for you, sir, is who do you believe?
Trump had the following choices in terms of a content response:
(1) I believe our intelligence. In other words, Putin’s lying—and of course Putin was standing right there and the eyes of the world were on them both, so whatever negotiations and rapport that might have been established at their previous meeting would have probably been undone by a statement like that from Trump
(2) I believe Putin. In other words, our intelligence is lying, which would create another firestorm if he’d said it.
(3) I’m somewhere in-between. Trump actually chose door #3, which seemed safest, when he answered:
…I’ve been asking…for months…Where is the server? I want to know where is the server and what is the server saying?
With that being said, all I can do is ask the question. My people came to me, Dan Coates came to me and some others, they said they think it’s Russia. I have President Putin; he just said it’s not Russia.
I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be. But I really do want to see the server.
But I have — I have confidence in both parties. I — I really believe that this will probably go on for a while, but I don’t think it can go on without finding out what happened to the server…
So I have great confidence in my intelligence people, but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.
And what he did is an incredible offer. He offered to have the people working on the case come and work with their investigators with respect to the 12 people. I think that’s an incredible offer. OK?
But as you know, this resulted in an enormous hue and cry, and it pleased just about no one. It gave an opening to many people to declare that Trump was saying that he believes Putin over our intelligence, although he didn’t say that. But it was a reply from Trump that was neither fish nor fowl, and it was somewhat confusing as well.
I actually have sympathy for Trump’s position and the trap he was placed in, but Trump is usually very good at getting out of such traps. This time I think his instincts somewhat failed him, because I believe that the best way out would have been a process response rather than any sort of content response at all.
Now don’t get me wrong—I actually don’t think any answer Trump could have given would have failed to draw harsh criticism. So what I’m about to suggest would have drawn criticism too. But I believe it would have drawn criticism from fewer people, and I believe it would have been a course of action that would have given them the least ammunition possible.
Something like this sort of response is what I’m talking about:
We’re in Helsinki, we just had a conference between the heads of state of Russia and the US, and we talked about all kinds of extremely important and substantive issues which I mentioned in the address I just gave. But you’d like to get me to be accusatory towards Russia right now, or accusatory towards US intelligence agencies right now, and I won’t do either thing. I won’t play that game, although you’d like me to. I’m going to focus on the task at hand, and I’d like you to do that, too.
That’s a process response. It’s evasive and sidesteps the issue, to be sure, but it was an issue that needed to be sidestepped. There’s plenty of time to address it later, and Trump has already addressed it earlier as well.
Why didn’t Trump answer in that manner? I’m not sure, but I do know that he made a different decision. What motivated him? The issue of Russian interference in the 2016 election isn’t a neutral one for Trump. In addition to the more general issues involving the US and the protection of its election process, the topic has more personal elements. The first is the accusation that Russian interference was biased in favor of Trump and therefore he didn’t really win the election. It has the potential to taint his victory, and that’s certainly very personal. The second related personal element is the charge that Trump actually colluded with them to do it.
Those two personal elements probably account for Trump’s repeated need to deny that Russian interference happened at all. Most people think not only that Russians meddled with our 2016 election but that they’ve been meddling in our elections for a long long time—as have other countries—and that we meddle in the elections of other countries as well. That seems pretty obvious, actually (although I doubt their meddling mattered in the outcome of our 2016 election).
So why deny it? Well, I just stated the special reasons Trump has for denying this particular act of alleged interference.
In addition, at this point, why would anyone trust our intelligence agencies? I used to trust them, for the most part. But no longer.
They’ll make a conspiracy theorist of me yet.
“In addition, at this point, why *would* anyone trust our intelligence agencies? I used to trust them, for the most part. But no longer.”
Yes, those were the days: neo and I are contemporaries, and back when we were young and innocent, USA intelligence was the best [and brightest!?], and Uncle Sam was to be believed. Well, we sure weren’t going to believe those dirty stinkin’ commies — and there was one under most mattresses, ya know.
We’ve all been through quite a lot of history by now, and I’m reminded of what a then-young aide said to a then-young Daniel Patrick Moynihan in the aftermath of the Kennedy assassination: “we’ll never laugh again.” Moynihan corrected her, offering: “we’ll laugh again, but we’ll never be young again.”
And so it is with our intelligence services. They’ve let us down too many times. We’re older and wiser.
Oh, to be young and innocent again. But it’s not to be.
But as you know, this resulted in an enormous hue and cry, and it pleased just about no one.
this is why the chinese dont take a compromise, and why stalin said compromise was a new form of warfare…
however, the fourth hidden answer was none of the above
ie. i sit here in bewilderment as the only thing not in the conversation is the normal idea of dissumulation and not really telling teh blunkt aspergers type truth!!!!!!!
you only have to take a logical look at each point…
they were going to bake his clam no matter what he did
if he stayed, they had that arguments set
if he goes, they had that argument set
if he sided only with the US, then they would say he was a bully
if he sided only with putin, the obvious
if he tried to pass between themnot negating his chance at negoatiotiating later… again
nothing would work..
nothing is allowed to work
there is no concept of concession at all
this is take no prisoners and everythin ghe does is wrong, wrong wrong, no matter what it is… even if its something they want..
they nearly got their communist state.. .
hillary was planning on finishing it
one crisis and the executive orders would be in effect and years of that would exist beore a supreme court could even hear the plea (which by then they would not exist)
they are litterally foaming they wnat their communist state
you know the one thing that scares russia and china MORE than the US and its weapopns and so on?
an amoral US that cares not for its people, and has al that weaponry and other stuff it can use with the same moral terpitude they have and bigger guns.
if you dont think that they are afraid of their predecessors work in the US and how that old stuff is creating a monster in their midst that is more like the 1930s than the 2030s
trump just set back everyone that will work for years and will now feel a turn back…
but everyone is a sucker
your thinking there are some rules
some quarter
there isnt..
all the gloves are off
and all the masks are off
like arguing against christianity and leaving out the 2000 years of great thinkers…
social democracy
All that happened is the capitalist men were kicked out of the family and the socialist women were used as marx and nechyeve said so, and thats that
I’m really not following any of this stuff because I assume from the get-go that the MSM is lying about it. Blatantly. Maliciously. Repugnantly. Disgustingly. Insanely. Provocatively trying to “gin up” their base. (Hey what’s the problem with serving up a little hatred when the goal is to get Trump out of the WH?)
And it usually turns out (unfortunately) that that’s exactly the case.
(Wish it weren’t…..)
So instead, I scan some twitter feeds of people that whose views I respect (e.g., Lee Smith, Mollie Hemingway, Omri Ceren, Tony Badran, Col. Richard Kemp) and learn more than enough about some of the garbage they wade through without having to wade through it myself.
For example:
https://twitter.com/leesmithdc
And of course, there’s neoneocon, fearlessly and honestly blogging away, dealing with so much of that crap, and somehow staying sane.
For which, many thanks….
“And of course, there’s neoneocon, fearlessly and honestly blogging away, dealing with so much of that crap, and somehow staying sane.
For which, many thanks….” Barry Meislin
Here, here! I’m thankful for your steadfast devotion to assessing current affairs. And also thankful for the content that offers us a reprieve from the problems du jour.
Daily reads in this order:
Drudge for the headlines
Neo for the insight and evaluation
Powerline for different insights, etc.
Ace of Spades for the giggles
OK.
I would add “Belmont Club” for its consistent insight, astuteness, creativity and craftsmanship….
(And generally outstanding comments.)
Considering the way thigs went, I’m convinced that the Mueller indictments of the 12 Russians on Friday was designed to put Trump in a no win situation. The MSM was primed to spring the trap. Unfortunately, Trump was not well prepared or was tired or? He is inarticulate and that can get you in trouble when they are mining every phrase for ammunition to be used against you.
That so many Republicans are jumping on the MSM bandwagon is disheartening. So many of them are afraid of the MSM and afraid to stand up to them in a situation where Trump appears vulnerable. Cowards!
I have long known that intelligence was often spotty, sometimes colored by bias, and all too vulnerable to human fallibility. I saw it in Vietnam, where intel was often massaged in various ways to improve the reputation of the various services. It was also massaged up the chain of command to present the best possible picture to the Pentagon.
That was bad enough. What really blew me away was when the USSR collapsed. For decades we had been lead to believe that the USSR was ahead of us economically. And our intelligence services had been mute on the possibility of economic collapse. In 1992 I read an account of two Americans who rode bicycles from Moscow to Vladivostok. Their account was of a country of great poverty as compared to the U.S. I realized then that we were being fed a narrative that the higher ups believed was necessary to keep us motivated to stay ahead of the Commies.
Our insight into what happened in the FBI during the Obama administration via the disclosures about Comey, McCabe, Strzok, Page, and others has opened our eyes to the fallibility of these agencies They are our intel and law enforcement agencies, but we can and should not consider them beyond criticism and, when necessary, reform.
With each passing day Trump earns my respect more and more. He’s not perfect (as the Helsinki press conference shows) but considering the trap set for him and the 24/7/365 obsession with obstructing his administration, anyone else would have long ago wilted.
He could have just said that the Deep State was trying to do a coup de tat from US intel.
Or brought up Nixon and Pearl Harbor.
Those in statemanship games begin to get more and more cautious, as they can’t be as crazy as they normally are.
Trum won’t use the Nixon card, because he was one of the ones that thought Nixon was trying to do something corrupt. He, like most people, would have bought into the narration story. Well, he has become the status quo narration story now and he can see how it looked from Nixon’s pov, from the inside rather than outside.
A nation of weaklings isn’t going to be saved by any President, no matter who that President is.
They’ll make a conspiracy theorist of me yet.
People think Alex Jones and Trum who watches Alex Jones know about conspiracies. They don’t know as much as people think they do.
Nixon is Trump’s biggest hero. Trump is holding as treasure a letter Nixon wrote to him in the 80s in which Nixon praised him and informed him that his wife Pat who Nixon claimed to be a much better judge of people than him believed Trump would make a great president someday after watching an interview of his.