Would he or wouldn’t he?
Today President Trump has said he actually meant “wouldn’t” instead of “would” when he uttered this phrase during the Helsinki news conference:
I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be [Russia]. But I really do want to see the server.
Hmmm; that seems somewhat odd. But it’s actually somewhat believable. People become exhausted and they really do sometimes make errors like that. When Obama did it I defended him (and others, as well).
And this correction by Trump actually makes more sense than the original, because of the word “but” at the beginning of that second sentence:
I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be [Russia]. But I really do want to see the server.
If he had meant what he had originally said—that he didn’t see any reason why it would be Russia—then why wouldn’t he have said “And I really do want to see the server” instead of “But I really do want to see the server”?
Not that his explanations or excuses will make a particle of difference. Trump critics will laugh at “would” instead of “wouldn’t.” Those who like him still like him. The corrections also don’t change the basic thrust of Trump’s remarks, which was to try to take a middle position and not choose either side.
Trump actually took a somewhat different position today as a whole (not just about “would” or “wouldn’t”), now that he’s home:
President Donald Trump says he meant the opposite when he said in Helsinki that he doesn’t see why Russia would have interfered in the 2016 U.S. elections.
Back at the White House on Tuesday, the president told reporters that he said he meant he doesn’t see why Russia “wouldn’t” be responsible.
He also said he accepts the American intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia interfered in the election, but he denied that his campaign had colluded in the effort.
This furor will probably die down. But Trump didn’t help himself at that Helsinki press conference.
Was this really worse than the apology tour, the reset button, or Bengazi?
To me that would be
whatever the would
of would be
would be.
But that’s just me.
Vanderleun:
Did you by any chance write Bill Clinton’s “depends what the meaning of ‘is’ is” speech?
I did and that cheap skate’s foundation still owes me for it.
Andrew C. McCarthy has a different take on the context of would/wouldn’t:
Ann:
I could not disagree with McCarthy more. I think he has it backwards.
Neither McCarthy nor I actually know for certain whether Trump initially misspoke and meant “wouldn’t” when he said “would.” But “wouldn’t” makes a lot more sense in the paragraph, with the word “but” in that next sentence. And people often make errors when they are trying to construct a sentence with a double negative, such as “I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be.”
McCarthy writes “He [Trump] was making a case for why one should harbor doubts about the intelligence agencies’ conclusion that Russia meddled.” Absolutely not! As I wrote in this post, Trump was NOT making that case. He was making case #3: I’m somewhere in-between. He was going back and forth between the 2 sides, saying a kind of “on the one hand, this; on the other hand, that.”
Here’s his quote in context, with my comments in brackets:
McCarthy is a brilliant lawyer and an excellent writer himself. But he hasn’t parsed this in detail, as I have, in terms of speech patterns and psychology.
I am shocked to learn the Peter Strzok connection to Iran.
http://dcwhispers.com/tag/peter-strzok/#WORzFcFEDuKbkB32.97
Things get weirder by the minute
“…connection to Iran.”
Too soon to jump to conclusions. The Iranian people are NOT the Iranian regime. (That is, not necessarily.)
The question is: does Strzok have any ideological affinity to the Mullahs’ regime, as does Valerie Jarrett and her anti-American parents.
While it does not necessarily follow that he does, if it is the case, then he’s a man after Jarrett’s heart.
And perfectly positioned.
So that things do indeed become even more “interesting” than they already are.
Trump “to the Finland Station”.
(Well, sort of….)
As the anti-Trump agit-prop gathers tsunami-like strength and the insanity rises to fever pitch…
..who knows what’s true any more?
Answer 1: It does not matter….as long as Trump is excoriated and eviscerated and his supporters ostracized and dehumanized?
Answer 2: The exact opposite of what the hysterical MSM is howling about?
As the saying goes, this will not end well barring some deep introspection from the usual suspects, though what are the chances of this happening?)….
One searches desperately for some sobriety and honesty (like a ship-wrecked person desperately grasping at any available flotsam), here’s something most interesting, IF true… FWIW:
https://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/trump-in-helsinki-the-score-i/
I don’t see any reason why I would believe Trump’s correction other than to pay him the courtesy of the benefit of the doubt.
Why *would* Putin have preferred a Trump presidency to a Hillary presidency? Hillary would clearly have been easier for him to manipulate, based on history…And it was quite clear that Trump would be much more pro-fracking than Hillary, and expanded US oil & gas production is a serious threat to the viability of the Russian economy.
Did Putin perhaps believe that Hillary was so unstable that she posed a serious threat of global nuclear war?
Or did he think that Trump was so unstable that he would wreck the US completely?
Or did he really not care who won and just want to spread maximum chaos and disruption in the US political environment?
Khrushchev, when deciding to put Soviet missiles in Cuba, said to his associates “Let’s throw a hedgehog down Uncle Sam’s pants”
I think the Trickster archetype is active in Russian intelligence.
(Trump, too, has much of the Trickster in him)
This furor will probably die down
no, it wont, they are not free to do that..
they are kind of under orders as a collective
even less so given they just compared it to pearl harbor and kristalnact… really! they did!!!
Why *would* Putin have preferred a Trump presidency to a Hillary presidency? Hillary would clearly have been easier for him to manipulate, based on history
heck no.
they want a thing they can foil and parasite off of
NOT a nother one of them – look how their games in china turned out for them… huge enemy on their border always overhanging waiting for a mistake..
last thing they both need is a state whose morals are like theirs!!!
I was skeptical of Trump’s walk-back from “would” to “wouldn’t” until I read that he approved the release of the Russians’ indictments BEFORE the Helsinki summit.
There’s no good reason why he would have the indictments publicly announced then publicly contradict them.
Neo — Exactly! This is standard Talmudic argument: “On the one hand, Hillel says this, and on the other hand, Shammai says that. Let’s see the proof.”
Since the Left knows the evidence will never be produced, they are perfectly happy to pretend Trump’s being skeptical without any evidence being produced means he’s favoring Putin.