The legitimacy filter

Article

The Crisis and the Truth

Summary

The Weekly Standard's editors believe we have a national crisis in Pres. Trump's accusation that he was illegally surveilled by Pres. Obama's administration.

Quote

"It is an institutional and perhaps constitutional crisis when the president of the United States accuses his predecessor of illegally wiretapping him as a candidate--a wiretapping presumably carried out by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, still headed by the director accused by the president of wiretapping him."

Understanding

Dueling conspiracy theories are racing at the speed of tweeting for legitimacy. The liberal narrative is that Pres. Trump wants to distract us from Russian influence on his administration.  Conservatives claim that the wiretapping accusation itself, even without evidence, is sufficient to warrant investigation.

The Weekly Standard's call for transparency is noble and appropriate, but I wonder what evidence any of us will accept that might alter our preconceptions?

We often prefer our opinions to the truth. Once we set our minds on a belief we filter out facts that challenge our mindset and collect data that reinforces our preferred concept.

We are like competing tribes who share the same land but a different language, and each of us is building a wall, tweet by tweet, claim by claim, stone by stone, to protect our enclave.