We Need to Agree On a Set of Rules For Calling Something a Lie

Membership Thermometer

Mother Jones’ union co-chair Patrick Caldwell connects the dots: Facebook's decision to throttle our content cost Mother Jones at least $400,000—the same amount we had to cut from our payroll this year. Please read his post, and if you can, chip in to help us finish our fall fundraising drive strong and hit our big goal by Saturday's deadline.

$350,000

We still need to raise about 400,000

Let our journalists help you make sense of the noise: Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily newsletter and get a recap of news that matters.

CBS News today uses an increasingly common description of a Trump falsehood:

Citing no evidence, Pres. Trump claims at address to troops that news outlets are not reporting terror attacks https://t.co/4KSzwmArQc pic.twitter.com/9Uf1gA8kjN

— CBS News (@CBSNews) February 6, 2017

Barton Gellman is not impressed:

You can’t go with “citing no evidence” here. It’s not as if there might be. Tens of thousands of stories prove this a preposterous lie. https://t.co/P57AdMxGE2

— Barton Gellman (@bartongellman) February 6, 2017

So here’s a good question: If someone says something with no evidence, is it a lie? Please don’t try to evade the question with a knowing reference to On Bullshit, either. Let’s assume—because I’m a charitable guy—that Trump isn’t affirmatively aware that there are no terrorist attacks that the media has ignored, and is deliberately saying the opposite. Let’s assume, instead, that he just doesn’t know, and said it because it sounded good.

Is that a lie?