Trump's people aren't denying the content of the tapes, they're only griping that the tapes exist.

[Towlie]

They don't get that an ad hominem argument, while still a fallacy, might be effective against the word of an opponent but is worthless against evidence. You can't discredit evidence based upon who offers it or how it was obtained unless you argue that it's fake, and so far I don't think anyone is making that claim.

So who cares what sort of person Omarosa is or what rules she broke? I don't. What matters is what's on those tapes. Anything else is...

[Arkansas Granny]

1. A very good point to remember.

[yallerdawg]

2. She did make a brilliant move!

If she has a recording - and no one knows what she has recorded - how can you credibly call her a liar if she has you on tape?

Which means - if they don't call her a liar, it must be true!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Exactly. There's a lot of kerfuffle about taping a conversation

inside the situation room, which obviously shouldn't have happened, and that security breach should be looked into. But what was ON the tape is important because it sounds like Kelly was threatening her: Go quietly, or else...

[unblock]

4. they're not trying to advance an intellectual argument.

they're playing an entirely different game.

for them, it's all about tribalism.

remember, if a liberal says that the sun rises in the east and donnie says no, fake news, it rises in the west and only i can make the sun come up, then their brainwashed followers will go about reciting how the sun rises in the west and donnie's the one who brings us the day and angrily denouncing the liberal for lying.


they don't believe in an objective truth. they believe in tribalism and angrily insisting that whatever their leaders claim to be so in, in fact, so. because that's what their role is in the tribe, to enforce what their leader say is so. with violence if necessary.


in this case, the only thing they care about is that omarosa is officially an outcast from the tribe. the enforcers will now drag her through the mud as a message to anyone else in the tribe who might be thinking about crossing them.

that's *all* they care about regarding omarosa.

[forgotmylogin]

5. TU QUOQUE (aka "whataboutism")

I had to look this up because I am tired of hearing rightards argue "well you were okay when Obama did it..."

Tu quoque: Latin for "you also" or the appeal to hypocrisy is an informal fallacy that intends to discredit the opponent's argument by asserting the opponent's failure to act consistently in accordance with its conclusion(s).

It applies better to the immigration issue "Obama did the same thing and nobody complained"... but it also applies here, though is closer to ad hominem. They are outraged nee shocked that anyone might have the audacity to tape them to potentially catch them in an illegal activity. Especially when Trump has bluffed previously claiming he "has tapes".

In any case, ad-hominem and tu quoque are both logical fallacies that do not win an argument.

[Corgigal]

6. and he hired her,

which telling about his judgment. He can't throw that under the bus because he's responsible for that person having access to him to begin with. What a fool. He should have known she would tape him, because I'm sure he bragged to her how much he taped others.