Ben Carson Lied About Being Named Most Honest Student

[M.G.]

Even by political standards, this is surreal.

A Wall Street Journal article notes that Ben Carson apparently claimed to have been named "most honest student" by a professor of a Yale class that never existed.

“The professor came toward me. With her was a photographer for the Yale Daily News who paused and snapped my picture,” Mr. Carson wrote. “ ‘A hoax,’ the teacher said. ‘We wanted to see who was the most honest student in the class.’ ” Mr. Carson wrote that the professor handed him a $10 bill.

No photo identifying Mr. Carson as a student ever ran, according to the Yale Daily News archives, and no stories from that era mention a class called Perceptions 301. Yale Librarian Claryn Spies said Friday there was no psychology course by that name or class number during any of Mr. Carson’s years at Yale."


http://www.wsj.com/articles/ben-carsons-past-faces-deeper-questions-1446861864

[randys1]

1. He is the perfect rw candidate. That he is Black allows those tens of millions of white racists

to pretend they arent, when they are vicious racists.

[tblue37]

39. He is Tommy Flanagan's brother by another mother.

Yeah, that's the ticket!

https://screen.yahoo.com/jon-lovitz-tommy-flanagan-oliver-000000619.html

[Olami]

2. Whao, Great

this is excellent though

[HassleCat]

3. He's obviously unbalanced

The only person who could get away with that was Reagan.

[immoderate]

14. THAT...

is astute!

What is it about Reagan that was so magic? And why do Republicans think it rubs onto them?

--imm

[HassleCat]

19. Reagan was an actor

He was trained to tell a fictional story and make people believe it was true. He was careful to tell moralistic tales, almost the way Jesus told parables. We realize Jesus invented his parables, that thy weren't literally true. We allowed Reagan to do the same thing, perhaps because so many people regarded him as a deity. Anyway, he was a good story teller, and his stories should have been true. So, when he told us how he felt when he helped liberate a Nazi concentration camp, we thought that was an accurate reflection of the emotions of the people who really were there, or the emotions they should have had. He was no good at telling us the truth, so he told us what we wanted to hear. Other Republicans think they can do the same thing, but they didn't host Death Valley Days, did they?

[M.G.]

21. I'm not sure Reagan's Presidency would fly today

Honestly, I'm not sure Reagan's Presidency could work in today's political environment.

Apart from having governed in a slightly less partisan time which afforded Reagan the luxury of appointing the occasional moderate without raising the ire of his base, a lot of his sillier howlers might well have been lethal blunders in the age of internet media.

[HassleCat]

23. Not with the religious right

It took them a while, but they realized they were duped by Reagan.

[Lionel Mandrake]

47. Speaking of Death Valley Days ...

This is my favorite portrait of the Great Communicator:

?w=640

[3catwoman3]

30. Whatever is was, it didn't...

...work on me. Total "bonzo."

[Scuba]

4. ...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1251&pid=777605

[Chemisse]

5. That one was locked (in the wrong forum).

[riversedge]

6. And in the process he makes up a new class--that did not happen. Web of lies.

.....No photo identifying Mr. Carson as a student ever ran, according to the Yale Daily News archives, and no stories from that era mention a class called Perceptions 301. Yale Librarian Claryn Spies said Friday there was no psychology course by that name or class number during any of Mr. Carson’s years at Yale."

[Chemisse]

7. Damn! Can't get into the article without a subscription.

But from what we can see here: Wow! Carson has dug a pretty deep hole for himself.

[M.G.]

8. Same info in another link

Here's the same info carried in another link:


http://gawker.com/ultimate-trickster-ben-carson-claims-he-was-named-most-1741171913

This really makes Carson look like a fool. Spread it far and wide!

[Glimmer of Hope]

9. Hahahaha. Why would he make up something like this? Because he isn't so honest?

[M.G.]

11. Fibbing as a life strategy

He probably fibbed his way through much of life.

If you never get called on it, it's a potentially effective career advancement strategy.

[tblue37]

38. Before he decided to run for president, no one ever had a reason to look for chinks in the "hero's"

glowing armor, but by becoming a candidate, he has provoked a careful examination of his self-aggrandizing tales.

[yellowcanine]

10. Another hatchet job on Ben Carson by that know lefty rag, the WSJ!

[bklyncowgirl]

12. The WSJ, Rubpert Murdoch's paper, not the Liberal Media going after him now.

I had a feeling this was coming. No way the Republican elite were going to let the yokels nominate the likes of Ben Carson--good god, he actually believes in that religious stuff.

It'll be interesting to see who wins the Fundie vote if Carson drops out. My guess is Cruz but if he can't be controlled they'll find a way to make them settle for Rubio or better yet, Bush.

[M.G.]

13. Keep your clowns in media, not in office.

He's certainly a clown (albeit an accomplished one.)

I think you're probably right; the GOP's big donors may be happy with clown spokesmen on the radio and such, but I doubt they want them anywhere near the White House.

[tabasco]

37. There is no such thing as the "liberal media"

The mass media are owned by right wing fascist billionaires.

[jpak]

15. It's OK to lie - God will forgive you

again and again and again.

see?

[Hepburn]

16. He's nuts.

I am wondering if he really has a medical license.

[Rex]

17. Carson is a pathological liar, that is becoming very apparent.

Which makes him a prime candidate for the GOP.

[M.G.]

18. Carson reminds me of Stephen Glass

Carson reminds me of Stephen Glass, a "journalist" for the New Republic who was caught fabricating, well, essentially everything he ever wrote. Later investigation found he had been doing this since his days in college journalism.

Fact-checking is not really a given in many arenas, and if you manage to avoid getting caught, fibbing your way to the top can be a pretty good life strategy.

Sad thing is that Carson has a legitimately compelling biography and never had to lie to be role model.

[Rex]

20. Sad thing is he cannot stop himself from lying now.

It has wormed into his very being as a character trait now. How sad for him. How sad for us if he gets into the WH.

[louis-t]

24. He's beginning to lie about his lying.

Pathetic.

[Rex]

26. That is why I think he is pathological by now.

This won't end well at all for him. Yet, he can go back to his mansion and stroke his awards and fake trophies. Which is fine...anything but the WH.

[Skittles]

34. he lies in an effort to build himself up

meaning his actual accomplishments just were not enough - that's the sign of someone who is mentally unbalanced

[Botany]

22. Too sweet!

<Yale Librarian Claryn Spies said Friday there was no psychology course by
that name or class number during any of Mr. Carson’s years at Yale.>

Maybe this happened at West Point after he tried to kill his mother w/a
claw hammer because she was stealing food from the pyramids that was
supposed to be used by the Biblical Joseph to feed the pilots of the UFOs.

[M.G.]

25. Those UFO's

Honestly, I thought it was a lot weirder that Carson thinks many "scientists" believe aliens built the pyramids than that they fit into some kind of Biblical myth. The latter is standard fundamentalist silliness of the sort one encounters all the time in religious Christian circles. The former may be no more nonsensical, but I have no idea how an educated physician could come to believe it.

[Botany]

27. I think the technical for Dr. Carson is Bat Shit Crazy.

[Blanks]

33. No, he didn't mean 'many'...

He meant 'mini'. Little tiny scientists believe that aliens built the pyramids.

[M.G.]

28. Unbelievable! More Carson Lies.

Apparently, Carson seems to fabricated protecting White Students from a racially motivated mob angered by Martin Luther King's assassination.

"Ben Carson’s classmates and a teacher from Southwestern High in Detroit told the Wall Street Journal they can’t confirm or verify yet another story from Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson.

Carson told the conservative paper – whose editorial department was the first to encourage him to run for President – that in 1968, on the day after Martin Luther King Jr. was killed, he protected white students from attacks from angry black students.

It is a dramatic account of courage and kindness, and it couldn’t be confirmed in interviews with a half-dozen of Mr. Carson’s classmates and his high school physics teacher. The students all remembered the riot. None recalled hearing about white students hiding in the biology lab, and Mr. Carson couldn’t remember any names of those he sheltered.

“It may have happened, but I didn’t see it myself or hear about it,” said Gregory Vartanian, a white classmate of Mr. Carson’s who served in the ROTC with Mr. Carson and is now a retired U.S. Marshal."


http://www.addictinginfo.org/2015/11/06/caught-again-two-more-ben-carson-stories-appear-to-be-made-up/

[Botany]

29. It gets worse ....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10027324618

[Sunlei]

31. fox should have spent more money and time training him, 2 million wasn't enough.

[Enrique]

32. I thought this was another gem from Borowitz

[Eric J in MN]

35. There was a religious aspect to Ben Carson's lie.

Last edited Sat Nov 7, 2015, 10:06 PM - Edit history (1)

Carson wrote about being penniless and walking to the Yale campus chapel hoping to find a $10 bill on the ground. Not finding one.

Then taking a difficult Psychology exam. So difficult that all the other students walked out without turning it in, planning to lie and say they didn't know about the exam and re-take it after studying more.

But Carson kept taking the exam and prayed, and then the professor said the difficult exam was a hoax (to determine the most honest student). She gave him a $10 bill for being the most honest.

[M.G.]

40. He's even a bigger fraud than I had thought

Last edited Sat Nov 7, 2015, 10:41 PM - Edit history (1)

Hadn't realized there was a religious component to Carson's lie. He's even a bigger fraud than the Wall Street Journal made him out to be.

He really could have been remembered as a genuine role model, whatever one's politics, but his success was pretty clearly built on a foundation of pure bulls---.

[DawgHouse]

43. Oh FFS. This guy is off the rails.

[tabasco]

36. It'll be news when it is discovered

that Carson told the truth once in his life.

[M.G.]

41. It gets weirder - the lie was based on a story from Yale's parody paper

It gets even weirder - Carson's lie was apparently based on a spoof story which appeared in Yale's parody newspaper. He re-imagined himself as protagonist of the spoof account.


http://m.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2015/11/ben-carsons-psychology-test-story-gets-even-weirder

[Eric J in MN]

46. Thanks I hadn't seen that.

I guess that drop of truth in his false story will be good enough for Republican primary voters. Which is fine if he gets the Republican nomination and loses the general election. But I hope he's not our next president. I'd prefer a President Jeb Bush to a President Ben Carson. I don't think the former would start WWIII, but I'm not sure about the latter.

[WinkyDink]

42. That's so Meta!

[LiberalElite]

44. I knew it was a lie particularly from the name

of the course. Perceptions 301? I'd call it: a/k/a BULLSHIT 101.

The rest of the story didn't pass the smell test either.

[B Calm]

45. Thou shalt not lie!