Spin. I sure wish they'd start calling it what it is. Lying. Plain and simple
Lying about something to make it seem better.
It's like they are telling us (the little kids) that liquid medicine tastes real good, yum yum.
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You say certain things in a certain context.
You lead the listener to assume relevancy, to assume that all the information is there, that the words mean not what you want them to mean but what the listener wants them to mean.
They take away a falsehood. You've led them to it, tickled them to open their mouths, and held their hands as they spooned it in. But you don't actually lie.
This is much worse than a lie, because the listener is deeply invested in protecting and defending the false conclusions and inferences that they drew. It's a kind of con, and the first rule is to make the mark committed to and a collaborator in his own deception.
One trick that stands out was common: "This stimulus will create up to 3 million jobs according to ..."; then you check, and the agency says "300 000 to 3 million, with 900 000 being the most likely outcome based on certain assumptions." You look at the assumptions and you find that they're not quite realistic--it assumes a specific multiplier on top of certain other legislation's being passed and economic growth being at a certain, unrealistic level. Now, is the "3 million" claim false? No. Neither is it the whole truth. And when the claim fails to be realized, excuses are made why the prophecy failed but the prophet is still a true prophet. Notice--claims are a bit different from proposition-based communication, but still constitute spin.
Bad spin doesn't quite work. You distrust too much to buy into and commit to furthering your own deception. You look at it, see the violation of the typical principles that underlie communication and shake your head. Critical thinking aimed at stuff you don't want to believe or said by somebody you don't want to trust is common place, trite, easy. It's purpose then is to find what is true in what's said to properly evaluate it. But critical thinking shines when it's directed against stuff we want to believe and those we trust, because then it's going to find the untruth and the errors. Then we're back to finding out what is true in order to properly evaluate it. Partisans can't let critical thinking shine. They're believers going to catechism. If you're Orthodox Jewish and taking your kid to bar mitzvah, you react differently than if you're Southern Baptist and your kid's visiting a bar mitzvah class with his friend. Same if you're a Mormon and your kid's tagging along with a friend to Catholic catechism class.
Spin is what all lawyers, politicians, and used car salesmen do. I don't care if you're (D) or (R) or (I), you do it. The truth is complicated; stripping away all the irrelevancies that you don't want people to focus on makes it easier, and you get them to accept "your truth". Except there is no "your truth" or "my truth." That's just partial, spun truth. Obama did it. Bush II did it. Clinton did it. So did Gore. And Bush I. And Reagan. And Carter, Ford, Johnson, gaggles of Kennedys, etc., etc. We just lapped up Obama's spin and piss on Trump's. Well, no. I don't like spin on principle, and listened to Obama with the same partisan spirit I listen to Trump, which is to say, none at all. Now, truth may be incomplete because we lack information through negligence or human frailty, but that's a failing, not a feature. Omitting relevant facts is as close as I can conceive to committing secular blasphemy because it undermines the very basis on which secular, rational thought has to rely. (Either way, religion or rationalism, you have to place truth as the highest value. Now, even among scientists belief matters--many scientists work for years finding the evidence to demolish a hypothesis they believe wrong to leave only the hypothesis they believe true standing. That's still faith. But secular faith. But secular faith still doesn't allow omission of what are still likely facts and the spreading of untrue "facts."
