Truths to Facts and Back Again

"Once again we've seen the truth that terrorists can attack in any time at any place using any technique and it is physically impossible to defend in every place against every conceivable technique at any time of the day or night. That fact is a truth. And that truth drives us to the mission that you're on."

I was amazed to hear Donald Rumsfeld deliver this line to some troops in Iraq on Christmas Eve, as reported on NPR. Today, I finally had time to look for the quote on the net, expecting to read many comments on this tortuous logic, but found only one (ONLY ONE!) reference to it online. (My heartfelt congratulations to Markos Moulitsas Zúniga for wonderful blogging). I challenge you to Google anything and find ONLY ONE reference to it online.

I will leave you to judge the content of what Rumsfeld actually said. (Is the impossibility of the task the truth to which he refers? A truth, indeed, that is a fact that is, in turn, a truth that drives the mission that is impossible...And that's a fact!) But look at the philosophical content: "That fact is a truth." Are some facts not truth? Not true? What is a fact, then? And, of course, the obligatory followup question, as Pilate is said to have asked Jesus, "What is truth?"

It's not just abstract and irritable criticism on my part (though I am not above that) when you consider how many facts this administration has ignored in the name of truth. And many of these "truths" are later re-packaged and handed to us as facts. And our journey down the rabbit hole continues...

In the words of Joe Friday, Dragnet philosopher, I'd be tempted to stop Rumsfeld and the rest of the gang from rhapsodizing on truth in favor of "just the facts."