Say What?

April 20, 2008 1:33 PM

From Radio 4's Broadcasting House: The Donald Rumsfeld Soundbites of the Decade. A collection of statements we do now know we know.
posted by forallmankind (16 comments total)

I'm afraid it's an old, but fun double:

As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know.

"The Unknown", D. Rumsfeld, Feb. 12, 2002, Department of Defense news briefing
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 1:48 PM on April 20, 2008 [2 favorites]

oh Rummy, I knew I wouldn't miss you.
posted by auralcoral at 1:57 PM on April 20, 2008

Speaking of Rummy: Pentagon institute calls Iraq war 'a major debacle' with outcome 'in doubt'

"The report lays much of the blame for what went wrong in Iraq after the initial U.S. victory at the feet of then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld."
posted by homunculus at 2:16 PM on April 20, 2008

A 2003 article from The Independent with some more soundbites, including my own personal favorite:

"Your questions have about eight or ten opinions in them, I notice."

Oh, memory lane....
posted by forallmankind at 3:21 PM on April 20, 2008

My fave was the Osama one. They're sure he's in Afghanistan or some other country or dead. Fuck, I knew that and I didn't spend a dime on intelligence!
posted by dobbs at 4:24 PM on April 20, 2008

The "unknowns" quote has been unfairly maligned in my opinion. It actually does make sense, it's just a complicated point that was lost on the media.
posted by bookish at 6:09 PM on April 20, 2008

it's just a complicated point that was lost on the media

On the contrary, it's a complicated way of saying something totally obvious that furthered our situation not one whit.
posted by lumpenprole at 6:36 PM on April 20, 2008

> it's a complicated way of saying something totally obvious

It's not enough to know things -- it's important to understand the ramifications of what you don't know (for example, you may benefit from knowing how many guns are in the room, but you will definitely want to know if any are pointed at you). It's one of the few times he said something with a respectable point, but in his usual ungainly way.

This is in the context of a history of public speaking in which Rumsfeld declares that Weapons of Mass Destruction as being somewhere to the north, south, east, or west, and a declaration that Osama Bin Laden is known to be either alive or dead. It is a fool's wisdom, sounding like another poor attempt at evading somebody's question.
posted by ardgedee at 7:06 PM on April 20, 2008

You people are awful

JUST LEAVE RUMMY ALONE

sniff
posted by mattoxic at 7:07 PM on April 20, 2008

Just for symmetry's sake, he should have touched on unknown knowns. I don't know what those would be. I'm guessing they're something to do with proprioception.
posted by penduluum at 7:28 PM on April 20, 2008

Here they are, penduluum.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 9:28 PM on April 20, 2008

The "unknowns" quote has been unfairly maligned in my opinion. It actually does make sense, it's just a complicated point that was lost on the media.
posted by bookish at 9:09 AM on April 21 [+] [!]

Yeah, actually it is reminiscent of a longer and deeper proverb attributed to the 8th century Arab philologist al-Khalil ibn Ahmad about the four kinds of me that I translate as follows:

1. The man who knows and he knows that he knows: This is the Scholar, so follow him.
2. The man who knows but he does not know that he knows: This is the Forgetful One, so wake him.
3. The man who does not know, and he knows that he does not know: This is the Seeker, so guide him.
4. The man who does not know, but he does not know that he does not know: This is the Ignoramus, so leave him.




I don't know whether to be impressed with Rummy for coming up with it or disgusted with him for deploying it as CYA.
posted by BinGregory at 12:10 AM on April 21, 2008 [1 favorite]

Oh lord: the four kinds of men
posted by BinGregory at 12:10 AM on April 21, 2008

Actually the true origin of many of Rumsfeld's odd phrases may be with Landmark Education aka the Forum, originally named est, founded by noted wack-job Werner Erhard. Turns out there may be a Bush cult after all, just not the one everybody expected.
posted by scalefree at 9:28 AM on April 21, 2008

In March 2003, Rumsfeld engaged in a little bit of amateur philosophizing about the relationship between the known and the unknown: "There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know." What he forgot to add was the crucial fourth term: the "unknown knowns," the things we don't know that we know-which is precisely, the Freudian unconscious, the "knowledge which doesn't know itself," as Lacan used to say.

If Rumsfeld thinks that the main dangers in the confrontation with Iraq were the "unknown unknowns," that is, the threats from Saddam whose nature we cannot even suspect, then the Abu Ghraib scandal shows that the main dangers lie in the "unknown knowns" - the disavowed beliefs, suppositions and obscene practices we pretend not to know about, even though they form the background of our public values.

Thus, Bush was wrong. What we get when we see the photos of humiliated Iraqi prisoners is precisely a direct insight into "American values," into the core of an obscene enjoyment that sustains the American way of life.

(What Rumsfeld Doesn't Know...)
posted by stammer at 11:43 AM on April 21, 2008

Kinds of men...?
1. Lost drunken men who don't know where they are and no longer care.
2. Lost drunken men who don't know where they are, but do care.
3. Men who know where they are and care, but don't drink.
posted by Hal Mumkin at 4:08 PM on April 21, 2008 [1 favorite]