Stupid Begets Stupid

I am reminded of a recurring argument that I used to have with my sister when we were little:

"You're stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid stupid stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid!"
"You're stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid stupid!"

Our vocabulary was limited in those days, but it didn't stop us from having disagreements.  At some point our mother would intervene, but all it took was one "stupid" to get us started the next time.  I don't know if I ever convinced my sister that she was indeed stupid, but I know that she never convinced me that I was.

Similarly, Uncle Ken has not yet convinced me that I was wrong about illegal immigrants voting in California.  I was indeed mistaken about Obama being a Muslim, but I thought I gave a reasonable explanation of how a guy could get the wrong idea about that.  I was not aware that 28 states had changed their laws about convicted felons voting, but I don't think that Uncle Ken was even aware that those laws had ever existed in the first place until I told him about them, so I'm calling that one a draw.

When Trump hears something that he doesn't like, he calls it fake news.  When Uncle Ken hears something that he doesn't like, he says that it must have come from Trump.  Me, I try to take all that stuff with a grain of salt.  Most stories have some truth in them, but not as much as some people think. I like to track them down, separate the truth from the falsehood, and speculate about where the falsehood might have come from.  Some of the myths I have tracked down are hundreds of years old, so I doubt that all falsehood comes from Donald Trump.