But he promised me. -- I understood the point of his statement. It was a stupid statement because in fact it's not enough to "truly" want something -- it's h

But he promised me. -- I understood the point of his statement. It was a stupid statement because in fact it's not enough to "truly" want something -- it's helpful but not enough. It was an insulting statement because it sets him up to tell anyone who fails that they didn't truly want it. There's little more offensive than someone telling someone else that he knows their mind better than they do. But the thing that I was really objecting to wasn't the insult or the stupidity, it was the rhetorical flourish of "promising." As obviously he has nothing on the line here, and if anyone was dumb enough to believe him, and they failed, he'd be out exactly nothing.