Jumping to conclusions

When Canada's transport minister decided to name his cat Thatcher, he likely never thought it would cause quite the stir it did during a gala dinner earlier this week.
During a tribute to Canada's military in Toronto, some 1,700 luminaries, including Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, were in the middle of dinner Tuesday night when smart phones throughout the room began to buzz with the news: "Lady Thatcher has passed away."
Dinner chatter abruptly veered to expressions of shock and reminiscences of Margaret Thatcher, the 84-year-old former British prime minister, as news of her apparent passing spread like wildfire.
Harper's aide Dimitri Soudas,.. was dispatched to confirm the news and start preparing an official statement.
Soudas immediately e-mailed his contacts....They had no idea what he was talking about.
Lady Thatcher, they informed an embarrassed Soudas, was still very much alive.
About 20 minutes after the rumor mill started churning, a corrective e-mail message began to circulate among the diners at the hall.
Turns out it was Transport Minister John Baird's beloved 16-year-old cat, whom he'd named Thatcher out of admiration for one of his political heroes, who had ceased to be.
Soudas is said to have quipped since: "If the cat wasn't dead, I'd have killed it by now." http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/pets/2009/11/14/2009-11-14_thatcher_the_cat_died__not_britains_former_prime_minister_margaret_thatcher.html#ixzz0Wr8JjtSB

The following is part of an email I received from the Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation.

We have learned that if someone says, “This isn’t loshon hora. I would say it right in front of him!” the Torah still classifies the statement as loshon hora and we are not permitted to believe it.
Now the Chofetz Chaim takes the case one step further. What if the speaker actually does say the loshon hora in front of the other person? For example, Reuven says in Shimon’s presence, “I saw with my own eyes how Shimon cheated on yesterday’s exam.” Shimon responds with silence. Can we interpret his silence as admission of guilt?
The Chofetz Chaim says that we cannot surmise that the information is true, because there can be a host of reasons why Shimon would stay quiet in such a situation, even if the information were not true. For example, Shimon might reason that people are more likely to believe Reuven’s words which were said about him in his presence, than to believe his denial. Or, he might be silent simply because he wants to avoid conflict.
The Chofetz Chaim suggests that the person may have chosen to be counted among the “those who suffer insult.” He is alluding to an important Talmudic teaching (Shabbos 88b):
“Those who suffer insult but do not insult (in response), who hear their disgrace but do not reply, who perform (God’s will) out of love and are happy in suffering, regarding them the verse states ‘But they who love Him (God) shall be as the sun going forth in its might’ ” (Shoftim 5:31). As the commentators explain, this means that those who bear insult in silence will not be diminished because of this1, while their antagonists will be humbled in the end.
The Torah demands that we never jump to conclusions, even when matters seem as clear as day. The case of one who is silent in the face of insult is an excellent illustration of this truth.