Donald Trump lies, James Comey lies, Hillary Clinton lies, Kellyanne Conway lies, Chuck Schumer lies, Paul Ryan lies, Nancy Pelosi lies. It is safe to say that most, if not all politicians lie. But there are white lies. There are black lies ... and 50 shades of grey in between. The seriousness of these transgressions depends a lot on their motivation and consequences. James Comey's lie about the possible number of Clinton e-mails on Anthony Weiner's computer had a lot to do with her losing the election. Donald Trump's promise that Mexico will pay for the wall may turn out to be a stretch ... but many American people treat it as hyperbole. These lies are at opposite ends of the mendacity spectrum.
And, of course, the media can point out (repeatedly) some untruths while ignoring others ... which they too frequently do. And the media often lie also ... to me, an unforgivable sin. These indiscretions they see as their sacred duty and protected by the Constitution. Perhaps President Trump lies more than most (just watch Joe and Mika play and replay this theme every morning) ... however he is doing most of the things his voters want him to do. And so they tune out a lot of the media's drumbeat of criticism. And this causes them to increase the tempo and volume.
But Trump has appointed Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, rolled back countless crippling regulations, stopped the flood of illegal migrants, dumped the Paris climate accord, faced head-on the North Korean nuclear threat, refriended Israel, and is struggling mightily to fix healthcare, the tax code and our infrastructure. As a consequence, many Americans (including me) are willing to view Trump's lies to be the lighter shades of grey.
5 comments:
I have a new theory about Trump and his lies. (George, you may want to Blog this) I think he dreams things like: “The boy scout president said my speech was the best one ever” “I had the biggest crowd at my inauguration ever”, etc. and when he wakes up he can’t distinguish between reality and his dreams. So he is not really lying; he actually believes his dreams are real.
. . ." he is doing most of the things his voters want him to do." Ha ha ha. Where is the wall? Who is going to pay (check text of phone calls with Mexican Prez)? The reduced "flood" of immigrant labor that our farmers rely on threatens the strawberry crop. North Korea nuclear threat more threatening than ever. Fix healthcare? he never even read the proposal, and he lost big time. His tax proposals do not benefit anyone who is not in the top 10%. He takes credit for lower unemployment and record wall street numbers that were "fake news" when he was a candidate. The world and a growing number of Americans agree that his administration is a (bad) joke. And Mueller has a grand jury looking at the "nothingburger." You can keep on drinking that kool aid, but for most of us, facts are stubborn. I predict that Trump will agree to resign before New Years 2018 and Pence will immediately pardon him and his family.
As Mark Twain once said, "History does't repeat itself, but it rhymes." You are counting on it repeating itself. See my latest blog "coup d'Etat". By the bye, the Commie head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, who was fudging the data, was replaced on day one of the Trump term.
I missed the report where the new guy re-cast the historical "fake" stats to show how disastrous the Obama years actually were.
As I recall, the BLS data was just fictionalized right before elections ...
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