Show me a politician who has never told a blatant lie and I’ll show you a miracle in full-blooming glory.
Politicians, after all, are mere mortals, though some act like shining gods or strutting emperors – Donald Trump for one. Never in my long life have I witnessed such a fib-flinger as Trump, who not only gets away with his mendacious claims but who flourishes on his whoppers. And to his diehard fans, the bigger the lie the better they like it.
A couple of weeks ago, The Donald delivered a speech (if you want to call it that) about Hillary Clinton. In fact, it more resembled a long, rambling verbal character-assassination attempt woven from a litany of lies.
He claimed Hillary was sound asleep in her bed when Chris Stevens, U.S. ambassador to Libya, was killed in Benghazi. Later, when he was questioned in a TV interview about his claim, with perfectly buoyant confidence, he said, oh well, Hillary “probably” was asleep, and then he said she “might” have been asleep, and then he conjured up the notion that – awake or not, in bed or not – she was “asleep” on her job as Secretary of State. As is typical with Trump, he tells a lie, then immediately repeats it two or three times, as if repeating a fib will somehow, through some verbal alchemy, turn the falsehood into the truth, an error into a fact. And I must admit, he’s a master at it. It has become an endearing facet of his “entertainment” value, especially to Trumpites who seem not to give a rip about pesky things called facts.
A team of reporters for USA Today recently did a revelatory exercise in detective work regarding Trump’s “Hillary Speech.” The reporters meticulously fact-checked every statement made by Trump, most of which were outlandishly incorrect, bloatedly exaggerated or – at best – slyly misleading.
Here are just some of them:
- He blamed Hillary for announcing the withdrawal from Iraq and thus “handing large parts of the country over to ISIS and the ISIS killers.” Wrong. It was George W. Bush who decided on the out-of-Iraq departure date, and Obama – not Hillary – adhered to that date.
- Trump claimed Hillary’s private server was hacked by foreign governments. There is no evidence whatsoever it happened.
- Trump blasted the North American Free Trade Agreement as “Bill Clinton’s disastrous and totally disastrous NAFTA.” Fact: Clinton signed the legislation, but the agreement was negotiated and signed by President George H.W. Bush.
- Hillary, claimed The Donald, “spent hundreds of billions of dollars to settle Middle Eastern refugees in the United States, on top of the current record level of immigration that we have.” Wrong. Yes, Hillary supports allowing as many as 65,000 Syrian refugees into the United States, but she has never said she would spend hundreds of billions. The current budget for Refugee and Entrant Assistance is $1.67 billion for this year.
- Trump claimed Hillary would “end virtually all immigration enforcement and thus create totally open borders for the United States.” That’s a blatant lie. Hillary has spoken in favor of a path to earning citizenship, but that would depend – she has insisted – on bolstering border security. Further, Hillary was a strong support of an immigration bill that would have funded enhanced border security, additional border fencing and the implementation of an E-Verity system, as well as an exit-visa system to put a stop to overstays on visas.
- Hillary, according to Trump, accepted $58,000 worth of jewelry from the Brunei government when she was Secretary of State. He conveniently forgot to mention the jewelry was accepted on behalf of the United States and was then immediately transferred to the General Services Administration, as diplomatic gifts have been throughout American history.
There are more whoppers in that speech, enough to fill many pages, as the USA Today story proved.
Trump calls Hillary a liar. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. Oh, and not to forget, he also claims Hillary is the most corrupt presidential candidate in American history. It’s yet another indication Donald must have been day-dreaming about towers or casinos in history class.
Trumpites justify his blustering falsehoods by claiming he might have gotten some facts wrong, yes, but the essence of his remarks is truthful, nonetheless. The trouble is, who wants a president who gets so many facts wrong so consistently, so constantly? Trump’s fantasy-land fabulism should be a warning sign to all voters a candidate without facts, and – worse, with so little regard for facts – should not be elected to lead this nation.
