We Have A President Who Will Lie At The Drop Of A Hat
President* Trump realizes that he wants X to be the case, but the reality on the ground is Y. What does someone like Donald Trump do when reality does not agree with his desires? He tries to create his own reality. I would suggest a large portion of his 12,000 lies and misstatements come from his inability to accept the details of reality. He loses a state like New Hampshire to Hillary Clinton? The remedy is to invent an alternate history where it was stolen from him. When New Hampshire officials responsible for policing the voting in that state tell him that everything was proper with the results, Trump eventually doubles down on his accusation. This is where his 12,000 lies accumulate, he repeats fragments of false reality numerous times, in many cases.
Most Americans, the 65 or 70 percent of the population who do not believe Trump tells the truth, often hear the president of the United States say something and have no way of knowing whether Trump's words align with the reality of the situation. On the face of it would seem like an important problem that needs to be corrected by Trump and his aides and advisers, but in practice everyone involved just denies it is an issue.
The Week magazine had an example this morning
On Monday morning, President Trump told reporters in Biarritz, France, that " China called last night " and said they want to resume trade talks , later elaborating that two "high-level" Chinese officials had called to try and restart stalled negotiations. He turned to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin for backup, and Mnuchin said there had been "communication," later amending it to "communications."
Well, "aides privately conceded the phone calls Trump described didn't happen they way he said they did," CNN reported Wednesday . "Instead, two officials said Trump was eager to project optimism that might boost markets, and conflated comments from China's vice premier with direct communication from the Chinese."
Trump is agitated, CNN reports , because "the economy is flashing warning signs Trump didn't expect, his trade war with China is dragging on months longer than expected yet he refuses to give in," and he's "spinning to find victories to sell to voters." The voters may be fooled — China apparently isn't . Peter Weber
Reality was that the stock market was struggling because of Trump's trade war with China, and it was a reality that Trump did not want to accept. So he made up a "phone call" from China which purportedly signaled hope for negotiations. Trump lies so much that surely he didnt blink an eye when he fabricated the "phone call".
Unfortunately both for Trump's re-election prospects, and for the American people, no one ever knows if Trump is telling the truth or lying about any given topic or instance. It's basically a coin toss.
The sad part is that his base completely accepts this situation.
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There is another example this morning as well. The president* is lying about having made statements to the effect that he will pardon aides who break the law by seizing private land at the southern border in order to build "the wall".
How are his aides supposed to seize that land? Just walk on it, plant a flag, and declare "It's mine!"?
In all honesty? That's pretty much what would happen.
I wonder how my neighbor would feel if I put caution tape around his pond and declared it mine?
In Trump's mind? Yes...
Probably not well.. LOL
In reality the government would cut a check for the property, (which would be far below market value), and essentially tell the owner to go pound sand.
I thought that when the government condemned a property under Eminent Domain they had to give you fair market value for it?
Of course, with that SCOTUS hearing about that thing in Conneticut (?), who knows now? (I can't remember the name of that case where the local gov't condemned a property because of civic value or some such nonsense)
They do. And they would.
When you hear the word "seize", consider the source.
Who determines the "fair market value"?
The real estate market? I dunno
This has happened to several of my clients.
Usually, they make you an offer. You think it's worth more than they offer. They counter offer. You counter offer. You still disagree so you end up in arbitration where you get pretty close to what you wanted to begin with.
I don't know either. But anyone want to bet that it eventually comes down to the government determining "fair market value"?
Water wars in the old West saw many improvements in ranch rifles.
He lies and then doubles down on the lies
He wins and will double down on that with re election next year.
"Another totally Fake story in the Amazon Washington Post (lobbyist) which states that if my Aides broke the law to build the Wall (which is going up rapidly), I would give them a Pardon. This was made up by the Washington Post only in order to demean and disparage - FAKE NEWS!" Trump tweeted.
Yawwwnnnnn - guess we can all go back to sleep now that this "new" story has been posted, eh? Since it's only a commentary, what's new?
However, the bias of The Week's commentary section clearly leans left overall. The Week's news portion is much more easily found in its print magazine than online. In addition, The Week's homepage features mostly commentary, giving its homepage a Lean Left bent.
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Those 2 sentences say more about you than I cared to know
Remember when trump said the stormy daniels thing was fake news? If trump says it's fake news, it's likely true.
"A White House official hadn't denied Trump's pardon offers to the Post, saying only that Trump was joking, and a senior administration official told the Times the same thing, insisting that when Trump offers pardons or asks aides to break the law, "he winks when he does it."
We are stuck with a sad, fat half-wit mob boss who thinks he can pretend to be joking anytime he gets in trouble for suggesting completely illegal actions to his aides. We know from the Mueller report that he did try to get several of his staff to lie and to fire those investigating him.
It seems the bar for his supporters is that if he lies in public it's no big deal because they see the lies as inconsequential, and if he lies or makes comments that are consequential then it was just a joke.
"Sure, I joked about having that lying snitch Smitty killed, but I never told anyone to go do it... And just because Smitty washed up on the Jersey shore wearing concrete boots doesn't mean I had anything to do with it. And besides, even if I did have something to do with it, Smitty was a piece of shit, hired muscle, nothing but a thug, but I didn't ask anyone to get rid of him, that's just a bunch of fake news...".
Good comment.
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Great post. I absolutely loved your linked source and highly recommend it.
"I hereby order all companies to stop doing business with China!!!!'
'take the land' and 'get it done,'
.
Trump is a fascist and a wannabe dictator.
The outrage from the right would be a gallows in the street if a democrat had said something like that.
I think it is fair to say that "conservatives" have lowered their standards for presidential honesty over the past three years.
Lowered? More like threw it out the window.
What standards?
Well we all know that many Trumps critics if they didn’t double standards wouldn’t have any at all.
You know we really should hold elections so Trump can be voted out of office. Oh wait, we do.
It is really funny that the left is focusing so hard on Trump; when it should be concentrating on their candidates- all 20 some odd of them- running for President. They need to get the word on how their candidates differ from one another on the main issues. Unfortunately all they have is an insane exploding clown car of candidates running ever further left. Anyone outside of the hard left that stops and looks at their agenda is turned off.
So it will be Trump 24/7 up to election night. The Democrats only hope is to make Trump look so bad that everyone will ignore their candidates agenda.
Democrats don't have to bother making Trump look bad, he does that all on his own.
They might consider explaining how they would be better.
Doubling my taxes so they can take away my healthcare is not actually "better".
They love to take from some and give to others.
"Today's level (of uninsured) is the highest in more than four years, and well above the low point of 10.9 percent reached in 2016," the report said. "The 2.8-percentage-point increase since that low represents a net increase of about seven million adults without health insurance."
"Trump likes to claim that everything he does is the largest by any President. He is going to get his “wish” with the budget deficit since they are on course to be the biggest in an expanding economy. Between the 2018 tax cuts and the increase in spending for 2020 and 2021 it will push the accumulated deficits to be the largest ever over a four-year timeframe ."
Considering Trump is the one kicking millions off their health insurance and doubling deficit spending I guess you won't be casting your vote for him in 2020.
Interesting what happens when you give people the freedom to make their own decisions.
AOC is telling us that deficits don't matter when it comes to her Green New Deal. So do they matter or not? Will you be voting for the candidate least likely to balloon the deficit? That would rule out Bernie, Warren, Harris and several others. So...Biden?
Riiiight. Because "not forcing you to buy" something is ...in some universe somewhere...the same as "kicking you off". So "not forcing you to buy" a Mercedes is the same as "kicking you out" of your Mercedes. Riiiiight. That's not totally batshit or anything.
Actually, you have to pay either way and the ACA was based on participation, blame the people that refused to sign up for the ACA not dropping to that fabled $2,500.00 a year.
Old System: Poor person goes to the ER, (because they have no ins.), which usually runs 3-4 thousand dollars a visit regardless of the reason. Poor person cannot pay so the hospital eats part of it and the rest is written off, which is picked up by the taxpayers.
ACA: Poor person now has insurance and they can go to a doctors office which is going to run ~$150.00. They still cannot pay for it, but, it's only $150.00 instead of 3-4 thousand dollars.
Summary? Either way, no matter what happens, you WILL be helping pay their medical bills, the only question is, what would you rather have to cover?
$150.00 or;
$3-4,000.00?
Judging by the right wing's reaction, they are much happier paying far more money to help people with their medical bills. "Genius"...
I wasn't referring to the ACA.
All your points above are well made and right on.
There is an old saying.
"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, then baffle them with bullshit." Trump baffles the world 24/7.
We have a president who thinks he should be given special treatment. Once again acting like a fucking dictator.....what a fucking disgrace
Trump suggests he should have extra time as president, in rant over ‘dishonest fool’ Comey’s leaks
We are going to give him that extra time as in 4 more years..
Did you consult your crystal ball?
More time to run up the debt? He said he would pay off the debt in 4 years and in 3 he has ADDED just short of three trillion. He lied. And where is that wonderful healthcare for all that trump was pushing? Nothing new? He lied. Tax breaks for the middle class? Lie. 10% tax cuts for the middle class that he announced days before the midterms? Where are they? Lie.
Trump flat out lies to your face every day, and you just smile and say how great he is? Look up the definition of a cult, you're in one.
So he's a politician. No different than the thousands of others before him.
FAR OUT Mr. Frost!!! What you just said means that any prediction Trump made which did not pan out 100% is a lie. EXCELLENT. That means that we can now hold Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden, Pete Butagieg, Beto O'Rourke, and all other Democrat politicians to exactly the same standard.
Sorry Mr. Sanders, when you proposed to give us health care for all and free tuition paid for by corporations and the one percent, which anyone who can do basic mathematics can determine is totally impossible, YOU LIED.
Exactly. He has been a Senator for decades, and he had the chance to at least propose these bullshit ideas, but never did. Same thing with Elizabeth Warren. She also had opportunities to propose the bs she is pushing today.
He is nothing but a pandering socialist who warps the minds of our younger people to push a well known failed ideology.
AND...He's a liar.
Those things are, of course, very true. The really great thing is, however, that the left wing has changed the definition of what is a lie by their treatment of the President. That allows us to adopt that definition.
From this point forward, any Democrat who says that he/she will walk ten steps forward and only walks nine, or who veers more than one degree off from walking exactly forward IS A LIAR. If they don't like that definition being used on them, they shouldn't have tried it on Trump.
Trump entered politics after securing the support of racists with his five year long "birther" lie.
He is nothing but a con man professional liar who has had a lifetime of experience avoiding consequences with an army of high priced attorneys. Whether it was discrimination in housing, cheating his contractors or employees, or cheating on wives, paying off mistresses, and paying off sexual assault victims. He is a liar.