[Apologies to my readers who struggled with the columns of “Deceit ” and “Consequences.” I hope these columns have been distinguished by what formatting power I have on this blog]
The Big Lie, Jonathan Lemire’s current political analysis of Donald Trump as a public figure, informs citizens by revealing Trump as a chronic, strategic liar, not just a public figure defending his reputation. As the lies recede in our memories, we tend to think of the former President as one who exaggerates or struggles with facts, rather than a man whose career is founded on, and elevated by, lies. Chronicling the public life of Donald Trump, Lemire reveals him as a man driven by wealth and power, who creates an alternate realty by manipulating the press and persisting with his version of the truth.
An outline of Chapter Three, “The Trump Presidency,” reveals a pattern of deceit.
Strategy of Deceit
Consequences
- Compelled Press Secretary Tony Spicer to announce the
Inauguration crowd was larger than Barak Obama’s 2009 crowd.
Spicer’s credibility as Press Secretary was ruined.
Republicans on Capitol hill “laughed it off.”
National Park Employee “edited photos to cut out the empty
spaces to make the crowd look bigger.”
Partisan ridicule.
2. Claimed he won the popular vote in 2016. Said his friend
Bernhard Langer was turned away from voting in Florida. (Langer
was not an American citizen). Claimed “people who didn’t ‘look
like they should be allowed to vote’ were permitted to stay in line.”
Announced an investigation on Twitter. “In addition to winning
the Electoral College by a landslide, I won the popular vote if you
deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”
In May Election Fraud commission established.
Chairman Kris Kobach demands state voting data,
including names and S.S.numbers.
New Hampshire and Mississippi publicly protest.
Election Commissioners Report finding
“no fraud” published in January, 2018.
No dire public reaction.
3. Claimed he knew nothing about payments made to purchase
the silence of porn star Stormy Davis.
Sworn testimony of attorney Michael Cohen contradicted.
4. He claimed to have ended Obama’s family separation
program.
Actually made it more unbearable.
5. He claimed “Joe Biden’s healthcare problems eliminated
coverage for those with pre-existing conditions. “
Unfounded.
No obvious consequences.
6. Claimed “the head of the Boy Scouts said his address to their
national jamboree was the best speech ever given to the organization.”
“the group’s leader never said such a thing.”
Lemire calls it “an inappropriate ramble.”
This next generation of lies are strengthened by their repetition, a tactic Trump used to change perceptions. The consequences of these lies are more serious because of the harm to other people. Lemire also argues the lying broke down the trust level for the government, which had declined through decades of wars , terror attacks, catastrophic weather like Hurricane Katrina, and partisan warfare beginning in the 1990’s.
7. The “Mission Act,” a strengthening of Obama’s 2014 bill,
was declared Trump’s original and unassisted accomplishment.
When he was corrected by aides, he brushed them aside.
Corrected by CBC White House Correspondent Paula Reid, in
2020, he looked around the room and abruptly
ended the news conference.
John McCain was a co-sponsor and honored with his name
on the bill, but Trump claimed “McCain didn’t get the job
done for our great vets and the VA.”
Trump made 150 false and misleading statements
about the bill over the next two years (Washington Post).
8. Claiming Hurricane Dorian would hit Alabama “harder
than anticipated.”
NOAA’s National Weather Service tweeted
“Alabama will not see any effects from Dorian.”
NOAA tweet goes viral.
Later during a briefing, “And Alabama could be in for some
very strong winds and something more than that it could be.
This just came up, unfortunately. It’s the size of –the storm
that we’re talking about. So, for Alabama, just please be
careful also.”
Days later, Trump shows the press the NOAA forecast
statement with a black line drawn to include Alabama.
“They actually gave that a 95% chance–probability.”
“The NOAA on September 6 published an unsigned report
in support of Trump’s original claim that tropical storm
force winds from Hurricane Dorian could impact Alabama.”
The NOAA administrator criticized the Birmingham employees
for contradicting the President.
Later that summer, a Commerce Dept report named Neil Jacobs
as the writer of the NOAA statement and “criticized the
misconduct for intentionally, knowingly and in reckless disregard
of the agency’s scientific integrity policy.”
9. On March 4, 2017 Trump tweeted early in the morning,
“Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’
in Trump Tower just before victory. Nothing found.
This is McCarthyism!” The implication was that Obama
was trying to influence the election with evidence that
Trump had urged Russia to troll against the Democrats.
Trump based his accusations on one report from Mark Levin,
a radio commentator known for spreading conspiracy theories.
Breitbart heightened the story the next day.
Devin Nunes, chair of the House Intelligence
Committee, collaborated with the White House,
rather than launching an independent investigatio n
Turned members of Congress into a secret ally of
Trump against all questioning, such as the Mueller
Report.
10. Finally, Lemire himself challenged Trump to
collaborate with a lie, in which he verbally doubted
the evidence of American intelligence over the
guarantee of Putin, “He just said it’s not Russia.
I don’t see any reason why it would be.” Meaning
he accepted Putin’s word there was no tampering.
Republicans, Fox News harshly criticized Trump
He yelled at the White House Press Secretary,
Sarah Huckabee Sanders for calling on Lemire, a
“tough reporter” to ask a question. He floated the
idea of another summit with Putin at the White House.
His connections with Russia increasingly suspicious.
These few examples are among 35, 573 false and misleading claims by President Trump over his four years, as recorded by the Washington Post. By Lemire’s calculation, that’s 21 per day.
Really the book could be called The Selected Lies of Donald Trump.
The panorama of lies over these years shows the depth, the strategy, the perseverance of deceit of the President over time. We have learned to live with his strange variations of truth without realizing we have left reality for what former press secretary Anthony Scaramucci referred to as his “reality distortion field.”
The Big Lie tries to bring us back to a world of facts, a welcome bout of sanity.