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<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:left;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">Hail to the Vision!</span></p><p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:left;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">For those who do not take the Daily News, appended is a longer version of the column. I get 2,000 words at the Idaho State Journal (to be published on Sunday), and that is attached. There you can read a selected list of Trump's falsehoods and much more analysis.</span></p><p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:left;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">The GOP Congress and Trump are already on a collision course, and I think impeachment is not an unlikely outcome.</span></p><p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:left;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">nfg</span></p><p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><b><br></b></span></p><p align="center" style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><b><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">The Liar-in-Chief and
the “Post-Truth” Era</span></b></p>
<p align="center" style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">Nick Gier, The Palouse Pundit</span></p>
<p align="center" style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><i><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">If Bush and Rove constructed a
fantasy world with a clear internal logic,<br clear="all">
Trump has built something more like an endless bad dream.</span></i></p>
<p align="center" style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><i><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">—New York Times </span></i><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">editorial</span></p>
<p align="center" style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><i><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">We are rapidly becoming a
people that<br clear="all">
totalitarian monsters could only drool about in their dreams.</span></i></p>
<p align="center" style="margin:0px 0px 11px;text-align:center;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">—Robert Kreitner, <i>The Nation</i></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>In October 2004 former President
Bush’s adviser Karl Rove declared: “We’re an empire now, and when we act, we
create our own reality.” Trump is so clueless and dishonest that he could not
be as candid as Rove, but with his brazen disregard for truth, he is doing
exactly the same thing.<span style="margin:0px"> </span></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">The Bush Big Lie on Iraq had a certain internal logic, but Trump’s Lies
about Everything is filled with contradictions.<span style="margin:0px">
</span>For example, he does not seem to realize that his charge of wide-spread
voter fraud undermines both his and Hillary’s votes. As one commentator says:
“Trump tells lies that are seemingly random, frequently inconsistent, and often
plainly ridiculous.” </span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>The GOP’s record of untruths was
clearly evident in the 2016 campaign.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>On
average the GOP candidates scored, according to Politifact, 52 percent true,
mostly true, and half true. Bernie’s average was 70 percent in these categories
and Hillary’s is now 75 percent. In stark contrast, Trump is lying to us 70
percent of the time.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>I would invite anyone to read the
in-depth analyses that are the basis for Politifact’s judgments. I will be reading
along and say to myself: “This is obviously false” or “This is obviously true.”
In all cases, however, caution is Politifact’s watchword and many of their conclusions
are “mostly true,” “half true,” or “mostly false.” The investigators reserve “Pants
on Fire” for the most egregious falsehoods.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>Trump has now accumulated 62 of
these whoppers, over three times as many as Mitt Romney’s 19 in the 2012
campaign. Obama has a total of 9 Pants on Fire, 2 percent of all statements
checked. Trump worst lies account for 18 percent of all his pronouncements.<span style="margin:0px"> </span></span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>In stark contrast Hillary’s pant
suits were aflame only 2 percent of the time for a total of 7.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>Her most egregious falsehood was that there
was no classified information in her emails.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">The editors of the <i>Oxford English
Dictionary</i> chose “post-truth” as the Word of the Year 2016. <span style="margin:0px"> </span>Trust in experts and commitment to widely accepted
facts have been waning for years.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>What
we have now is Donald Trump, who,<span style="margin:0px"> </span>“like
any autocrat,” according to the <i>New York Times</i>,
“wins his followers’ blind trust by lying so often and so brazenly that
millions of people give up on trying to distinguish truth from falsehood.”</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">In the 2004 election war hero John Kerry was “swiftboated” by Bush
supporters so successfully that Bush’s failure to show up for national guard
duty in Alabama was ignored. In the same way, the worst liar in American
politics has succeeded in labeling Hillary a liar.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">Candidate Trump’s disregard for the truth was bad enough for the moral
fabric of our country, but as president his rejection of economic and
intelligence data will be disastrous. Trump received a two-hour briefing on
Russian hacking (it was not delayed as he falsely claimed and Obama did indeed
mention it before election), and afterwards he refused accept the conclusions,
which have been accepted by the most skeptical cyber security experts. </span></p>
<p style="background:white;margin:0px 0px 26px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">Currently, however, Trump is relying on Wikileaks
founder Julian Assange, who rejects the Russian hacking and whom GOP House
Speaker calls “a sycophant for Russia.” Previously, Trump’s called for Assange’s
execution, but now he is to be trusted.</span></p>
<p style="background:white;margin:0px 0px 26px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt"><span style="margin:0px"> </span>GOP
Senate leaders, led by John McCain, are going ahead with their investigation. GOP
Senator Lindsey Graham pleaded with Trump: </span><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">“When you listen
to these people you can be skeptical. But understand they are the best among
us. And they are trying to protect us.”</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">I hope that Trump does not hear about “Team B,” a group of hardline
defense professionals who were put in place by then CIA Director George H. W.
Bush in the 1977.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>After Ronald Reagan, charging
that Ford was soft on the Soviets, almost defeated him the New Hampshire primary,
Ford allowed Team B to counter the CIA’s more accurate reports with their own questionable
assessments. President Reagan used Team B’s exaggerations and falsehoods to add
$1 trillion dollars to the defense budget, which, along with excessive tax
cuts, led to tripling of the national debt. </span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">During the campaign Trump said that the unemployment rate was actually 42
percent.<span style="margin:0px"> </span>Will he use that bogus figure
as a benchmark when he boasts about his own administration’s success?<span style="margin:0px"> </span>Or will be forced to use the government
figure of 4.6 percent and reveal the 42 percent as an outrageous lie?</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">At their peril—international agencies blacklist countries that cheat on
their data—GOP leaders will buck the experts at the Bureau of Labor Statistics
and the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office. </span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">Trump’s lies will not stand within these tried and true parameters, unless
he tries to take all power unto himself.<span style="margin:0px">
</span>If he does, I predict that he will be impeached.</span></p>
<p style="margin:0px 0px 11px;line-height:115%;text-indent:0.5in"><span style="margin:0px;color:black;line-height:115%;font-family:"georgia",serif;font-size:12pt">Nick Gier taught philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31 years.</span><font face="georgia,serif">-- </font><br></p><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div> <div style="width:auto;height:auto"> <div> <div><div><font face="georgia,serif"></font><br></div></div></div></div></div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><font size="2"><span style="font-size:10pt"><div><span style="font-size:13.33px"><font face="georgia,serif">A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. </font></span><br style="font-size:13.33px"><font face="georgia,serif"><br style="font-size:13.33px"></font><span style="font-size:13.33px"><font face="georgia,serif">-Greek proverb</font></span></div><div><font face="georgia,serif"><br>
“Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity.
Immaturity is the inability to use one’s understanding without guidance
from another. This immaturity is self- imposed when its cause lies not
in lack of understanding, but in lack of resolve and courage to use it
without guidance from another. Sapere Aude! ‘Have courage to use your
own understand-ing!—that is the motto of enlightenment.<br>
<br>
--Immanuel Kant<br>
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