There is likely nothing as hurtful as when someone close lies and it doesn’t matter one iota why they lied. Whether it’s a feeling of betrayal or just being treated dishonestly, it’s safe to say no human being on Earth likes a liar.
Something that is particularly curious to non-believers is how so-called religious right Republicans have little problem lying as a matter of course. And, they lie through their teeth while they clutch their King James and attempt to legislate according to that book of religious myth that includes a very specific prohibition on lying. A non-cynical person might believe those religious Republicans only hold their precious bible and are unable to open or read it, because they seem to have missed one of the big Ten Commandments they want to see posted in every public classroom to be memorized by every student in America.
It’s apparent that the current theocratic-minded malcontents serving in the king of the liar’s administration, and religious Republicans in Congress, look the other way when Republicans lie; or they lie and claim there aren’t liars in the Trump camp.
Last week one of the contenders for chief liar, religious extremist Mike Pence, told CNN’s Dana Bash that he would “say to voters, President Trump is a man of his word.” It is the expected response from a Republican liar who is lying to the people to cover another Republican’s lies. The majority of Americans believe contrary to what Pence wants them to think according to a Gallup poll last week where only 45 percent of the population believe Trump is trustworthy or will keep his word. That 45 percent is down from 62 percent barely a few weeks earlier; even the people are catching on that this administration is nearly as mendacious as it is corrupt and treasonous – and incredibly hypocritical.
Republicans could not comport a false statement from Bill Clinton and drew up impeachment charges over an inappropriate (oral) tryst he didn’t consider was “having sex with that woman.” Republicans didn’t care that Clinton meant he didn’t have “sexual intercourse” with that woman, they just were not going to countenance a President of the United States who lied. Fair enough. It is noteworthy, though, that Republicans did not hold the next president accountable for his lies. Republicans and later Democrats gave the George W. Bush administration a pass for lying despite it leading the nation into a perpetual Middle East war in Iraq that will add about $7.9 trillion to the national debt.
Republicans also spent no small amount of years, and millions of taxpayer dollars, investigating what they thought was dishonesty from then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over the attack on a diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, and the State Department’s decade-long issue with email servers Clinton’s predecessors agreed was woefully lacking. In fact, Republicans, including the bible-toting ones, were prepared to spend the next four years and millions of more taxpayer dollars to continue investigating Clinton for dishonesty if she had won the election. However, everything changed for the Republicans with the election of the king of liars himself, Donald Trump. It is exactly the kind of change they embraced when George W. Bush was president and lied to go to lead the nation in a bloody, costly and senseless war.
The lies from Trump, his transition team, Cabinet nominees, and trusted advisors should have sent religious Republicans into near-fatal apoplexy if they adhered to their concrete demand that any and all Democrats be drawn and quartered for lying. And if they were not lying hypocrites themselves, Republicans in the House and Senate would be busily charging myriad people in the Trump administration for lying. Or in the case of five of Trump’s Cabinet appointees; committing perjury under oath before the Senate. It is a federal felony that Trump’s attorney general, education secretary, E.P.A head, Treasury Secretary, and HHS Secretary should be facing prison for if Trump’s attorney general would do his job. However, it means he would be indicting himself, and if he’s not willing to prosecute the other Trump team members for perjury, he certainly isn’t going to let an underling prosecute him.
Of all the Trump liars, it seems that Mike Pence is only second to Trump himself. This is particularly true in the case of Mike Flynn as Rachel Maddow has pointed out explicitly and on more than one occasion and over more than one instance.
However, until Republicans embrace the same distaste for Republican liars as they do when they think a Democrat is being dishonest, Americans are just going to have to accept the sad fact that America is under siege from a lying administration, including Trump’s kids. The terrible fact is that there is nothing anyone can, or will do to change anything and Trump’s administration knows they have veritable impunity from prosecution.
Born in the South, raised in the Mid-West and California for a well-rounded view of America; it doesn't look good.
Former minister, lifelong musician, Mahayana Zen-Buddhist.
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