Lies are on the Ballot

A quote from Jonathan Swift in 1710 says it just right, “Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it.”

That’s what’s been happening for the past nine years. Vast fossilized layers of lies. Preposterous lies. Dangerous lies. And it seems people are so used to the lies, the lies are so endemic to daily life, that no one is a good lie detector anymore. Well, now, we call it fact checking. It isn’t fact checking, it’s lie detection. We’ve lost that skill.

It used to be a normal person, one raised with an average amount of moral instruction, could spot a liar a hundred yards away. The same person would be loath to lie but might now and then tell a ‘white lie.’ An otherwise honest person might screw up details or embellish a story. But now there’s no more tiny stepping into lie country. We’ve busted the gates of lying wide open. You can just say whatever shit you want. No filters. Isn’t that what they say? No filters. No repercussions either.

Lordy.

Trump produces extravagant lies every day and then the lies he produces go into a catechism that his followers carry in their pockets and retrieve whenever challenged by reality. Didn’t Mao have a little book like that? I get my autocrats mixed up.

JD Vance gave a master class in fantastical lying, the greatest of which was claiming Trump worked to save Obamacare. Don’t get me started on how he forgot he supported a national abortion ban.

More Lordy.

It’s depressing, for sure. And that’s a bad thing because depression isn’t a motivation for change. Anger is, though. So, I’m going to rev up my anger at all the lying and write more Get Out the Vote postcards. I’m trying to make them look happy and cheerful, but inside I’m seething. 300 done. 200 to go.