Charlotte NC Editorial: Trumps lies matter, and were starting to see how
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/editorials/article165203842.html
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Trumps lies matter, and were starting to see how
The Observer editorial board
August 03, 2017 1:42 PM
Donald Trump lies. A lot. This isnt fake news, but it is old news. Yet here we are, a little more than six months into his presidency, and his fibs are real news once again.
In part thats because his latest lie involving a speech last month to the National Scout Jamboree was startlingly narcissistic and just plain weird............................
First, that Boy Scout lie: In an interview with the Wall Street Journal published this week, someone suggested that reaction to Trumps Jamboree speech was mixed. Trump disagreed. I got a call from the head of the Boy Scouts saying it was the greatest speech that was ever made to them, and they were very thankful, he said. So there was there was no mix.
Problem is, the Boy Scouts of America said no such call happened. So on Wednesday, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was forced to offer Version No. 2 of events. Trump, she said, didnt actually get a phone call praising his speech, and it wasnt actually the head of the BSA who heaped that praise on him, just officials at the Jamboree.
Even if all that is true, it still means the president was making stuff up. The same seems to be the case about Trump claiming this week that Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto called me to praise Trumps border control measures. That also didnt happen.
Why does this matter? Because as any serial fibber learns, people eventually stop believing what you say. Thats already happening to the president with congressional Republicans, who have more openly defied him of late. When Trump threatened to rescind their health care subsidies last week after the failed Senate heath care vote, Republicans ignored him. They didnt believe him. They practically dared him to do it.
They and others have learned that Trumps words are, at best, unreliable. The president, meanwhile, is discovering that lying can accomplish the opposite of what you intend. Instead of bolstering his stature, it has weakened him..................................?
We dont expect Trump to realize this, nor his core supporters who continue to stand by their man. But even that support is peeling away as the presidents fibs accumulate, including this weeks revelations that Trump dictated a misleading explanation last month for his sons meeting with a Russian lawyer and was dishonest about a call with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.............................
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