Now, there’s a talking point:
“Stop lying.”
All of us can say that. Every politician who cares about our democracy can say that. Democratic candidates can say that to their Republican opponents regarding Trump and ask them if they agree with that sentiment.
If Trump and company can hammer “No collusion!” endlessly into the media narrative, the rest of us can hammer, “Stop lying” into the narrative.
It’s rather sad, of course, that the national media is only just now expressing real outrage about the consistent lying from Trump and damn near everyone else in this administration. Sure, the fact checkers have documented Trump’s endless stream of lies (more than 3,000 at last count), but it is only this latest flat-out lie about the Stormy Daniels payment that seems to have caught their attention.
Dan Balz of the Washington Post wrote yesterday:
Does it bother anyone that President Trump has been caught lying? Does it bother anyone that this is not new? Does it bother anyone that the president has been shown to be a liar?
Jake Tapper called out Trump’s “credibility chasm.”
And the Post has a front page piece today about the never-ending stream of lies passing the lips of ol’ Smokey Eyes:
…
By virtue of her position, Sanders is inextricably bound in the mistruths of the Trump administration. She is a willing warrior for Trump, and her critics say she should be held accountable for his utterances — from the untruthful to the racist to the sexist.
“Her critics say?” Why isn’t anyone/everyone in the media concerned about the survival of our democracy saying that?
It is not okay.
I want every Democratic politician to say, over and over, “Stop lying.” Say it everywhere, all the time, in every media appearance, on the floor of the House and the Senate, in debates, like a mantra.
And we need to spread this to the media and insist that they say this simply and directly to the president and anyone supporting the president publicly: “Stop lying. Just stop lying.”
This is not complicated. Our democracy is at a breaking point. That is not an overly dramatic statement. Trump’s approval numbers are going up. Lying by the President of the United States has been normalized. Our democracy is dying.