Unfortunately you need a subscription to read The Washington Post Editorial editorial, so for those who can’t access the piece, here’s the 10,000th lie according to the newspaper’s fact-checkers:
Excerpt:
During an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Mr. Trump suggested that his heartless policy had continued practices in place under the Barack Obama and George W. Bush administrations, among others. In contrast to his predecessors, Mr. Trump said, “we’ve been on a humane basis . . . we go out and stop the separations,” he said. “The problem is you have 10 times as many people coming up with their families. It’s like Disneyland now.”
In fact, the “zero tolerance” policy was formulated (with White House approval) by Mr. Trump’s then- attorney general, Jeff Sessions. The policy mandated automatic imprisonment for undocumented adult asylum seekers apprehended at the border, meaning migrant children would be seized from their parents’ custody and transferred for placements scattered around the country by the Department of Health and Human Services.
Several thousand parents and children were left with no means of contacting each other and no documents to facilitate their eventual reunification. It was an act of singular cruelty by an administration that has not shied from demonstrating malice toward migrants.
Trump suggesting any of his policies are humane suggests he is a pathological liar or has a delusional disorder, or perhaps (as a psychotherapist*) I think at times acctually he believes his lies in a kind of borderline delusional way. He suspends the kind of natural reality testing most people engage in, the “does it pass the small test” of discerning what is and isnt’ plausible. It’s possible he even believed that President Obama was born in Africa.
Many of his lies are merely self-aggrandising, but even then at some level when he says to his supporters that he is the greatest and they cheer we don’t know whether he really believes it deep down inside. Psychoanalysts say that those who have to say it to other, and try to convince themselves that it is true are deeply insecure.
Next thing we’ll hear him saying his is that his is the most transparent presidency in history or even more outrageous, the most ethical. He may say he’s the modern version of “Honest Abe” who he’ll again remind the ignorant (and there are many in his MAGA cult who don’t know) “was also a Republican.”
Did you know President Abraham Lincoln was a Republican? President Trump apparently thinks most people don’t.
“Great president,” Trump said Tuesday night at a fundraising dinner for House Republicans. “Most people don’t even know he was a Republican. Right? Does anyone know? A lot of people don’t know that. We have to build that up a little more.”
Trump then suggested using a political action committee to run advertisements letting people know that Lincoln was a member of his party. Washington Post
Sadly and ironically it isn’t a lie saying that most people, at least his ignorant followers, don’t know Lincoln was a Republican isn’t a lie.
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* About: I received my Masters in Social Work from Michigan State University in 1971 and was a psychotherapist until my retirement. My main salaried work experience was with one of the best community mental health programs in the country, the Mason Mental Health Center (LINK inlcudes photos) , Clinton-Eaton-Ingham Community Mental Health Board headquartered in Lansing, Michigan. I always had a private practice along with my salaried job.