Donald Trump betrayed our country’s most cherished institution—Democracy—by selling it out to the Russian government, in exchange for their help in getting him elected president. Not only Trump but most members of his inner circle, and most members of his immediate family, were aware of this betrayal, and either directly abetted it or did nothing to stop it. Put simply, that places them in a special category of the very worst kind of Americans. Whether or not a Fox-News addled, ignorant portion of the voting public accepts that fact, it happens to possess the rare distinction of being the truth.
And while it may sound quaint in this era where a constant torrent of disinformation is now the norm, truth is important, because the consequences of ignoring it can be disastrous.
One of the most infamous political quotes in American history was attributed by journalist Ron Suskind in a 2002 interview with an unnamed senior administration official (later possibly identified as GOP political strategist Karl Rove) about the Bush administration’s endless run-up of lies and distortions that culminated in the Iraq war. In a hubris-drenched display of arrogance and condescension, Rove (or whoever it was) patiently explained to Suskind that the “truth” didn’t particularly matter; rather what mattered was whatever alternative narrative (“reality”) the administration put forward.
The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' [...] 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors...and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do'
As the events that followed in Iraq unfolded, the body counts exploded and that country sank into a maelstrom of chaos, it became painfully apparent the “empire” about which that unnamed person spoke at that time was a wholly fictional delusion. Whatever “reality” was being “created” was nothing resembling a legitimate strategic end, for an “empire” or anyone else. Rather, the entire adventure was (and continues to be) a colossal blunder ultimately costing trillions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives. It spawned the most brutal terrorist organization this century had ever seen and decimated a region of the world with no discernible benefit to this country. We are still living with the repercussions of that disastrous, glib dismissal of the truth.
You would think that Americans would have learned something about what it means to ignore facts and reality. But on the 4th of July, Americans were once again force-fed a tawdry display of haughty condescension by yet another Republican president trying to divert us from what is plainly obvious for anyone who cares to look.
Before the event, Alex Kingsbury, writing for The New York Times, made a well-intentioned case for simply ignoring Trump’s disgusting attempt to co-opt the U.S military for a celebration of himself:
So fear not the flyover. The contrails of the warplanes will fade with the wind. President Trump can have his star-spangled show and preach to his choir.
The rest of us have the hard-won freedom to change the channel if we wish.
But we couldn’t really change the channel. There is only one channel. Trump’s Nuremberg-style celebration in front of his cheering supporters was an insult and a disgrace not only to the lives of those who actually witnessed it but for any American who respects the truth.
The “reality” is that we have a president who, based on all the evidence, sought the assistance of a hostile, antagonistic foreign power to manipulate Americans for the purpose of putting himself into office. He’s there because that foreign power wanted him there, and not someone else. And that foreign power worked very hard, using all the cyber warfare tools at their disposal, to put him there. Period. The idea that this person should be allowed anywhere near, let alone preside over, a celebration of American independence is an obscenity. That he should invoke the military to aid him in his dirty work is an abomination.
In the past two years, we have been forced over and over to re-live this wholesale abandonment of truth in our democracy, in every rally this president has staged for his supporters, every foul Tweet, every racist policy, every nasty, lying insult that comes out of his mouth. As a consequence of this nonstop barrage of lies we see people from all walks of life—including many from the so-called “professional” classes of lawyers, doctors, businessmen—educated people we are socialized and taught to respect—revealing themselves as little more than obedient dogs, lapping up a set of convenient and self-comforting lies wrapped and fed to them as validating their prejudices, and by extension, their identities. If the lies work to their benefit, they seem to reason, then they are acceptable lies. Or, at the very least, they’ll rationalize those lies, for their own selfish interests, never mind the consequences to the country.
Apparently close to half of the people of voting age in this country have now acclimated themselves to this bogus, spoon-fed version of “reality.” My guess is they will go to their graves, grinning in their self-delusion, content in the sweet assurance and comfort of these lies they’ve internalized. I’ve seen it in my friends, people I grew up with, watching in a kind of numb horror as they’ve been duped and manipulated. For those of us still dealing with reality, July 4th was yet another defining moment, where we were forced to witness the true character of many of the people we live and work with, and grow older alongside, for who they really are.
And whatever that is, it has nothing to do with truth.