By Laurie Baron
SAN DIEGO — FactCheck.org recorded 60 lies Trump told at his rallies over five days in late October. This is five times the number Harris told during the same period. Have we forgotten that that the Washington Post tallied over 30,000 lies that Trump told during his presidency? FactCheck.org points out that his speeches last three times longer than hers because, as he puts it, what sounds like rambling is really an intricate weave. Has Trump read Shakespeare? The Bard wrote, “Oh what a tangled web we weave/When first we practice to deceive.”
After correctly bragging to a North Carolina crowd that he won the state twice, he claimed that he “won twice everywhere.” No matter how many times he repeats, it doesn’t change his loss in 2020. A .500 batting average is stellar in baseball, but he lost 63 of 64 election court cases and every recount in swing states That many strikeouts would relegate him to the tee ball league if he played baseball.
High tariffs on imports from China and other countries supposedly will help the American economy and generate much revenue. Econ 101: importers pay tariffs not the exporting nation. Importers pass these price increases on to wholesalers who pass them on to consumers. In any case this would raise the price of Trump Bibles which are printed in China.
Trump constantly charges poor countries of dumping their prisoners and mental hospital patients into the United States. There is no evidence of this. He blames Harris for accepting these undesirables in her capacity as “Border Czar.” Parenthetically, Trump admires leaders who rule like Czars. Biden dispatched Harris to El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras to attract private investment, provide funding for natural disaster relief, and recommend political reforms with the goal of addressing the climate displacement, gang violence, governmental corruption, poverty, and repression that drive immigration. Trump should know that this is what motivates immigrants. His grandfather Friedrich fled to the United States to evade conscription in Germany. Perhaps this was the precedent for Donald to cite bone spurs as the reason he couldn’t be drafted to fight in the Vietnam War.
Trump continues to characterize the 1/6 storming of the Capitol as a “love fest.” If American voters believe this after watching footage of the riot, then they must believe that battering doors down demonstrates how eager the protesters were to hug their congressional representatives and senators, that bear spray is perfume, that striking police with flagpoles is a patriotic gesture, and that tying the knot is about marriage and not nooses.
I fear we live in the United States of Amnesia but hope instead that Tuesday’s election redeems us as the United States of Accountability.
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Laurie Baron is a professor emeritus of history at San Diego State University
It’s hard to believe that his followers can’t see thru his b-s!