While one might construe Michael A. Cohen’s summary statement in his May 5 column—“We’ve gone from George Washington saying ‘I cannot tell a lie’ to our current moment: a president who cannot tell the truth”—as stating the obvious, it’s essential that we continue to remind ourselves that this is the reality we are living with (“10,000 lies: another Trump milestone”). To do otherwise would help enable Don the con, a.k.a. President Trump, to continue eroding what should be a reasonable expectation of truth-telling in a president.
Normalizing lying is rooted in the psychological concept of habituation. As human beings, we react less with each successive lie. Eventually, only a real whopper would penetrate our awareness. We have arrived at a new normal with Trump. What might be more concerning than a president who cannot tell the truth is a president who, simply by virtue of being president, cannot possibly be called a liar. It is an ominous echo of Attorney General William Barr’s belief in the theory of the unitary executive—if the president does it, it can’t be illegal.
Jim Cain
Wakefield
Note from KBJ: I’m still not aware of a single lie told by Donald Trump. Not one. The real liar was Barack Obama. Remember when he said you could keep your doctor? Remember when he said your health-insurance premium would go down by $2,500? Someone should do a study of why leftists project their own failings onto others.
