Lying Liars and the Lies They Tell

What I learned in grade school, junior high, and high school is that if a person lies about the small things, they will lie about everything and they cannot be trusted with anything.

Trump has decided to lie. And he lies about the stupidest, smallest, least significant things possible. It makes no sense. If he is going to lie about things we can look out our proverbial window and see the truth of, then what will he do when something big and important comes along?

I accept he won the Presidency. I don't completely understand it, and I'm still shaking my head over the Electoral College's first chance to live up to and perform its duty as mandated in the Constitution yet refusing to do it, but I accept the results.

I cannot, however, accept the lies. I was always taught that lying is bad. Granted, we all lie every day... you know, those little white lies that everyone uses. How are you? Fine (but you're really not fine at all; you're sick, you're mentally exhausted, you're on your last nerve). Did I wake you? No (it's 3:30 am, and you were having that awesome dream where 1980's Adrienne Barbeau is throwing sandwich pickles at your bare feet, of course you were asleep).

If you voted for Trump because of religion, the lying must really gall you. I mean, most religions directly or indirectly say that lying is sinful. And yet he does it about everything. Even the most easily researched topics and least complicated areas. Why?

When I was younger, what I discovered was that the people around me that lied regularly and often usually lied at the biggest, most important times. If the teacher found out something, that person would lie to the teacher's face, accusing others or shifting blame. In one case, that person accused me and it took getting a half-dozen friends who knew I was elsewhere to get involved to shift the blame back where it belonged. In another case, someone I generally trusted, but played fast and loose with the truth, stole something of value from me that I never got back. The same person actually used a teacher's confusion over who we were to steal my higher grade in a class we both had with that teacher (still an acceptable grade, but lower than I earned; and, yes, this also points out the age and infirmity of that teacher who couldn't tell two similarly-sized, blond boys apart in his classroom).

If Donald Trump wants to lie about something as simple as the size of the gathering for his inauguration, what does he gain by it? I mean, it takes about 10 seconds to make a Google search and see pictures from a dozen or more inaugurations, and see at a glance that fewer went to his than to many others. So why state it was the largest ever? What does he get by doing that?

One person may have the answer. This was tweeted by Anna Rescouet-Paz:

Tweet posted by Anna Rescouet-Paz, January 21, 2017

That makes a lot of sense. This liar wants to set up the ability to lie again and again. He wants to make lying so regular, that those who listen to him will not know or, and this is the key part, question the lies he speaks. He wants to keep his base distrustful and aggressive toward everyone else. He wants to further divide the nation.

And he may succeed. Because the people who want to hear this are coming from an emotional place. They are emotionally invested in Trump and in his lies, and they do not want to hear or accept facts that run counter to that emotion. They believe that foreigners are bad, are going to kill them, and are taking their jobs, even when there is no evidence to prove it. They believe that other races are out to get them somehow, even as the fact of being employed by, or working with, other races has never been an issue for them. They believe that Trump can bring back jobs even though those jobs have been gone for 20 years and are never coming back, but new jobs for which they could retrain are already here.

I can't help but wonder what Trump and his administration will say if and when something big happens. What if we have another attack on our soil? Can we trust that anything said by him will be true? What if Russia pushes toward global expansion and world war? Will Trump tell us truly, or let the Russians do what they plan? What about North Korea and Kim Jong Crazy? He claims to have missiles now that can reach America... will Trump tell us if that is the case, and what will he say if he does?

To counter lies and misinformation, I get my news from a variety of sites. I read a little right, a little left, and a lot of foreign press (who, generally, don't have a dog in the fight). I try to find the consistent facts and I believe that the truth is somewhere in the middle. But I know I'm also fairly uncommon in my quest for truth and facts from news. I fear for the Average American who listens to his or her echo chamber and simply reinforces the emotional truth they already believe in, facts and evidence be damned.

I fear where this president could lead the nation, even while I cautiously hope he has an epiphany and realizes how big and important the job he just undertook will be. I hope I'm wrong about him, but history shows that lying liars usually just keep telling bigger and bigger lies until they are stopped.