I’m keeping my subscription to the New York Times.
We’re on a tight budget now, and I’ve thought more than once
of canceling my digital subscription. But the NYT is the one mainstream press
that has actually used the word “lie” in its reporting on Trump, both before
and since the Inauguration. Other media outlets have opted for “falsehood” or “fabrication,”
or at best have said that he “repeated a lie.” They insist that using the word “lie”
means that they have to know that he intended to deceive people by saying what
he did: in this case, that his Inauguration was the best attended ever, and
(this is even more dangerous and delusional) that 3-5 million people voted
illegally, calling into question the fact
that his popular vote was far lower
than Clinton’s.
Now Trump plans to use taxpayer dollars to launch an
investigation into this outright lie. As Rep. Elijah Cummings said on MSNBC
last night, “This is chilling.” When we hear people use the word, chilling… what are we hearing? We ourselves feel this.
We are more than angry. We are far more than fearful. We are way more than
upset. We are seeing a horrendous nightmare, the stuff of dystopian novels,
play out in real time, and we pass every day, in the marketplace and workplace,
people who facilitated this or allowed it to happen. Chilling is our visceral
reaction to that. It is the body’s way of saying, No, this is not be okay.
Maybe you don’t feel that way.
Maybe you feel numb, or paralyzed, or deeply depressed.
Those, too, would be expected reactions. Evidently, some people are delighted.
They want to see happening the policy changes that Trump is bringing about.
Rounding up of immigrants, splitting up families, huge amounts of taxpayer
money spent on walls with Mexico, creation of bad will with NATO and other
countries, a sure-to-be deadly pipeline through native lands, exploiting our
natural resources to make the few rich, while providing a relatively small number
of temporary jobs, for what? Fossil fuels, when all indicators show that renewable
sources of energy are where our money needs to go. Silencing of national
agencies that protect and preserve our climate and resources. Anyone who is
happy about this, or excuses these things because it will “help the economy’ or
“bring back jobs” is enabling the machinations of a madman who has been given
the reins of power. They believe these orders and bills are so great they can
excuse the lies, the abuses of power and the outrageous behavior of Donald
Trump.
Cuba. I'll be talking more about propaganda. Later.
So. It’s interesting that Trump doesn’t drink, or use drugs.
Often, people who do not drink come from a family in which there was alcoholism
or another severe addiction. They repress that addiction in themselves, only to
have the genetic tendency come out elsewhere: food, religion, or, in this case
money and power. In my years of counseling, I saw this again and again.
I think Donald Trump, like many addicts, is starved for love
and affection. No matter his wealth and power, he will always suspect that everyone
around him, his sycophants, his wife, even his children, are loyal because they
fear/ need him for his money and power.
His behavior is like that of someone in the downward spiral
of addiction. It can only get worse.
Everyone (and this includes NPR, all the news channels who’ve
decided to normalize his presidency, and, sadly, most of the Democratic congress so far) who does not actively
resist in some way is enabling him.
Those of us who grew up with addiction of any kind are
suffering a bit more than others. We see playing out on a national/world stage
the shame-filled and destructive scenes of our past. The rants, the outbursts,
the enablers, the excuse-makers, the tap-dancing, and the lies.
In AA the saying goes, “How can you tell an alcoholic/addict
is lying? A: Their lips are moving.”
Addicts lie for no reason. They believe their own lies. They
live in a world of self-delusion, and we, their families, are faced with the
painful choice of listening (which they will take as acquiescence) or
confrontation (which they will turn around on you and blame you for as an
attack.)
This is one of the reasons people in recovery strive to be scrupulously honest. I'll go into that a little further on.
So take a moment each day to separate truth from lies. Make
sure you speak truth always. I know sometimes I tell the little lies, saying I
like something that I don’t, that things are okay when they’re not…that sort of
thing. Today I will endeavor to be honest in all my speaking and writing.
By the way, it’s in the Bible, “Thou shalt not bear false
witness.” And lying is condemned in about 10 other places in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. How do all the
Christians who voted for Trump feel about that?
