Poughkeepsie

The Mueller report is weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in Iraq, all over again. Republicans are using the same playbook to protect Trump that they used to hype the Iraq war, and the strategy seems, yet again, to be working. […] The public is being fed a fake Mueller report, just as the public was being fed what amounted to fake intelligence about WMDs in Iraq. In both cases, however, there were sprinklings of truth inserted in the fakes in order to scare journalists off calling them fabrications and to lure people into line-by-line debates that distract from the larger issues. Those would include the fact that invading Iraq was a bad idea or the fact that Trump is a corrupt president and a pathological liar and that, regardless of his level of collusion in election interference, he sold out our country’s interests to Russia during the 2016 campaign, and still more during his presidency. […] Trump’s entire career has been based on lies and corruption, he has substantial ties to Russia that he tried to hide and he has repeatedly endorsed Vladimir Putin’s claims of innocence over the evidence gathered by U.S. intelligence services. And there’s a cover-up underway, in swing, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocking a resolution calling for the actual Mueller report — not the truncated spin document written by Bill Barr — to be released. But those of us who are willing to speak these truths are already being written off as crazy conspiracy theorists who have been driven mad by our dislike of Trump. Others who see these truths are beginning to silence themselves and play along with the media narrative about Trump’s “vindication,” rather than run the risk of being called crazy, which can mean lost job opportunities and social shunning. This is why gaslighting works: You drive people crazy with all your lies, and then write them off as crazy when they call you a liar.

The Mueller report is weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in Iraq, all over again. Republicans are using the same playbook to protect Trump that they used to hype the Iraq war, and the strategy seems, yet again, to be working. […] The public is being fed a fake Mueller report, just as the public was being fed what amounted to fake intelligence about WMDs in Iraq. In both cases, however, there were sprinklings of truth inserted in the fakes in order to scare journalists off calling them fabrications and to lure people into line-by-line debates that distract from the larger issues. Those would include the fact that invading Iraq was a bad idea or the fact that Trump is a corrupt president and a pathological liar and that, regardless of his level of collusion in election interference, he sold out our country’s interests to Russia during the 2016 campaign, and still more during his presidency. […] Trump’s entire career has been based on lies and corruption, he has substantial ties to Russia that he tried to hide and he has repeatedly endorsed Vladimir Putin’s claims of innocence over the evidence gathered by U.S. intelligence services. And there’s a cover-up underway, in swing, with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocking a resolution calling for the actual Mueller report — not the truncated spin document written by Bill Barr — to be released. But those of us who are willing to speak these truths are already being written off as crazy conspiracy theorists who have been driven mad by our dislike of Trump. Others who see these truths are beginning to silence themselves and play along with the media narrative about Trump’s “vindication,” rather than run the risk of being called crazy, which can mean lost job opportunities and social shunning. This is why gaslighting works: You drive people crazy with all your lies, and then write them off as crazy when they call you a liar.

And if we weren’t already dead: