Lies shock tolerant US into action - President Trump’s fantasies
It seemed a stream of consciousness, Dr Strangelove meets the socially insecure, bewigged captain of a tatty, back-of-beyond golf club. It was a mixture of glaring dishonesty and the kind of titanic hubris only someone absolutely unanchored could indulge — or imagine that anyone with the perception of a golf ball might believe. But Mr Trump’s vaudeville had a dark and calculated objective that looks as it may well be realised. It was so bizarre it was necessary to take pause to remember that this man is the leader of the free world and successor of Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Clinton, and Obama. Of course, some of those men lied — “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” — but it was hardly their default policy. Effortless dishonesty was not used to cow opposition.
Mr Trump’s amorality continued in Florida on Saturday when he said that Sweden had suffered a terrorist attack. Except there has not been any attack in Sweden this weekend. One of that country’s official Twitter accounts, run by a different citizen each week, was, naturally, confused. This week’s curator, a school librarian, responded: “Nothing has happened here in Sweden. There have not been any terrorist attacks here. At all.”
