Most of the news I watch, read, and see is “fake news,” according to Mr. Trump. The only news, polls and “truth,” that is not fake, he tells us, is that which he reports. “Just remember, what you are seeing and what you are reading is not really happening…” He makes no bones about this. Many of his supporters like a “straight shooter.” They think Mr. Trump is such a person, but these supporters are re-defining what “straight shooter” really means. They think it means a person saying what is on his or her mind, regardless of what that may be and/or what that may do to others. I think there is that in all of us that admires the bully on occasion. There is also that in all of us that sympathizes with the victim. Mr. Trump says he is both at the same time. He beats up on people constantly, making them victims, and yet claims he is the one who is the victim (of the media and any and all who oppose him). His supporters say they like the way he says what’s on his mind, but the word “straight shooter” is defined as “an honest and forthright person.” A straight shooter is a “direct and out-spoken” person—but a straight shooter is also a person who is honest.
Thomas Jefferson wrote in another context, “To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.” But has the world (America) lost its candor? A candid world is one that is openhearted and sincere, free from reservation, disguise or subterfuge. Have we lost our candor in the present mendacity where “facts” are ignored and/or reinterpreted by a self-proclaimed “genius” (“a stable genius”) with a “very good brain” who admonishes us to ignore what we see and what we read, because what we see and what we read is not what is happening? Have we become so dehumanized, so fearful, so manipulated, that we are no longer candid?
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