THE AGE OF POST TRUTH “DELUSIONAL” TRUMP

In 2016 the Oxford Dictionary named Post Truth as The Word of the Year. The Oxford Dictionary establishment takes The Word of the Year pretty seriously with over 30,000 voting and finally decided upon by a team of language experts..They defined “post truth”, an adjective, as follows, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief”. Although he has not the monopoly on Post Truth the greatest exponent of the genre in the twenty first century is America’s own Donald J. Trump. It was a hall mark of his first campaign by labelling the legitimate media as “Fake News” expanding the Post Truth concept to herculean heights in his third campaign. 

What is not included in the Oxford Dictionary definition is intent - what if Trump is deluded and actually believes his life long tens of thousands of lies. Trump’s legal woes relating to January 6 whether he is aware or not of his lies is crucial to his culpability. 

SIXTY PERCENT OF THE “GOP” BELIEVE THE BIG LIE

It is obvious that the 45th President’s political base, who represent over 60 percent of the former “GOP” has accepted his world view, particularly in regard to the result of the 2020 election - “The Big Lie” .Their gut feeling is ad idem with Trump regardless of the facts. As Trump’s central plank in his 2024 election platform is that he won the 2020 election and he did not cause an insurrection it makes him run away favorite to be the “GOP’S” nominee for 2024. 

  

Trump’s post truth is negated by fact finders such as the bipartisan January 6 House of Representatives Investigation Committee, at least eight Federal Judges, State Officials and a slew of his own administration. But legally it matters whether Trump had the intent to reverse the 2020 election and the prosecution has to prove that he did. He  is sticking to the fact that he genuinely thought he won the election and used his free speech to proclaim this. Further he is not responsible for the behavior of others. In addition as President he is immune from prosecution. All this is absurd on its face but sixty percent of those who call themselves "Republicans" believe it. 

TRUMP AND POST TRUTH

Post Truth is synonymous with the ascension of Trump to the Presidency. He has been and still is exemplified, personified embodied, typified and wrapped around in a shroud of post truth. His 2016 Presidency culture was introduced by his closest connection to Goebbels, KellyAnne Conway, who told Anderson Cooper that the Trump outfit, “had their own truth”.

Trump trades on the worst of emotions and he is the grandmaster of hate of the other, bigotry, sexism, paranoia, victimhood, anti science while he promises to be the redemption of those who he has inspired to wallow in self pity. He confirms to those who perceive that they have not “made it” that it is because the cards are stacked against them by the dark state elites who are incidentally “out to get them”.Only he stands in the way. All this garbage without a fact to support him. 

Hence “they” rigged the election against him which he really had won hands down. Trump had 61 failed court challenges on alleged election interference. Now the current “corrupt crooked” President Biden has weaponized his Justice Department to “get him”.

In truth Trump’s whole life had been post truth. His business life from the get go was based on smoke and mirrors. Early on he learned that you could make fortunes manipulating the legal system with the vast sums of money his father had left him. This did not avoid his companies going bankrupt no less than six times. Even though this is in the public record he denied it when Hillary Clinton confronted him in a Presidential debate.

In an earlier post truth mammoth play to bigotry, even after it had been conclusively proved that five youths of color had been wrongly convicted for a gang rape and murder, he argued that they should get the death penalty. To this day Trump won’t apologize. He took out a full page advertisement in the NY Times peddling his lie with one objective in mind, racism.

With this history there has to be a strong argument that he is delusional and really believes the lies he espouses. But in his political life there have been two occasions where he had to recant, 

TRUMP’S TWO APOLOGIES IN A LIFE TIME OF POST TRUTH

Trump has recanted or half apologized only twice in recent memory. Bearing in mind that the Washington Post documented that Trump, had lied 30,753 times during his four year Presidency and has accelerated the pace in the last three years. There has been on a non stop rampage surrounding “The Big Lie”. He trots out his untruths with apparent sincerity day in and day out.

 In 2011 he propagated the most implausible lie which the Post Truth news channel, Fox, helped him perpetuate, namely that Barack Obama was a Muslim, hadn’t been born in America and whose birth certificate was suspect. He fed America with a steady diet of this monumental lie for five years only to finally grudgingly concede that Obama was born in America. On this occasion he defied his dictum never to back down on his lies but rather to double down and spin an even big web of falsities. Politically it was untenable for continue. He often reflects back regretfully that he hadn’t made that concession. 

With his 2016 campaign on the line Trump, having bragged about his pattern of sexual assault of women, apologized in a press release, video recording and presidential debate for his disgusting braggadocio. This episode was labelled “The Access Hollywood Incident”.He has subsequently denied that he  apologized. 

There is good reason why Trump regrets his acknowledgment and half apologies and that he couldn’t stick to the advice that had served him so well all his life from his disembared lawyer and reputation destroyer the sociopath and McCarthyite inquisitor Roy Cohn. These deviations from the norm give the lie to the fact that he is clinically delusional.                   

Trump once again is facing the Courts with post truth arguments in the public arena. 

TRUMP’S LEGAL JEOPARDY. AND THE SUPREME COURT

For the most part it will be The Supreme Court who will control Trump’s eligibility to even  be a candidate and whether he has Presidential immunity. The Robert’s Supreme Court with the lowest ratings ever need this like a hole in the head but a third of the Court shouldn’t complain since they are there thanks to him. The other two radical jurists, Thomas and Alito, are under an ethical cloud but are shameless.

Truth be told Trump’s cases before the Court should pose no challenge. The Court has ruled  as “Constructionists”, that is strictly on the basis of what the Constitution meant at the time it was written. It is clearcut that he shouldn’t even be on the ballot. 

Trump appears fearful that in fact the Supreme Court led, by one of his appointed Justices, Bret Kavanaugh, will author an overwhelming majority decision to keep him off the ballot. Hence his legal counsel has publicly called upon Kavanaugh to “do the right thing” as he, Trump, fought extremely hard to get his nomination confirmed .If in fact Trump’s fears are realized then he has one last hope - amnesty from Congress. He needs a two thirds majority of both Houses to pardon him. In order to do that he will need Democratic votes which he may well get because in accepting a pardon means he admits guilt as do the “GOP” and this does not absolve him from criminal liability. 

Trump’s immunity claim is ridiculous. He literally claims what he swaggered in 2015 that if he shot anyone on Fifth Avenue in New York he would get away with it. 

 The Court may find some bizarre reason to keep Trump on the ballot and in all solemnity debate whether he is immune or not before deciding that he, like everyone else, is responsible for his criminal actions. 

There are also two other State cases besides his perennial  civil litigation for repeated calling his rape victim a liar as well as other civil liability one in which he stands to lose his business license and be fined hundreds of millions of dollars.  

Incidentally the criminal litigation against Trump for stealing of secret documents and obstruction of justice, doesn’t require what the legal fraternity label, “Mens rea” - the intention or knowing of wrongdoing - as the failing to return them is sufficient for conviction.. His lawyers warned him that if he didn’t return them he would be guilty. There are tapes and witnesses that he tried to hide them,,,, tra la la. 

Trump’s defense once again is delusional, namely that as President he was entitled to steal secret documents. The reason that this criminal case is not relevant to this discussion is that the Judge overseeing this case is charitably a rookie and doesn’t quite know what she is doing. She has had two admonitions from a highly Conservative Appellate Court for patently wrong decisions favoring Trump. It is conventional wisdom that one way or another this trial will not start prior to the 2024 Presidential election. 

 Trump’s defense for January 6 is dependent on whether the Special Counsel can prove that he was lying in his ongoing illegal attempts to remain in office.

IS TRUMP LEGALLY INSANE I.E. DIDN’T KNOW THAT HE LOST THE 2020 ELECTION

The onus on the Special Counsel Jack Smith to prove that Trump knowingly did what he did. No good saying -“You lost 61 Court Cases get real”. Trump has stuck to his guns about everything and anything. He has not budged from his position that the election was stolen, that January 6 was not an insurrection and even if it was he didn’t cause it, that he has already been tried in his impeachment and found not guilty and trying him again is double jeopardy, and even if he did attempt to subvert the 2020 election result he would be entitled to because he had immunity as President. 

The world knows that Trump knows exactly what he was doing because, besides everything else, on two situations in order to politically survive, as outlined above, he recanted. However those denials are peripheral to his litigation. What is germane to  his double jeopardy plea is the fact that in his second impeachment trial where it was touch and go that seventeen “GOP” members would join the Democrats and vote that he could never occupy an office of the country again, he argued that he was already out of office and could be subject to criminal law. He cannot go back on that admission 

With regard to his intent in the January 6 litigation, Jack Smith has a string of witnesses including his own lawyers, WhiteHouse Administrative Staff and reportedly his former Chief of Staff that will testify that he knew that Biden had won and therefore he knowingly attempted to prevent the transfer of power. 

Now knowing that Trump is not legally insane or clinically psychotically delusional, the big question is whether his January 6 trial will take place prior to the election. Jay H. Ell believes it will even though the Supreme Court refused to take it up immediately. Following an expedited ruling from the Appellate Court it will set a March date to hear whether or not Trump must face the criminal charges. So even if that crucial trial is put back three months it will be heard in a milieu where post truth is not a defense.

Before even that Trump has obviously reason to believe that he will be removed from the ballot by the Court.

AT THE END OF THE DAY. 

Trump has proved George Orwell’s prophesies. He is the democrat and Biden is the authoritarian. He is honorable and Biden is crooked. He didn’t try and steal the election the election was stolen from him. The convicted insurrectionists are true patriots, presumably like him…….Then he easily holds two opposing thoughts at the same time- he can be criminally liable, (Second Impeachment trial) and he can't have a criminal trial after the impeachment as that is double jeopardy!

As reality beckons he grows more and more desperate and unhinged. He has innumerable civil and criminal trials over the election cycle. Sadly he has convinced thirty five percent of the country that they are victims like him. 

This is not only the age of post truth “delusional” Trump it is The Age of Trump period. The media obsess over his every action then wonder why Biden can’t get his message out!. On the same day that Biden launched his campaign in this fateful time the headlines were either that the Supreme Court had taken up the issue whether Trump was disqualified for causing an insurrection or that he was attacking Biden's speech