The current President of the United States is a pathological liar. This all men know. Some of us have known it since the 80s. His early fame was based on the lie of his business acumen, his television show was a lie about his ability manage and his political career was based on racist lie about a functional President. Now, as he fumbles through a collapsing economy and a raging pandemic, he makes wild claims all the time. But two lies this week are dangerous on a level.
When the explosion in Beirut occurred the other day, there was a great deal of speculation of what caused it on the internet. Silly speculation was that it was a small nuclear device or a MOAB (Mother of All Bombs). It was clear from every video that it wasn't a nuclear device because the shock wave would have vaporized those who filmed the blast. The MOAB which actually stands for Massive Ordinance Air Blast is a bomb the size of a city bus that is dropped from a C-130 and explodes over the target not at grown level. Since there was always a fire already raging at the port many were filming the area when it blew up. No one saw an airplane drop a giant bomb at the time. The current story is that a massive amount of explosive material was being stored at the port and when the fire from a fireworks warehouse reached it the ammonium nitrate it went up.
But the President a few hours later speaking in front of reporters said that it looked like an attack. When asked about it in a follow up he said that he spoke with the generals and they said it was an attack. He has since doubled down. The problem is that there is no evidence it was an attack and so now it feeds the rumors that are part of the culture in that part of the world. Lebanon is a country whose government is already in trouble because of failures on many levels but it also sows the seeds of conspiracies. So when rumors are out that it was an attack there are few suspects in the minds of the people and the main antagonist is Israel. In fact, there are those in the reason who blame Israel for losing a sock in the wash. While Israel was pleading to allow then to come help with the aftermath, our President is feeding the notion that Israel may be responsible for this horrific accident. This helps the government of Lebanon avoid their own culpability in the explosion because they see calls for revolution in the streets today. This was not only an irresponsible statement, referencing the generals made it a lie that drags our military leaders into it. They, the generals, however have stated that they can't figure out who said anything to the President.
The other lie was dangerous to our own citizens. In an interview with Fox News, the President said children are immune to Covid-19. This was part of his effort to have schools open for in-person instruction around the country. This is simply not true. Children get Covid-19, children die of Covid-19, children spread Covid-19 to vulnerable family members, and children should not be treated as canaries in coal mines. This lie will feed the ridiculous people who see the virus as a hoax, a Democratic ploy or some other nonsense. I have already seen this lie repeated by the anti-mask, anti-lock down crowd. They take what the President says as fact. While reality doesn't care what you think, the actions of those who believe these falsehoods can be deadly to many. The President shouldn't make these kinds of statements that are not only false they drive actions that put people at risk. To me it is clear that he doesn't care about the people he could hurt.
The President lies easily and sometimes for no reason. It seems to be the way he interacts with the universe. Some of his lies are laughable. Some of his lies are hurtful. Some of his lies are dangerous. But he lies so often that he is rarely held accountable because by the time anyone speaks on the first lie his next one is in the wild. But we must stop and analyse these kinds of lies because if we don't who knows what will come next.
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