Destroying Truth Simply to Gain Attention

By Shlomo Maital

Cartoon: Psychology Today

Alexander Petri,  in an Op-Ed in the Wahsington Post, September 17, 2024, recounts these words by a Trump favorite:

    “If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do.” — Republican vice-presidential nominee JD Vance    

Words matter.

When you slander a hard-working community, like Springfield, Ohio, with a bald lie (Haitian immigrants ther steal and eat dogs and cats), you bring far-right marches, bomb threats against schools, and personal harm and risk to thousands of innocent people. 

Lying is one thing.  Very bad. But justifying lying, in order to draw attention????

Is politics today about gaining attention at all cost, by floating the most unbelievable, sensational, hurtful, stupid, bald-faced lying attacks on human beings?

 J.D. Vance has an even chance to become Vice-President of the United States, and in 2028, President. 

  Will we ever again believe a word that comes from his mouth – including, as a wag once said, ‘the’ and ‘and’?   

   Is truth in America doomed?  Are we doomed in the foreseeable future to invented stories by J.D. Vance?

    Eating dogs? 

    You couldn’t make it up…

     Or could you?  J.D. could.