The current political fervor that is winding to a conclusion (finally) in the United States, has drawn the usual measure of accusations, flying back and forth like some sort of verbal fireworks display. In this now rather customary performance of chest pounding and bravado-enriched name calling, we are used to seeing the label "liar" thrown around rather loosely. But as typical as this bombardment has always been, this year has seen the birth to a new breed of fabrication--one that has never been so boldly experienced in American politics.
This year's "liar" labels will forever reshape the political landscape with newly acquired depth of meaning for American politics in general. In fact, there has never been a time when lying has been so universally exploited as a primary strategy for success. This 2012 election year will go down in history as a milestone, marking the point at which brazen lying became not just another tangential component, but THE major focus of a presidential campaign strategy.
In earlier years the use of deliberate fabrication has had its moments of influence both in political campaigns and after their respective elections. The words, "They have WMDs," and "I am not a crook," still ring with a vibrancy that is unmistakable. And while a case can certainly be made for there being a systematic formulation of a network of lies in both of those cases, they pale in comparison to the tightly sewn fabric of UNRELATED lies produced in our current election cycle.
You see, this year things are different. It isn't just an occasional lie, a slight bending of the truth for momentary gain. And it isn't so much a meshwork of interrelated lies, for the purpose of supporting a specifically related agenda, as was the case with the WMDs, for example.
This year we have planned, rehearsed, scheduled lies on a scale never before measured. But these lies are not related to an agenda like justifying the invasion of a sovereign nation or the illegal bugging of an office. No, this year's network of lies indeed has no formal structure, no melding together of a baseline set of opinions about any specific event or agenda. In fact, it isn't even a network. It is, instead, just a series of fabrications based on the researched tendencies of the audience in question. The only agenda involved here is the presentation of what the audience wants to hear, and there is no curbing that agenda with any prior statements to the contrary. It couldn't matter less what has been said before. Only what needs to be said right now is of any concern. Only what THIS GROUP wants to hear is of any importance whatsoever.
But just for fun let's cite some examples. You are on record as saying, "Let Detroit go bankrupt?" Does that present a problem now that a lot of folks are out of work, and lots more who ARE working, are doing so in the companies you would have allowed to go bankrupt? No problem. You ignore what you said previously and state matter-of-factly to your audience of Michigan voters, "I would never do anything to hurt Detroit."
You stated when you campaigned for Governor of Massachusetts, that you were Pro-Choice, and would never do anything to change the existing laws protecting that choice. But in the primaries of your 2008 Presidential campaign--obviously speaking to a group of Pro-Lifers--you said that while Governor, you "came down on the side of Life constantly...in every way" that you knew to be possible.
You claim that you resigned from the infamous Bain Capital in 1999, so you couldn't have had anything to do with the many Bain-controlled companies that went bankrupt, and the many jobs that were lost accordingly during BAIN's rather ugly period of "harvesting assets." But public records indicate you were the CEO and sole stock holder in Bain for at least three more years after 1999. No problem. Just say again, unequivocally, that you resigned in 1999 and had nothing to do with Bain during that period when you were being paid by Bain.
In March you publicly announce your support for the Roy Blunt amendment, which would allow employers to deny contraceptive coverage to employees. Seven months later you emphatically state in a presidential debate, "I don’t believe employers should tell someone whether they could have contraceptive care or not. Every woman in America should have access to contraceptives."
With the Romney campaign in full swing, it is easy to see the major focus and overriding strategy has become the perpetuation of old lies and the promulgation of as many new ones as possible. His campaign continues to run advertising containing critical falsifications that have been soundly debunked by those who do that sort of thing. But Mr. Romney has already covered that minor inconvenience by stating that he would not allow his campaign to be run by fact-checkers. Apparently, he has an equal aversion to the facts, themselves. After all, who needs facts when you make up the statements you require, as the need arises?
This serial falsifier is the first recorded case of Romnesiac Mythomania. It is a term I proudly coin based on the brilliant contribution of some anonymous Obama campaign worker who came up with the name, Romnesia, for Mitt's particular brand of selective forgetting.
It can only be hoped that in a few days, our country can get back to the business at hand, and do some selective forgetting of this Romney campaign, as well.
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