In a 1710 newspaper, satirist Jonathan Swift wrote: “Falsehood flies, and the truth comes limping after it.” Keep that in mind as we assess, and limp after, the latest lie tweeted by a Trumpist Republican. And as the campaign season grinds on, gird yourself for a lot more, for a veritable fire hose of Russian-style disinformation.
A 3:02 p.m. yesterday, Arizona congressman Paul Gosar – a Trump lickspittle eager to abet Trump’s threatened march toward war – tweeted a photo that shows President Barack Obama shaking hands in friendly fashion with Iran President Hassan Rouhani. You don’t need a PhD from Trump University to decode the message that Gosar was sending to the dolts who follow his feed.
There was only one problem: Obama and Rhouhani have never met.
The fake pic has been circulating since 2015, when supporters of Wisconsin Republican Ron Johnson tried to use it in his Senate campaign. (That ad was produced by a GOP strategist who’d participated in the 2004 plot to smear John Kerry’s military service. Natch.) And even though the photo-shopped Obama image has been repeatedly debunked – the real photo shows Obama shaking hands with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh – some right-wing propagandists, like Paul Gosar, still find it useful. Since the goal is to paint Obama as “weak” for forging a nuclear deescalation pact with Iran, what better way than to put it in a picture? Seeing is believing, right?
The irony, apparently lost on Gosar, is that Trump himself has no qualms about meeting up with bad guys, no matter who they are. In 2018, Trump said: “I’ll meet with anybody. I believe in meeting…There’s nothing wrong with meeting.”
And if you’re not familiar with Gosar, this may help: When he ran for re-election in 2018, six of his siblings endorsed his Democratic opponent. They even attacked their brother in Democratic videos. The siblings said that their brother “is not just not fit for that (House) office and he needs to be removed.” They said he “just keeps getting nuttier and nuttier” – as evidenced, for example, by his baseless belief that the infamous white nationalist rally in Charlottesville was a false-flag operation financed by George Soros. (Gosar’s response to his siblings: “Like leftists everywhere, they put political ideology before family. Stalin would be proud.”)
By the way, Gosar declared not long ago that he knew the identity of the intelligence official who blew the whistle on Trump’s Ukraine scandal. He said it was George Soras’ son. Along with a slew of right-wing loons, he tweeted that lie.
Gosar is a dentist by trade. I wouldn’t let that guy floss me.
But I digress. For a few minutes yesterday, journalists wondered whether Gosar had tweeted the fake Obama-Rouhani photo without knowing it was fake, and that perhaps his sin was mere stupidity. But at 4 p.m., Gosar solved the mystery. In a new tweet, he said: “To the dim-witted reporters…no one said this wasn’t photoshopped.”
Thanks for clearing that up! It’s good to know that a mendaciously Machiavellian congressman knowingly posted the fake photo for dim-witted followers, knowing full well that images can be more powerful and persuasive than words. Congressmen are supposed to behave better than that – according to House ethics rules, members are required to “conduct themselves at all times in a manner that reflects credibility on the House” – but as we most vividly witnessed during the recent impeachment hearings, the chamber’s Trumpist Republicans have defected to The Twilight Zone.
Paul Gosar is merely a metaphor for a fact-free party in thrall to the most notorious liar in presidential history. And as the flap over the fake Obama photo began to fade last night, Nikki Haley surfaced Fox News with a brand new lie marketed for mass consumption. Haley, auditioning anew for the Trumpist base and her own fact-free political future, told Sean Hannity:
“The only ones that are mourning the loss of Soleimani are Democrat leadership and our Democrat presidential candidates.”
Not a single Democrat, in leadership or on the campaign trail, has been “mourning the loss” of the assassinated Iranian general. But, as Jonathan Swift pointed out, fact-checking a flying lie is merely to limp after it. He satirized the worst of human nature 310 years ago, and one hesitates to imagine what he would make of us now.