Do American presidents lie? Or we should ask: Should they?
Michael Blake, a professor of philosophy at the University of Washington, answers, “Yes, they all do!” And he asks it this way: “The question is why and when American presidents lie?”
The Washington Post published a database of U.S. President Donald Trump’s lies and deceptions during his first term. The tally was about 30,000. As the paper reported, all American presidents, from Washington to Trump, engaged in frequent deception of the people. Some presidents and many other statesmen had to resort to it as a patriotic duty, like deceiving the enemy in a conflict, while others did it so skillfully and so frequently because their characters tended toward manipulation and deception. For no particular political reason, they habitually resorted to fraud and hypocrisy
You can read the philosophers' and psychologists' analysis of the attitude and behavior of these habitual liars. Especially, learning about the compulsion Trump has for deception and manipulation that much and that often is very instructive. When you learn that Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher and a central thinker of the Enlightenment, had argued that lying even to a murderer at the door “from Benevolent Motives” was wrong. If you ask Trump, he will probably say, “Yes, you can and should lie to save a life!” Better yet, you must lie if your own tail is in the line.
Because, unlike you and me and Kant, Trump and his ilk believe morality is not derived from reason. He and his secretary of war do not feel truthfulness is an absolute duty of human beings. For these two and some others in his administration, lying is not wrong; it does not undermine trust. The man, who is ruling 350 million people, believes that lying is universal and everyone lies like him.
Kant used to argue that if a murderer asks where your friend is, you must not lie, even to save your friend. Because you are responsible only for your own moral actions, which were telling the truth, not for the consequences caused by others, like the murderer’s actions! Many people strongly disagree with Kant here; lying to save a life is morally justified or even required.
Trump does not even need a moral justification to lie.
Iran was not a threat to any nation, and it would be convinced not to support Hezbollah and Hamas if Israel implemented the United Nations General Assembly resolution demanding withdrawal from the occupied Palestinian territories.
Trump lied that Iran has been killing “thousands of innocent people for the last 47 years!” Where were those thousands of people? “47 years” must be the time passed since the U.S. Embassy occupation in Tehran by the Iranian students who detained more than 50 American diplomats as hostages for 444 days. But Iranians had not killed any innocent or guilty people, not since the 1979 embassy occupation or the 1949 Palestine occupation.
Iran labeled the popular resistance movements like Hezbollah and Hamas as its allies, which are called "proxies" by many others. Lebanese Hezbollah consisted of Shiite adherents and willingly acted as Iran’s proxy, but not Hamas. If they had accepted Iranian military assistance, that was because of necessity. The Palestinian people could not receive humanitarian assistance from the Muslim countries, let alone military supplies, and Iran could supply them through Lebanon.
But Trump shamelessly altered the history, saying Iran was about to have a nuclear arsenal in no time and it was threatening the U.S. and its allies. Iran had not posed a threat to its neighbors, let alone to the U.S. In the third week of the Israeli-American war on Iran, Trump, seeking madly a way to end the war and get out of the mess Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dragged him into, changed his narrative, stating the U.S. doesn’t “have to be there ... But we’re there to help our allies.” He had not consulted European or Asian allies, not even the Gulf countries where he had bases. Not only were they not consulted, but almost all the European and Asian allies have spoken out against the war.
Now the whole world, especially 73% of the American voters, knows that Netanyahu sold Trump on this war: not that Iran was a threat, but Netanyahu needed a new military conflict to be used as an excuse not to go to court, which is waiting to condemn him to 10 years in jail for corruption charges. Netanyahu fouled Trump, claiming that because of its "unprecedented weakness," a joint U.S. and Israeli assault could inflict regime change in Iran. At the start of the war, Trump urged the Iranian people to rise and overthrow the regime after Netanyahu did the same in his own message. Now that the liar tries to mess with Americans’ heads, saying that he never sought regime change in Iran.
David Rothkopf, an American foreign policy and national security analyst, finds Trump, “a man with the emotional maturity of a three-year-old and the foresight of a newt,” not only ruined the U.S. economy, endangered its own oil and gas production for many years to come, but also put the European and Asian allies in great danger.
The Hormuz Straight was open and functioning perfectly before Trump was on Iran, but now it is closed, and he is asking NATO and the Europeans to join his war to reopen it. For a week, he lied to the world that the U.S. air power was able to “obliterate” Iran’s entire military power; but losing America’s most modern air-fighters one after another, his administration of the war represented a significant defeat for the U.S.
The previous Sunday night on Air Force One, he lied to the American media again, saying that Iran had agreed to his 15-point demand during “negotiations.” Last Sunday, he said there were no negotiations because Netanyahu had one of the most prominent Iranian negotiators killed!
That is because Netanyahu needs that aimless war to go on indefinitely. If it ends, he will start another war (probably, he will end the so-called ceasefire in Gaza) and drag Trump by his nose into it.
Professor Jeffrey Sachs, in one of his TV interviews, said, “Iran is a victim of illegal war.” I respectfully disagree, professor. The major casualty in this war is Trump himself! Is he a “collateral damage” or an incidental contingency? I am not sure. But he is definitely a pathological liar, like that lawyer in Jim Carrey’s movie. Still, we cannot find a way to make him inexplicably stop lying for 24 whole hours.
