When I was a kid, I overheard some adults telling a strange story that went like this. It seems one of their friends heard several reports about her husband walking arm-in-arm with an unfamiliar woman. Then she found lipstick on her husband’s shirt collar and a hotel receipt in his pocket for a day he said he was at work. When she confronted him, he quickly hung up the phone and claimed he was talking to “no one.”
“Are you having an affair?” the woman asked.
“Did you witness me having sex with another woman?” her husband snapped.
“No,” the wife replied.
“Well, then,” the husband announced. “Thank you for proving that I’ve been faithful to you!”
The men laughed while the women grimaced. I was too young back then to understand “gaslighting” as practiced by liars and cheats. Now, with the help of the world’s most famous adulterer, Donald Trump, I understand the point of the story. When confronted with the Mueller report, Trump boasted, “No collusion! No obstruction!” in classic gaslighting fashion.
In fact, the Mueller report shows how Russia acted to weaken the United States by supporting an unqualified, unstable, irresponsible and easily manipulated candidate. The report shows that Trump and his campaign welcomed Russia’s help, lied about that help, and didn’t report the election interference to American authorities.
Mueller’s team declined to say that Trump’s Russian connections rose to the level of a provable, criminal “conspiracy,” but those connections are clearly damning to Trump and his campaign. The report also shows that Trump acted maliciously to undermine the investigations into the Russian election attack. Mueller’s team didn’t charge Trump with obstruction of justice only because he is a sitting president. If he weren’t, he’d be indicted right now.
And yet the gaslighters are out in force, braying for Trump’s innocence. How should we deal with these people as they deny basic reality?
For example, I have a coworker who floods Facebook with memes portraying Democrats as insanely attacking a heroic president. Many of his reposted memes (never original material because that would require original thinking) claim that Democrats see imaginary Russians around every corner. If my coworker had read the report, he would know that Mueller clearly destroyed Trump’s talking point that Russia didn’t attack our election. Other memes from this coworker depict Democrats driven by hatred and delusion rather than patriotism and evidence. And, of course, he posts fact-free, absurd memes twisting reality to blame Obama and Clinton for Trump’s crimes.
How can I expect this guy to do his job when he can’t see basic reality?
What about Attorney General William Barr? He has been lying about the Mueller report since it was submitted. Barr claimed Mueller didn’t find collusion, but the report details multiple inappropriate contacts between the Trump campaign and Russians, and Mueller made clear he was looking for criminal conspiracy, not collusion. Barr claimed that Mueller didn’t feel bound by the guideline that a sitting president can’t be indicted, but Mueller cited that exact guideline as part of the reason for not charging Trump. Barr claimed he had the right to pass judgement on the president’s obstruction, but Mueller clearly left that for Congress to decide.
Hundreds of former Justice Department prosecutors (Republicans and Democrats from the Eisenhower to Trump administrations) recently signed a letter saying that Trump would be charged with obstruction of justice were he not a sitting president.
How can we have faith in our justice system when the attorney general’s written statements, press conferences, and even congressional testimony are incredibly dishonest?
And, worst of all, how should we deal with a president who denies the basic reality that he has been caught in a multilayered web of lies, deceit, collusion, and obstruction? Trump can lie about the report, defy subpoenas, falsely claim executive privilege, and rail about “witch hunts” all he wants. That doesn’t change the fact that he’s unfit for any office, let alone the highest office in our nation.
What do we do as responsible citizens when we see Trump and his enablers deny basic reality in ways that damage the moral fabric of our country? How can we trust these self-serving liars to care about the nation’s best interests? Do we take the easy path and accept their lies, shrugging our collective shoulders and ignoring evidence? Or do we take the difficult path and confront those who think a lie that benefits them is better than a truth that benefits us all?
Do we just dab some stain-remover on the collar and toss the cheater’s shirt into the washing machine? Or do we dump his entire wardrobe into the street?
I say we dump the cheater and landslide him from our White House in November 2020. Once on the street, he won’t be able to damage our country any further. And he won’t be able to hide behind the temporary immunity of his office. That’s when prosecutors should follow Mueller’s roadmap and indict Trump for flagrantly obstructing our nation’s justice system.
Gaslighting philanderers, terrible as they are, don’t necessarily belong in jail. But criminal presidents absolutely do.
John Sheirer is an author and teacher who lives in Florence. His most recent book is, “Donald Trump’s Top Secret Concession Speech.” Find him at JohnSheirer.com.