Pants on fire

Judging by his facial expression President Trump did not expect the question S V Date of the Huffington Post asked him at a COVID-19 press conference last week. The question - "Do you regret all the lying you've been doing over the past 4 years to the American people?" Trump bought some time by asking that the question be repeated and then by asking for a clarification ("Who's been lying?"). With all doubts about the question cleared, the president did not answer but called on another reporter and moved on. Those of us who had waited for an incident like this for so long are justifiably disappointed in the lack of a reaction to it. It was the equivalent of the little boy in the crowd proclaiming "But the Emperor has no clothes!". Sure, that was a children's story. In real life in this country the question asked of Senator Joe McCarthy at a senate committee hearing "Have you no sense of decency, sir?" heralded the beginning of the end of his political career. Do we live in the same country today? Is it too much to expect that the reporter called on for the next question would ask the president to answer the previous one? Apparently it is. For every S V Date willing to jeopardize his career there is a roomful of his colleagues who see nothing wrong with continuing to participate in the charade. Is it any wonder that the press is held in such low esteem by the public? Even the president's supporters have stopped pretending he is not a habitual liar. Like the frog in the pot of water coming slowly to a boil, we are all apparently oblivious to the peril we are in. A little over 20 years ago the slogan "character counts" could mobilize public opinion and change election outcomes. Those who swore by that slogan then are today rationalizing conduct which they know is putting our country in peril, all because they want to hold on to their positions of power. I, for one, refuse to believe we will let them get away with it. It is said that when someone asked Benjamin Franklin as he emerged from Independence Hall "What have we got?" he replied "A republican if we can keep it". Like so many anecdotes from history, we may never know if that exchange ever actually took place. But there is a reason stories like that survive over the centuries. In November we face a test. There is only one question on that test, and it is:

"Can we keep this republic?"