The institutionalised lying of the "centre ground"
Forget left v right. The divide now is between fantasists and realists
This is an expanded version of my column in today’s Times (£) of London.
By common consent, the public believe that all politicians lie to them. There's truth in that, of course. But more significant are the lies people tell themselves.
The astonishing thing about the reaction to Joe Biden’s performance in last week’s TV debate with Donald Trump was the astonishment displayed by so many.
The mental decline of America’s 46th president has been a topic of widespread discussion and concern throughout his term of office. Indeed, it surfaced as early as the 2020 presidential campaign, which he conducted effectively in hiding (reportedly in his basement) to avoid the kind of scrutiny that it was assumed would reveal his mental frailty.
Ever since, that frailty has become ever more pronounced. There have been innumerable videos of, and references to, his regular physical and verbal stumbles, his unfinished sentences, his vacant stares and bewildered behaviour. *
Yet during the TV debate, Democrat sympathisers in the media and elsewhere went into shock at his patent mental infirmity. Tears were shed on air; hands flew to mouths; brows were smitten at the sudden realisation that Biden couldn’t actually be running the country. Fancy!
So why was there such an anguished rending of garments as if this had come as a bolt from the blue?
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