Willard ‘Mittens’ Romney’s post-truth politics (big lie) campaign

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

I posted about the relatively new political science concept of Post-Truth Politics a couple of years ago. Briefly:

We live in post-truth politics: a political culture in which politics (public opinion and media narratives) have become almost entirely disconnected from policy (the substance of legislation). This obviously dims any hope of reasoned legislative compromise.

This post-truth politics has become a hallmark of Willard "Mittens" Romney's campaign. As Steve Benen pointed out in The rationale behind ‘bald-faced lies’:

Romney and his team have demonstrated a willingness to lie — blatantly and shamelessly — with discomforting ease. We’ve seen this in offensive campaign ads, routine talking points, policy arguments, and even personal anecdotes and characteristics.

And when pressed, Romney and his aides have freely admitted, more than once, that niceties such as facts, evidence, and reason just aren’t that important to them. Dishonest “propaganda” should simply be expected and accepted, they’ve said.

I’ve been watching national campaigns for quite a while, and I can’t think of any comparable major-party campaigns acting this way[.]

Romney lies often and as carelessly as he does without the slightest regard for how easy it is to prove which of his claims aren’t true. He is confident that the mainstream media will not hold him accountable for his lies, or will devise false equivalencies from minor misstatements of fact by President Obama. It's all the same to the media villagers.

Greg Sargent has also been hammering away on this theme. The method behind Mitt Romney’s Big Lie strategy – The Plum Line:

[A]nother thing that’s also important to understand about Romney’s falsehoods is that they all serve a larger story that he and his advisers have been deliberately developing over time. When you look at all the Big Lies Romney has told in recent months, you’ll see a common thread running through them all.

They’re all about conveying a sense that you should find Obama’s intentions towards America vaguely suspect; that Obama harbors a deep seated indifference or even hostility towards the fundamentals that make America what it is; and that Obama is in some basic way undermining the foundation of American life as we know it.

* * *

At this point, the pattern here is obvious, and it’s clearly not an accident. And Romney and his team will remain secure in the knowledge that most of the media will politely look the other way as the Big Lies keep flowing, and will continue to treat them as just part of the game.

Today, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman adds his voice to the growing number of political commentators who are expounding on the ease with which Mittens Romney lies. The Post-Truth Campaign – NYTimes.com (excerpt):

Over all, Mr. Obama’s positions on economic policy resemble those that moderate Republicans used to espouse. Yet Mr. Romney portrays the president as the second coming of Fidel Castro and seems confident that he will pay no price for making stuff up.

Welcome to post-truth politics.

Why does Mr. Romney think he can get away with this kind of thing? Well, he has already gotten away with a series of equally fraudulent attacks. In fact, he has based pretty much his whole campaign around a strategy of attacking Mr. Obama for doing things that the president hasn’t done and believing things he doesn’t believe.

For example, in October Mr. Romney pledged that as president, “I will reverse President Obama’s massive defense cuts.” That line presumably plays well with Republican audiences, but what is he talking about? The defense budget has continued to grow steadily since Mr. Obama took office.

Then there’s Mr. Romney’s frequent suggestion that the president has gone around the world “apologizing for America.” This is a popular theme on the right — but the so-called Obama apology tour is a complete fabrication, assembled by taking quotes out of context.

As Greg Sargent of The Washington Post has pointed out, there’s a common theme to these whoppers and a number of other things Mr. Romney has said: the strategy is clearly to portray the president as a suspect character, someone who doesn’t share American values. And since Mr. Obama has done and said nothing to justify this portrait, Mr. Romney just invents stuff to make his case.

But won’t there be some blowback? Won’t Mr. Romney pay a price for running a campaign based entirely on falsehoods? He obviously thinks not, and I’m afraid he may be right.

Oh, Mr. Romney will probably be called on some falsehoods. But, if past experience is any guide, most of the news media will feel as though their reporting must be “balanced,” which means that every time they point out that a Republican lied they have to match it with a comparable accusation against a Democrat — even if what the Democrat said was actually true or, at worst, a minor misstatement.

This isn’t an abstract speculation. Politifact, the project that is supposed to enforce truth in politics, has declared Democratic claims that Republicans voted to end Medicare its “Lie of the Year.” It did so even though Republicans did indeed vote to dismantle Medicare as we know it and replace it with a voucher scheme that would still be called “Medicare,” but would look nothing like the current program — and would no longer guarantee affordable care.

So here’s my forecast for next year: If Mr. Romney is in fact the Republican presidential nominee, he will make wildly false claims about Mr. Obama and, occasionally, get some flack for doing so. But news organizations will compensate by treating it as a comparable offense when, say, the president misstates the income share of the top 1 percent by a percentage point or two.

The end result will be no real penalty for running an utterly fraudulent campaign. As I said, welcome to post-truth politics.

The corporate mainstream media is an abject failure. If Obama says the Earth is round and the Earth revolves around the Sun, the corporate mainstream media is compelled to report that Romney says the Earth is flat and the Sun revolves around the Earth, as if both statements are equally true. It is a matter of "opinion" in "fair and balanced" reporting. Even though Obama is stating a demonstrably provable fact, and Romney is stating a demonstrably provable falsehood. The fact-free world of FAUX News Fraudcasting and its immitators in the mainstream media has resulted in the death of truth. And it may be the death of our democracy.