Jack Hitt, an author and journalist, thinks the mainstream media have started to push back against politicians’ lies because of “the sheer magnitude of [Donald] Trump’s horseshit.” In his cover story for the November issue of The New Republic, Hitt asserted that “thanks to Trump, some television hosts have discovered the ratings pull of a different style of journalism. Jake Tapper of CNN grilled Trump about his bigotry regarding the all-American judge of Mexican descent [Gonzalo Curiel] so skillfully and persistently that Trump wound up making several more mistakes, and now avoids the subject entirely. The interview was…a departure from standard TV interview fare…which strives to be ‘fair’ in the face of nonstop falsehoods.”
Now, noted Hitt, “other journalists have followed suit…When the New York Times ran a story about Trump ‘softening’ his immigration stance after one of his bloodcurdling nativist dog whistles, the rest of the media vilified the paper. When Matt Lauer beat Hillary [Clinton] with a two-by-four before letting Trump spout one unchallenged lie after another, other journalists suggested [Lauer] be reassigned to the weather desk. CNN has even taken to running onscreen disclaimers: ‘Trump: I Never Said Japan Should Have Nukes (He Did),’ and ‘Trump Calls Obama Founder of ISIS (He’s Not).’”
As for Hillary, Hitt contended, that new, tougher standard doesn’t really apply, since her flaws don’t include mendacity (bolding added):
Hillary lies the way her husband lies, which is to say she does not lie. What she does do is even more irritating…Take any of her lies, sit down with the facts, and -- well, as James Comey found, it’s like trying to pith mercury. Clinton said, for instance, that Comey testified that she had told the truth in her statements about the email controversy. Well, not precisely. What he said was, “We have no basis to conclude she lied to the FBI.” Clinton’s parsing was weaselly, but not a lie.
The Big Lie, as practiced by Richard Nixon—when he insisted he “scrupulously respected the neutrality of the Cambodian people” while bombing Cambodia—is a lie so huge that, usually, everyone falls for it because of the sheer audacity of the claim. Bill Clinton, by contrast, was the first to perfect what should be called the Tiny Truth. In his infamous deposition, he managed to get “sex” defined as intercourse, and then said that he had not had sex with Monica Lewinsky, which as we all know is true in the smallest possible sense of anything being true.
For Nixon, the Big Lie served as an occasional dodge; for Trump, it’s his native tongue.
