Saving the “best” for last, we capture the essence of the last three presidents who somehow wormed their way into the highest office in the land. Most current presidents like past ones agree that American motives are always pure, standing up for democracy in every country they invade. Don’t believe me? Ask the people who live in Haiti, a country falling apart at the seams thanks to America’s “help.”
Think we’re getting into conspiracy-land here? History doesn’t lie and as this sordid tale unfolds, the proof of the pudding is manifest. Let’s begin with the third most current president, Saint Obama who, even after his many betrayals of campaign promises to improve American lives bit the dust, he continues to bedazzle the majority of democratic voters. Maybe you don’t remember his numerous broken promises so let’s concentrate on his biggest whoppers. In first place is the illusory public option that was to be the crown jewel of his new healthcare system. It didn’t make the cut. Here’s how Obama explained its absence: “Like every major piece of legislation… the law is not perfect. We’ve had to make adjustments along the way.” Making adjustments led to the disappearing public option. Farewell public option.
What about his campaign promise to uphold the rights of union workers— “If American workers are being denied their right to organize and collectively bargain when I’m in the White House, I’ll put on a comfortable pair of shoes myself, I’ll walk on that picket line with you as President of the United States of America.” In the face of stonewalling by powerful corporations, aka Obama’s major donors, and a right-wing governor Obama’s bold stance melted down to [speaking through his press secretary] “… he [Obama] made his viewpoints known on the situation in Wisconsin, the need for people to come together… and sacrifice together.” What he meant all along— that all the sacrificing would be one-sided, falling squarely on public and private union members. Collective bargaining was never on the presidential radar.
You might be tempted to point out that campaign promises are not meant to be taken seriously. Every presidential hopeful makes promises which usually wind up in the circular file. But some lies are much more dangerous than empty promises for a fairer deal for the people. Some lies set the stage for another U.S. war. On Apr 14, 2008, candidate Obama promised that one of his first acts in office would be to ask his attorney general to “immediately review” the potential of war crimes in the Bush White House. You probably won’t be surprised to learn that the opposite happened. Obama’s Justice Department defended former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others against charges of war crimes and refused to investigate the CIA for its use of torture and rendition.
It was a broken promise that the Muslim world never forgave him or America for. How did he defend the indefensible? “…My instinct is for us to focus on how do we make sure that moving forward we are doing the right thing…When it comes to national security what we have to focus on is getting things right in the future as opposed to looking at what we got wrong in the past.”
It turns out that Obama was no exception to the rule that US leaders have a longstanding habit of fighting wars which they claim to be in the interests of human rights that are really about oil or geopolitics. How else to explain the U.S. support for dictatorships in Argentina, Chile, Indonesia, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, among other places) and the overthrow of democratic governments in Guatemala, Chile and Iran.
On March 28, 2011, Obama became a contender for top spot in the presidential liars sweeps. This time it was Libya and its leader Gadaffi who were slated for extinction. As we expected from Obama his excuse was a clever blend of a blatant lie and a masterful obfuscation. “The task that I assigned our forces [is] to protect the Libyan people from immediate danger.… Broadening our military mission to include regime change would be a mistake.”. Long after Obama’s Secretary of State, Bill Gates, was out of office and had nothing to lose, he came clean and admitted what everybody already suspected: “the fiction was maintained” that the goal was limited to disabling Colonel Gaddafi’s military command. Getting rid of Gaddafi was the real objective, leaving what was once the most prosperous African country in ruins. Obama’s blunder came back to bite the U.S. as once Libya was leaderless, Libyan weapons, bombs, and missiles became the property of terrorists all over the Mideast. Three guesses who they used them on.
This Nobel peace prize winning President came into office while the U.S. was embroiled in two wars. By the time he left office, the U.S. had ratcheted that total up to seven wars. The power of lies in the hands of a seasoned and unconscionable liar is the true tale of the eight-year Obama reign of terror.
Surprisingly the only president who told the truth, once only, was credited with being the biggest liar of them all. The jury is still out on that assertion. Never known for his subtlety Trump let it all hang out: “We left troops behind [in Syria] only for the oil…we’re keeping the oil, we have the oil, the oil is secure.” To know the oil is secure must come as a relief to all those “USA, USA” chanting troglodytes (aka Trump’s base) After that one moment of candor Trump quickly reverted to page one of the official presidential playbook — lies to disarm a gullible public. In January of 2020, the Trump administration assassinated the Iranian General Qassem Soleimani justifying the killing by citing the “imminent threat’ [the general posed to] United States forces and interests in the Middle East”. As presidential lies go, this one had lots of holes. It turned out later in a series of legally mandated communications between the White House and Congress that by the administration’s own admission no such imminent threat existed. As one legal scholar (possibly an Obama supporter) noted: “We have carried out the attack on the territory of a state [Syria] that plainly did not give us permission, the attack was unlawful, the assassination was not justifiable.”
From the ridiculous to the more ridiculous, we turn to the current President Biden. Although only three years into his first term, he has been awarded the SA Whooper-in-Chief badge for meritorious service in keeping the presidential liars’ tradition alive and well going on fourteen presidents (since the end of World War II. Look no further than the U.S. managed Ukraine war and Biden’s initial justification for sending over $120 billion to keep the faltering Ukraine war effort on life support. “We’re going to help Ukraine build a strong, capable defense across land, air, and sea, which will be a force of stability in the region and deter against any and all threats.” Biden’s speech writer must have labored mightily to come up with that yarn. That it was a lie didn’t seem to have bothered any of the top brass including Biden. It didn’t take long for Biden to blow his cover. At a widely watched speech in Poland he blurted out— “For God’s sake, this man [Putin] cannot remain in power.” Although his handlers begged him to recant, Joe wasn’t budging — “I’m not walking anything back…I wasn’t then, nor am I now, articulating a policy change. I was expressing the moral outrage that I feel and I make no apologies for it.” In Joe’s muddled brain, moral outrage was at worst a white lie. Many in his audience weren’t so sure.
What is clear from the trail of duplicity which our last three Presidents have walked, the U.S. leadership class occupying the top spot in the food chain is bipartisan in their belief that the U.S. is exempt from following the tenets of human rights treaties, even ones they sign, in operations abroad and have no compunction about lying to the American people to hide their original lies.
Is there a human being on this planet that could become the president of the United States who isn’t a consummate liar. It’s a question that should worry all Americans.
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