It goes without saying that one of the tragedies of 2017 was the relegation of reality to the backburner of public discourse.

I’m not much on the notion that there is an objective distinction between “right” and “wrong” (“right” and “wrong” are almost always subjective). On a personal note, I once publicly castigated a former friend’s modus operandi as “wrong.” I actually regret that characterization because again, there are relatively few instances where something can fairly be described as hands-down “wrong” and that wasn’t one of them.

But while “right” and “wrong” are generally subjective, there is an objective distinction between truth and lies. Sure, “spin” is employed gratuitously by the media on both sides and thanks to spin, facts are often presented in a way that betrays the inherent biases of the person presenting them.

That said, before 2017 everyone generally worked from the same set of facts. It was just a matter of how far the right (or the left) would go in the application of spin. When deliberate spin morphs into purposeful deception via misinformation campaigns, that’s when the line has to be drawn.

Well Donald Trump has ushered in what’s come to be known as the post-Truth world where the President of the United States traffics in outright falsehoods – demonstrably inaccurate statements that simply are not “true” in any sense of the word. He doesn’t “spin” things – he employs outright lies in an effort to suspend disbelief and help his followers persist in the “MAGA” fantasy.

To our conservative readers who are still persisting in this fantasy (and that won’t be all of our conservative readers because God knows there are a lot of GOPers who aren’t buying into this anymore), try something new: read the rest of this post and look at the charts.