【美国日记】21.02.03 不管什么王，都是“撒谎王”！_风闻

“精美”和“美分”等“吃狗屎的苍蝇（港独苍蝇哥）”在抹黑中国时，常用美国人信上帝因此什么都是好的/对的。美国总统作为美国的领袖和楷模，也是美国的代表，难道是上帝教导他们撒谎？还是他们根本不信上帝？

非常有名的美媒《大西洋月刊》发表了以下的观点。

所以蓬佩奥的名言不是首创，只是注解。

所有总统都撒谎。即便如此，特朗普政府在还是将不诚实武器化到惊人的程度。

唐纳德·特朗普不仅撒谎夸大自己的成就，或者抹黑对手。对于特朗普和共和党来说，说谎是对忠诚度的考验。拒绝特朗普的谎言或夸张，即使它们与现任总统先前的主张相抵触，也是要表达不忠，这是特朗普时代唯一的被他的信徒无法宽恕的罪恶。这使总统能够为支持者塑造不容质疑的替代现实，例如他对选民欺诈的虚假指控。

当然，那不是后果的唯一谎言。总统从左翼制造了恐怖主义威胁，并隐瞒来自右翼的警告。他惩处了适当进行监督的政府官员，并奖励了那些按他的意愿误导公众的人。最具有破坏性的是，他对一场大流行的范围和危险撒了谎，这场大流行正在杀死近50万美国人。。

拜登时代预示着将重新回到典型的总统不诚实，而没有定义特朗普时代的个性崇拜。但是总统的谎言在特朗普出现之前很长一段时间就具有破坏性，因此新闻界和公众应该抵制这种诱惑，认为拜登政府将永远处于平等地位，或者可以容忍其不诚实，因为拜登的前任曾因为这种放弃而虚假。有时候，公共利益会与白宫的政治利益发生冲突，在某些时候，总统会撒谎。

总统出于各种原因撒谎。林登·约翰逊（Lyndon B. Johnson）和理查德·尼克松（Richard Nixon）都对越南战争撒谎。比尔·克林顿（Bill Clinton）谎称与莫妮卡·莱温斯基（Monica Lewinsky）的关系，罗纳德·里根（Ronald Reagan）谎称向伊朗出售武器，以资助尼加拉瓜的右翼武装分子。乔治·W·布什（George H. W. Bush）谎称要提高税收；他的儿子乔治·W·布什（George W. Bush）撒谎以便利他推动伊拉克战争。巴拉克•奥巴马（Barack Obama）对《平价医疗法案》（Affordable Care Act）将如何影响先前存在的健康保险计划撒谎。成为总统之前，拜登以夸口和夸张而著称，其中最令人难忘的谎言是，他在探视被监禁的纳尔逊·曼德拉时被捕。这些是欺骗，而不仅仅是凡人所犯的事实错误。

***有时总统会撒谎是因为他们的行为政治不便。有时他们说谎是因为他们认为事实会损害国家安全。有时他们撒谎掩盖自己的不当行为。有时，他们撒谎掩饰自己与政治盟友甚至政治对手之间的摩擦。有时他们只是在虚张声势。有时它们会因疏忽，误导或轻描淡写而说谎。***我们不太可能看到谄媚的内阁成员公开舔拜登靴子的场面，但这并不是判断总统的标准。

拜登已经试图通过设定专家认为过于温和的疫苗接种预期来误导公众，这将使总统在目标超标时宣布自己的方法取得巨大成功。拜登周四坚持认为，在100天之内接种1亿疫苗是一个雄心勃勃的目标，新闻界宣称这是不可能的。

我觉得这很有趣-昨天，媒体问了一个问题：一亿够了吗？一周前，他们说：“拜登，你疯了吗？你不可能在100天之内做到一亿。”好吧，我们愿意，上帝愿意，不仅要做一亿，我们还将做的更多。但这是-我们必须这样做。我们必须行动。

事实上，这是错误的。尽管对流行病本身和疫苗供应都处理不当，但到拜登上任时，特朗普政府已接近这一步伐。疫苗科学家彼得·霍特兹（Peter Hotez）在接受《华盛顿邮报》采访时说：“如果要在六个月内阻止病毒传播，每天要进行100万次疫苗接种还远远不够。”拜登政府此后宣称1亿剂疫苗的目标是“下限，而不是上限”。周一，拜登宣布了一个新的目标，即在未来的100天之内生产1.5亿种疫苗，这是在默默地承认最初的目标并不像他所声称的那样雄心勃勃。

拜登的言论远不及特朗普坚持认为病毒会“消失”的可怕程度，但特朗普式的谎言不该成为上下限。标准应该是一个纯粹的事实，即使拜登政府有时会不可避免地不符合该标准。拜登将说谎。所有总统都这样做。

*********************************************************************************************

“真探”的翻译不是最好的，有兴趣的朋友请看以下原文：

All presidents lie. Even so, the Trump administration weaponized dishonesty to a remarkable degree.

Donald Trump did not merely lie to exaggerate his accomplishments, or smear his opponents. For Trump and the Republican Party, lies were a loyalty test. To reject Trump’s lies or exaggerations, even if they contradicted prior assertions by the now-ex-president, was to express disloyalty, the only Trump-era sin that was unforgivable by his faithful. This allowed the president to fashion for his supporters alternate realities whose tenets could not be questioned, such as his false allegations of voter fraud.

That was not the only lie of consequence, of course. The president manufactured terrorism threats from the left, and suppressed warnings about those on the right. He punished government officials who properly engaged in oversight and rewarded those who misled the public as he wanted. Most damaging, he lied about the scope and danger of a pandemic that is on course to kill half a million Americans. Listing his lies would require more time than I can offer here.

The Biden era presages a return to typical presidential dishonesty, without the cult of personality that defined the Trump era. But presidential lies were destructive long before Trump appeared, so the press and the public should resist the temptation to assume that the Biden administration will always be on the level, or that its dishonesties can be forgiven because Biden’s predecessor wielded falsehood with such abandon. There will be moments when the public interest conflicts with the political interest of the White House, and during some of these moments, the president will lie.

Presidents lie for all sorts of reasons. Lyndon B. Johnson lied about the Vietnam War, as did Richard Nixon. Bill Clinton lied about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky, Ronald Reagan lied about selling weapons to Iran to fund right-wing militants in Nicaragua. George H. W. Bush lied about raising taxes; his son George W. Bush lied to facilitate his push for war in Iraq. Barack Obama lied about how the Affordable Care Act would affect preexisting health-insurance plans. Prior to becoming president, Biden was known for bluster and exaggerations, including most memorably the falsehood that he was arrested while trying to visit an imprisoned Nelson Mandela. These are deceptions, not mere errors of fact, which all mortals make.

Sometimes presidents lie because the politics of their actions are inconvenient. Sometimes they lie because they believe the facts would harm national security. Sometimes they lie to cover up their own misdeeds. Sometimes they lie to conceal friction between themselves and their political allies, or even their political adversaries. Sometimes they are simply bluffing; other times they will lie by omission, misdirection, or understatement. We are unlikely to be treated to the spectacle of obsequious Cabinet members publicly licking Biden’s boots on camera, but that is not the standard upon which presidents should be judged.

Already, Biden has sought to mislead the public by setting expectations for vaccinations that experts have said are too modest—which will allow the president to declare his approach a great success if the goal is exceeded. On Thursday, Biden insisted that 100 million vaccinations in 100 days was an ambitious goal that the press had declared impossible.

I found it fascinating—yesterday the press asked the question: Is, you know, 100 million enough? A week before, they were saying, “Biden, are you crazy? You can’t do 100 million in 100 days.” Well, we’re going to, God willing, not only do 100 million, we’re going to do more than that. But this is—we have to do this. We have to move.

This was, in fact, false—the Trump administration had nearly reached that pace by the time Biden took office, despite its mishandling of both the pandemic itself and vaccine supply. Speaking to The Washington Post, the vaccine scientist Peter Hotez said that “1 million vaccinations per day is not nearly enough if the aim is to halt virus transmission in six months.” The Biden administration has since claimed that the 100 million target was “a floor, not a ceiling.” On Monday Biden announced a new target of 150 million vaccines over the next hundred days, a tacit acknowledgment that the original goal was not as ambitious as he had claimed.

Biden’s remarks are nowhere near as egregious as Trump’s insistence that the virus would “disappear,” but Trumpian lies should be neither floor nor ceiling. The standard should be the plain truth, even though the Biden administration will, at times, inevitably fail to meet it. Biden will lie. All presidents do.