Last Saturday, I was reading the FT’s weekend section, saw a long interview with Bob Lighthizer. I’ve known him not well since his days working for Bob Dole before Trump 1.0, he became the hardline protectionist czar. He has provocative ideas of debatable solutions, but he’s interesting. So I began to read the piece before getting to the substance. Lighthizer declared that Trump was the most honest man he knew.
That’s when it was time to discount everything else that he said. I’ve been reading newspaper stories and watching television for well over half a century. And often there are small errors. That’s understandable. It’s not a perfect business. But when one sees a major, a big error, that casts credibility on the entire story. If I read a story on NATO that writes that Egypt is a member, that’s so recklessly careless, that I really don’t pay much credence to the rest of the story.
Or if a piece talks about Newt Gingrich as a serious historian, you know it’s not for real. It was this week that Newt said that Trump may well go down as the third greatest US president, better than FDR, better than Jefferson. That’s the kind of stuff you just laugh. So when I see Bob Lighthizer uttering a total fabrication, whatever you think of Trump’s policies, integrity is not his strong suit or any suit, that does cast doubts about the rest of the piece.
Now I do watch Fox News, I read stories in the Federalist or Jonathan Turley’s columns, which I think all these are often more than slightly flawed, to see what the other side is thinking. But when a serious piece contains a big factual error or an absurd contention, either stop reading or just take the rest lightly.
I’m going to waste your time to tell you “well done,” but sometimes you must thank people for continuing telling the truth.