The latest Trump pants on fire lie

Misdirection is the first considered refuge of a cornered politician or a guilty suspect.

Of course, some politicians and suspects have a core character that draws the line at lying once caught – and they face the music.

Mr. Trump is not, however, “that guy” who confesses to chopping down the cherry tree.

Mr. Trump charged President Obama wasn’t born in the United States without any evidence.

Mr. Trump claimed he would have won the popular vote last year if there hadn’t been voter fraud without any evidence of fraud.

Mr. Trump claimed to have had the biggest electoral vote since 1984 when President Obama bested Mr. Trump’s electoral total in both of Mr. Obama’s elections.

Mr. Trump lies about things big and small.

Afterwards, he walks his lies back, when the lies have had the desired effect that Mr. Trump contemplated, to gain tribute for himself (often) or, to misdirect public attention from his own misconduct (an almost daily occurrence now).

It is little wonder that Mr. Trump has surrounded himself with cabinet members and oval office staff who have trouble “recalling” their contacts with the Russians during or since the presidential election.

We now know what it is we must investigate – whether the Russians’ interfered in the presidential election in exchange for Mr. Trump relaxing sanctions against Russia for invading Ukraine and seizing Crimea.

Since the election, another serious matter has become manifest, whether Russia’s Ambassador discussed with Mr. Trump’s designated National Security Adviser, Michael Flynn, how to relax President Obama’s sanctions for Russia’s interference in the presidential elections.

Attorney General Sessions recused himself from any oversight by the Justice Department investigation of Russia, admitting that he “should’ve told” the Senate that he met with the Russian Ambassador in Cleveland during the Republican National Convention and in his Senate office.

In order to be confirmed, Senator Sessions told his friends and Senate colleagues and the nation under oath, “I did not have communications with the Russians.”

Mr. Sessions “remembered” afterwards, however, that he spoke with the Russian Ambassador in his office and, in that conversation, the Ukraine “came up” and the Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak “got a little testy.”

But Mr. Sessions just couldn’t remember the details prompting Sergei’s “testy” disquiet.

Mr. Sessions couldn’t recall what was said about the Trump campaign, slipping the press inquiry by conceding only, “most of these ambassadors are pretty gossipy.”  Mr. Sessions admitted, however, that Sergei may have sought the meeting because of Mr. Session’s ties to the campaign; Mr. Sessions headed up the National Security Advisory Committee for the Trump campaign.

When Mr. Sessions saw Sergei earlier in July in Cleveland, it was during the Republican convention and Trump forces intervened in the National Security Committee’s platform meeting to blunt Senator Cruz’s language to continue sanctions against Russia for its Ukraine invasion.

Thus, the context for Mr. Trump’s embattled Saturday morning tweet, his largest “pants on fire” lie perhaps, misdirecting public attention from his own misconduct to a chest-beating claim that he was the real victim, and that was because President Obama had the “wires-tapped” at his gauche gold simulation of a high floor low-ceilinged Versailles apartment.

Mr. Trump understands so little about wiretaps that his claim is disputable on its own terms as the President cannot simply order “a tap.”  All the talking heads on Sunday could not find even a gossamer thin thread of evidence to suggest otherwise.  The former director of national intelligence, James R. Clapper, Jr., said no way.  The FBI Director, James B. Comey, insisted that the Department of Justice must publicly contradict Mr. Trump’s assertion as untrue.  You have to wonder if the recused Mr. Sessions will participate in that response.

Mr. Trump miscalculated badly when he made such an obvious lie.  Vladimir Putin would have crafted a better stratagem.  True, the tweet consumed the Sunday shows, but forced all those talking about the tweet to consider whether Mr. Trump’s motive was to conceal some corrupt bargain with his Russian better, KGB’s finest alumnus, Vladimir Putin.

Why does Mr. Trump conduct himself in this manner?

It’s because his counsel and tutor in such demeaning practices, starting in the 1970s, was Roy Cohn, ruthless mob counsel and the former US Senate counsel to the red-baiting demagogic Committee Chair, Joe McCarthy, who saw commies everywhere.

Consider the irony of Trump’s tweet, that Mr. Trump charges McCarthyism when he’s the one making false and demagogic charges as McCarthy did, and Mr. Trump is defending the “Commies” whereas McCarthy opposed them.

Mr. Trump is going down; he is a tragic figure and this will end badly; only the date is in question.