So the pivot never came.
Only the continuing darkness - Darth Trump and his Death Star, full of talk about the largely mythical problems and failures he sees. He offered no hope, no ideas, no solutions - only trumped up fear, hate, gloom and doom - and his favorite admonition: "Believe me! Believe me!"
For an hour and 16 minutes Thursday night, Donald Trump rambled and ranted through the longest Republican nomination acceptance speech in more than 40 years. Yet the Donald's business plan for America was completely lacking in substance. Not surprisingly, it also was lacking in the "truth" he promised.
"We cannot afford to be so politically correct anymore," he said. "Here, at our convention, there will be no lies."
Hah!
When Trump's wind finally stopped blowing and his children were finished doing their best to put a positive light on a man who can't seem to do it himself, he looked into the television camera and said, "I will be your voice."
Heaven help us.
Let's look at just a few of his Trumpian facts.
- The self-proclaimed "law and order" candidate said homicides in the last year increased by 17 percent in America's 50 largest cities - the largest increase in 25 years. Naturally, he blamed it on "this administration's rollback of criminal enforcement."
Truth be told, homicides in America's largest cities are half - HALF - what they were 25 years ago when George H.W. Bush roamed the White House. Trump's rising crime statistics came from a Washington Post analysis published in January, but Trump conveniently omitted the fact that it pertained only to some, not all, of the 50 largest cities and that the statistical jump last year was so large because homicides are still very low by historical standards.
As for the "rollback" of enforcement? There hasn't been one. President Barack Obama has overseen big increases in spending for state and local law enforcement, including billions in grants provided through the 2009 stimulus, according to AP.
- Trump claimed the number of new illegal immigrant families who have crossed the border so far this year (as measured by arrests) already exceeds the entire total from 2015, and Obama is releasing these families "by the tens of thousands into our communities with no regard for the impact on public safety or resources."
Fact: The pace of releasing immigrants is driven not by the Obama administration, but by a court ruling. You might recall that a federal judge ruled last year the government couldn't hold parents and children in jail for more than 20 days. An appeals court partially negated that rule earlier this month, saying that parents could be detained but children must be released. Trump is right that the number of border crossing arrests in this budget year has already exceeded last year's total. But he neglected the fact that it's down from 2014.
- Trump said: "The number of police officers killed in the line of duty has risen by almost 50 percent compared to this point last year."
Not. The National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund tallies officer deaths daily, and as of Friday just after noon, 67 officers had been killed this year (including 24 in traffic accidents), compared to 63 in the same period last year - an increase of 6 percent. By the total tally, police are statistically safer on America's streets now than at any time in recent decades. According to AP, the 109 law enforcement fatalities in 2013 were the lowest since 1956. By the way, historic spikes for police deaths in recent history fell in the Richard Nixon/Gerald Ford administrations and the George W. Bush administration.
Trump may have been referencing the stark increase in firearms-related officer deaths. This year there have been 32 firearms-related officer deaths, compared to 19 last year. But to have singled out this nearly doubled firearms statistic might have opened a gun-safety can of worms. So much for the myth that relaxed open-carry gun laws make all of us - including police - safer. Trump's only foray into the gun-control issue was to repeat a claim that Hillary Clinton wants to abolish the Second Amendment - an unfounded assertion that has consistently been debunked.
- Another of Trump's serial "pants-on-fire" lies is this one: "America is one of the highest-taxed nations in the world."
The opposite is true. The U.S. tax burden is actually the fourth lowest among the 34 developed and large emerging-market economies. Taxes made up 26 percent of the total U.S. economy in 2014. In Sweden, the tax burden is 42.7 percent, in Britain, 32.6 percent, and in Germany, 36.1 percent.
- Trump's false claims about Hillary Clinton would take an entire page to catalog, so we'll deal here with just two.
He says she calls for a "radical" 550 percent increase in Syrian refugees, despite the fact that there's no way to screen them or know where they're from.
Fact: She does, but the Department of Homeland Security has a rigorous background check that takes 18 months to two years to complete.
- He also says Clinton "illegally" stores emails on a private server, et al., ad nauseum.
Reality: Clinton's use of a private server to store her emails was not illegal under federal law. Her actions were not established as a crime. The FBI investigated the matter to advise the Justice Department whether to bring charges. FBI Director James Comey declined to refer the case for criminal prosecution to the Justice Department, saying "no reasonable" prosecutor would bring charges because there was no crime. He did call Clinton's action extreme carelessness.
When Trump finally stopped talking, family members took to the stage and waited through long, embarrassing minutes before balloons began to fall and the band struck up a far-too-slow version of the Rolling Stones' song: "You Can't Always Get What You Want."
That awkward moment and prophetic song may have been the only truthful scenes we saw Thursday night.