The weekend was filled with pundit talk about how and why the media, candidates and the American people should stop being polite and politically correct with Donald Trump.
Instead, we should just call him out for being exactly what he is – a liar. We should – as he so often suggests – be direct and politically incorrect to get through his oft-repeated baloney.
The straw that broke the camel’s back was Trump’s assertion that he “saw” thousands – no, “thousands and thousands,” of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating the fall of the Twin Towers on 9/11.
He didn’t. He didn’t see it live, nor did he see it later in media footage. Because it didn’t happen.
What’s curious in all of this is that in the past year, some in the media, as well as politicians and a number of presidential wannabes, have felt absolutely no need to be politically correct and polite when talking about Democrats – especially about Hillary Clinton.
In fact, she probably had cornered the market on accusations that she was untruthful about any number of things that she actually wasn’t untruthful about. Until The Donald came on scene and began doing “Duck Dynasty” imitations.
Discounting the endless and pointless congressional hearings and subpoenas, Hillary Clinton was thrown under the bus in practically every news cycle of 2015. Even in more than one nationally televised primary debate, some form of the word “lie” and Hillary Clinton showed up in the same sentence at least once – never to be questioned by a moderator or another candidate. And heaven only knows how many times similar assertions were repeated in opinion blogs and columns, especially in right-wing publications.
What’s amazing is that no one began questioning the truthfulness of any of these candidates – especially those in the GOP, and especially Trump – before now.
Apparently even political correctness has been a partisan issue.