There are men who lie, and there are men who build systems around lying. Donald Trump belongs to the second category.

His “stable genius”, (pun intended), if that is the right word for a moral deformation, is that he has not merely told falsehoods. He has trained millions of Americans to treat truth as an act of hostility. In the Trump universe, reality is not something to be discovered. It is something to be crushed, mocked, or screamed down until it submits.

That is the Big Lie in reverse.

The old political lie said, “Believe this false thing.” Trump’s version says, “Do not believe anything that threatens me.” Every fact becomes suspect. Every critic is corrupt. Every judge is crooked. Every prosecutor is biased. Every journalist is lying. Every election loss is theft. Every embarrassment is sabotage. Every consequence is persecution. This is not skepticism. It is moral and intellectual arson. A nation cannot breathe in such an atmosphere. A society that learns to distrust every source of judgment except one man is not becoming strong. It is becoming childish, frightened, and easily manipulated. That is how demagogues operate. They do not simply lie. They destroy the public’s confidence that truth can even be known.

The Torah commands, Midvar sheker tirchak, “Distance yourself from falsehood.” The wording matters. Judaism does not merely prohibit lying. It recognizes that falsehood is a spiritual contaminant. Once it enters public life, it does not stay confined to one speech, one slogan, or one election. It spreads. It teaches people to lie to themselves. That is the great corruption. A person who lies occasionally is still reachable. A people that learns to prefer illusion over truth is already in........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)