7600 LIES From Donald Trump (So Far)

Let's end the year with a Pinocchio-summary from Kessler of the Washington Post:

President Trump’s year of lies, false statements and misleading claims started with some morning tweets.

Over a couple of hours on Jan. 2, Trump made false claims about three of his favorite targets — Iran, the New York Times and Hillary Clinton. He also took credit for the “best and safest year on record” for commercial aviation, even though there had been no commercial plane crashes in the United States since 2009 and, in any case, the president has little to do with ensuring the safety of commercial aviation.

The fusillade of tweets was the start of a year of unprecedented deception during which Trump became increasingly unmoored from the truth. When 2018 began, the president had made 1,989 false and misleading claims, according to The Fact Checker’s database, which tracks every suspect statement uttered by the president. By the end of the year, Trump had accumulated more than 7,600 untruths during his presidency — averaging more than 15 erroneous claims a day during 2018, almost triple the rate from the year before.

Kessler uses the phrases "false statements" and "misleading claims" and "false claims" and "untruths" and "erroneous claims" in his description (why can't he use another, shorter term? Like, I dunno, "lies") as well as saying  that "Trump became increasingly unmoored from the truth."

Here's an example:

President and Mrs. Obama built/has a ten foot Wall around their D.C. mansion/compound. I agree, totally necessary for their safety and security. The U.S. needs the same thing, slightly larger version!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 30, 2018

And here's the reality from Kessler:

In trying to make the case for a high concrete border wall, Trump exaggerates about the Obama house in Washington, D.C. It is an 8,200 square foot Tudor-style home in the Kalorama residential area, but it is not a "compound." The Obamas added security fencing to an enlarged retaining wall in front for the needs of the Secret Service but there is not a ten-foot wall around the house; the front steps are open to the sidewalk. Chain link fencing, but no wall, was added to the back. While Trump says the border wall would be a "slightly larger version" of the alleged Obama wall, he has previously described his proposed wall as 1,000 miles long, made of precast concrete slabs, rising 35 to 40 feet in the air.

This is the state of the presidency this December 31.