Subtitled “The Epidemic of Political Lying, Why Republicans Do It More, and How It Could Burn Down Our Democracy”
(Atria, Oct 2024, xxiii + 273pp, including 55pp of acknowledgements, sources, notes, and index.)
This is a recent book, just published in October, on a very timely subject. The author, I didn’t realize when I bought the book, created the PoliFact website, already my personal go-to source for fact-checking. The second phrase in the subtitle is what drew me in; do Republicans really lie more (though that’s certainly my impression), and if so, *why* do they lie more? I have developed my own ideas about this question — generally, that conservatives are especially beholden to ideology, including religious ideology, to the point where they dismiss or dispute facts that would challenge their ideological narratives. How do they resolve the conflict between their behavior and their commandment about not bearing false witness? Well, because they’re living for some ‘higher’ truth that is more important than maintaining fidelity to the ordinary, mundane world. But is there more to it than that? I read the book waiting for the implicit promise of that subtitle to pay off.
Like a lot of books about contemporary social matters, this one includes lots of anecdotes and details about particular people. A framing narrative, told at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end, concerns how the Department of Homeland Security launched, in April 2022, an organization to combat disinformation, called the Disinformation Governance Board. And right-wing folks went ballistic, accusing the board of Orwellian censorship and maligning the leader of the board, Nina Jankowicz, on every possible ground, from intellectual to artistic (they found an old video of her in a stage play to mock her). Right-wingers like Sean Hannity just made things up. The board was eventually cancelled, and Republicans cheered about the money they’d made fundraising off ruining Nina Jankowicz’ life.
Along the way, Adair identifies key ideas and players in the overall issue. In Ch2, A Taxonomy of Lying, he identifies levels of severity of lies (‘under-the-lights’ mistakes; then white lies; misdemeanor lies; felony lies); types of lies (about accomplishments; self-defense lies; lies attacking opponents; lies about policy and issues); and how they lie (cherry-picking; repetition; up is down (e.g. Trumpism); exaggeration; prediction; appeals to fear).
He identifies a “Lying Hall of Fame.” Big Tobacco; Exxon; Rupert Murdoch; Roger Ailes; The Fox & Friends Couch; Tucker Carlson; Talk Radio; Lyndon Johnson; Richard Nixon; Newt Gingrich; Bill Clinton; and Donald Trump.
Among other anecdotes is one about Eric Barber, who admits he was radicalized by Facebook into believing the 2020 election had been stolen, and was among those who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. And still believes. Adair explains why people like him fall for election lies:
1. Lack of skepticism. Conditioned by evolution to trust incoming information (p67.3)
2. “Overconfident” consumers fall for bogus news.
3. A “home team” mentality. Directionally motivated reasoning; loyalty to the group.
4. The Network of Lies. I.e., Fox News.
5. Repetition, repetition, repetition. Repeat a lie and it becomes the truth.
And then Adair’s own history with journalism and wanting to call out politicians who lied more plainly than had been done before. Chapter 9 is called “Patterns of Lying” and is where we get to the heart of the matter. The author knew, from running PolitiFact, that Republicans lied more than Democrats. Kessler, a fact checker at Washington Post, admitted the same thing. P122.2:
Kessler cites two factors in the GOP’s decline. An early one was Newt Gingrich, who Kessler found had lied boldly beginning with his rise in the 1990s and stoked the party’s distrust of facts and experts. But the bigger problem was the ascendance of Trump and his impact on elected officials throughout the party. “Trump legitimized lying,” Kessler told me. “It’s not really about policies anymore; it’s about power. And Trump showed you could be president and not have real policies, only be consumed with power, and you could lie with impunity and not be punished by your supporters for it.” Kessler said the new generation of Republicans — Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and Josh Hawley, among others — mimicked Trump’s behavior, making preposterous claims that were catnip for the right-wing media and the MAGA audience.
Did the data back up their impressions, or were they subject to selection bias? addresses that later.
Author then posed the question of why Republicans are such big liars to various elected officials, journalists, and members of Congress. Excerpts from their responses:
“The type of person that’s drawn to Republican political campaigns is much more nihilistic, much more of a personal that just wants to win at all costs, does not care that deeply about the issues. And the type of persona drawn to Democratic campaigns almost, sometimes to a fault, earnest.”
…
Matthew Dowd … said that Democrats feel a deep responsibility to get the facts correct while many Republicans often don’t care. Democrats “take on shame way too fast, and Republicans have none.” … “Depending upon the outlet that’s confronting them, they’ll take it [lying] as a badge of honor.”
Some Republicans feel pressure to go along.
“That’s the root of it, that they’re fearful of what could happen to them politically if they speak out.”
…
“Democrats often try to be accurate and give long explanations. Republicans, on the other hand, opt for repeating the pithy sound bite without being concerned with it being accurate.”
Page 125b:
Several people I interviewed said Republicans believe lying is justified because they see victory as part of an epic struggle. … “If you believe you’re in an existential battle for the souls of Americans, if you believe that millions of people are making bad decisions based on globalists, the deep state, or you believe that somehow a secular America is overwhelming the basic underpinnings of our Constitution… When you start to sort of add all that together, why is lying so bad?”
Bingo.
Page 126:
“When reality doesn’t meet with your political necessity, you lie. Lying is basically trying to change the rules of the game. It’s a form of cheating, and no one ever tries to change the rules of a game they’re winning.
(Political necessity, or grip on reality?)
Page 128:
Anita Dunn, a White House adviser to President Biden, told me that while Democrats sweat the details on a speech or talking point, the Republicans blithely ignore the facts because they know the get away with it and score easy point. “And they also know that especially given the way social media works now when they put something out there, it becomes a fact very quickly,” she told me.
So these comments are consistent with my take at the top: Republicans think they work for a higher cause to an extent that lying about mundane things doesn’t matter. But also, with my observations that conservatives tend to think of the world in black and white, good vs. evil, terms, so that they *prefer* the simple-minded sound bites (“Lock her up!” “Drill, baby, drill!”) to any nuanced discussion of issues. They also think Democrats are policy wonks (“long explanation”)? Well I suppose they do. Like academic nerds. In their minds, everything is simple.
What about selection bias? Are these the results of exactly what is claimed, that Democrats more than Republicans nit-pick over details? Conservatives certainly think PolitiFact is biased, and have charged such without providing any evidence. (For instance, they could easily identify Democratic howlers that PolitiFact ignored, should there be any out there.) Also, fact-checkers tend to be journalists, who tend to be reality-based and therefore liberal. (“Reality has a liberal bias” is another take on this whole issue.) At the same time, some Democrats say PolitiFact holds them to a higher standard, in an attempt to *not* look biased. To an extent that Paul Krugman accused it being useless and irrelevant. In defense, author points to his history of Nina Jankowicz and the dozens of lies Republicans told about her, of which only one rose to the attention of the fact-checkers. Ditto for the hundreds or thousands of lies told by Republicans about the 2020 election; no fact-checker can begin to keep up with them all.
Adair has a final chapter called “How Can We Stop the Lying?” He thought PolitiFact would have had more of an impact. But Republicans didn’t care. What to do instead? Ask politicians point blank why they lie. Keep score. Invite them to take a pledge against lying. In debates, get both sides to stipulate six facts before the debate. Track misinformation as data, the way the World Economic Forum tracks global risks. When this was done in 2024, conservatives pooh-poohed the idea. (Of course.)
And finally, Adair closes out the several people whose stories he’s followed. Eric Barber, Mike Pence, Tim Miller, Kevin Madden, and Nina Jankowicz. Miller expects the Republican culture of lying to continue. Madden said, “The most challenging thing about combating misinformation is just how badly some audiences in the public realm want to believe information that’s not true… They want to believe it.” And Nina Jankowicz sued Fox News. A judge dismissed her suit, on the grounds that they attacks were about the government, not her.
