After Donald Trump joined Chuck Todd on NBC's Meet The Press, and refused to back off his comments that he said he saw Muslims in New Jersey cheering at the Twin Towers attack, the topic of fact checkers came into the debate with the MTP panel and how it affects Trump supporters. Andrea Mitchell correctly explained that Donald Trump's serial exaggerations on important issues has been very damaging to the people he's targeting, even though his supporters don't care about the truth.
ANDREA MITCHELL: But it's not only that that didn't happen. "200,000 Syrian refugees are coming." It's not only that the facts are wrong. It's that what he is saying is so emotionally and, you know, politically powerful. He is lighting fires. He is turning people against people. He is misstating the facts of what's happening domestically, what's happening with Muslims. The kinds of facts that he is misstating are so much.
EUGENE ROBINSON: Incendiary.
ANDREA MITCHELL: Incendiary.
MOLLY BALL: But here's the political genius of Donald Trump, right. What he is doing is different. All politicians say things that are technically true but a little bit misleading or a lot misleading. They say whatever they can get away with. And if they're called on it, they'll walk it back a little bit. They'll trim their sails.
CHUCK TODD: Truth is conditional. As we found out, mostly true, half true--
MOLLY BALL: Yes. They'll just talk about the definition of "is." Donald Trump doesn't do that. He creates an entire alternate reality. And he does not back down.
ANDREA MITCHELL: Because he pays no price for it with his supporters.
Mitchell was exactly correct with her words on Trump and his supporters. He's openly lying about facts, figures and actual events and he's paid no price for it so far. But he's also cheapened the debate about important issues and his xenophobic rhetoric is having a horrible effect on the right wing base and the people he targets.
I wonder if Trump will start crying on Twitter about how unfair Andrea Mitchell was to him? He saw those thousands of Muslims in America cheering after the 9/11 attacks and no matter what the facts say, he's right because he's Trump.
By the way, Hugh Hewitt acted like a complete buffoon on the panel and I'm not sure why he's even there other than to mock the panel's sincerity.
