Vindication Denied?

I suspect that many Trump followers are not well served by their preferred media, which have led them to believe wholeheartedly in various scandals that haven't panned out, even after much investigation, like Benghazi, while not believing in other scandals that are real and unfolding before our eyes. 

A steady diet of Fox News leaves these MAGA folks ill-prepared when the "scandal" of the moment turns out to be a nothingburger. Of course, they will never admit to this.

One of the scandals that may not pan out in the way the Trump cult hopes is the origins (or "oranges", as POTUS might say) of the FBI investigation into Russian election interference in 2016.  

For months, Sean Hannity has been touting that the FBI  Inspector General's internal investigation into the matter will deliver earthshaking revelations into the Bureau's corrupt role in the Russian "hoax", breathlessly promising proof that the investigation was illegitimate from the beginning. Sweet, sweet vindication of a sweet, benevolent prince.  As if anyone not on the Fox payroll could imagine Trump that way. 

The IG's report comes out tomorrow, and already there are signs that Hannity's flock will be disappointed in the report's main findings. I'm crossing my fingers that their expectations will be dashed. Sean has even been hinting at such in his recent radio broadcasts. Guess we'll see. 

Anyway, the lucky thing about having a conspiracy-minded mentality is you always have a ready excuse when things don't turn out like you expected -- namely that the oh-so-deep-state is at it again. If your main source of news is the likes of Sean Hannity, you can hardly think any other way. 

Hannity Dishonesty

One thing that I suppose helps Trump supporters sleep at night is the notion that, despite his rotten, ill-tempered, chaotic, ignorant, conniving, and dishonest nature, Trump has one saving grace – he is giving a tremendous boost to the economy. Or, at least, that’s what he never hesitates to claim he is doing. 

And, in some ways that Democrats may be reluctant to acknowledge, there might be something to some of these claims. Some economic indicators are looking better under Trump. But not necessarily all. 

One such indicator is GDP. During the campaign, Trump loved to blast Obama for the sluggish economy and highlighted the fact that annual GDP growth never rose above 3% in Obama’s eight years. Trump promised that, with him in charge of the economy, growth would go up to 4%, maybe even to 6%. This pie-in-the-sky promise was also touted by Trump’s number one bootlicker, Sean Hannity. Naturally.

So, it’s no wonder that when, back in November, the Atlanta Fed made an eye-watering prediction of 4.5% growth for the final quarter of last year, Hannity latched onto this bit of optimistic news like a dog on a bone, repeating it often on his radio show. (Hannity generally repeats the same talking points a lot, ad nauseum, in fact.) 

This prediction was just what Hannity wanted to hear. He effused:

“Yesterday, the Atlanta Fed projected that GDP growth for the fourth quarter will be 4.5%. Obama never once in his presidency for a year had 3% GDP growth. Not once. The only president in history.”

You can see how Hannity was parroting Trump’s line about Obama’s shoddy GDP track record. 

Now, the preliminary results for 2017 are in. The Atlanta Fed’s 4.5% growth rate for Q4 didn’t materialize. Instead, it came in at only a more down-to-earth 2.6%, forcing Hannity to create some positive spin by misleading his listeners. He does this all the time. Here’s what he said this week: 

“When you look at these economic statistics, they’re mind-blowing. Lowest unemployment rate we have had now in decades. The best economic growth. It could have been better for the final quarter of the year. The fourth quarter it was 2.6%. But the previous two quarters were better than Obama had in any two given years.” 

The last sentence is where Hannity’s supreme dishonesty is on full display. He’s trying to deflect from the disappointment of 2.6% growth by pointing to the Q2 and Q3 rates of 3.1% and 3.2%, respectively. 

As I’ve written before, he’s comparing apples to oranges. It’s true that Obama never had a year of 3.1% or 3.2% growth.  But neither has Trump. Not yet. Hannity is implying that Obama never saw the kind of quarterly growth that we've seen so far under Trump. That’s a lie. 

In fact, under Obama there was a quarter of 3.1% (Q3 2013), and a quarter of 3.2% (Q1 2015). Plus, two quarters of 3.9%, one quarter of 4.0%, two quarters of 4.6%, and one quarter of 5.2%. That’s eight quarters as good, or much better, than Trump as achieved thus far. 

Of course, Hannity also failed to mention the annual rate for 2017, which is preliminarily estimated to be 2.3%. That’s not quite the 3%, 4% or 6% Americans were promised. And he would be even less eager to mention that Obama had annual rates higher than 2.3% during three years of his presidency (2010, 2014, 2015). 

Now, 2.6% growth perhaps isn’t too bad. And perhaps this will turn out to be the nadir of the Trump economy. Perhaps 2018 will turn out much better, maybe even be tremendous. 

Maybe. But, still it always pisses me off when someone like Hannity so obviously twists the truth in order to gloss over unwelcome news that runs counter to his narrative – and most of his audience no doubt swallow it all without blinking.  And that is sad.  

The Gospel According to Hannity

Yesterday, I was listening to a Sean Hannity show from last week in which a caller from Jacksonville, Florida, posed a question for all the people who are criticizing Trump’s travel ban and his “America First” philosophy.

“Do they feed their neighbor’s children before they feed their own?" the caller asked. "Or do they pay their neighbor’s bills before paying their own? And if they do not, does that make them racist for not doing so?”

Hannity loved the question. He agreed that many critics of the travel ban are hypocrites and then -- after going off on a passionate tangent about how Ashton Kutcher married a much older woman -- offered his caller a relevant lesson from the Bible.  

“It’s utter hypocrisy. You take care of your family first. You take care of your own life," Hannity agreed. 

"For example, I’ll give you a Biblical example," he went on. "You know, how do you notice the faults of your brother when you’ve got your own problems? And the answer was, well, take out, get rid of your own problems or whatever it is in your eye and this way you’ll be clearer to see other people and help them better.”

In other words, before helping others, help yourself. 

Kind of like the precaution on airliners that, in case of an emergency, you should put your own oxygen mask on before helping others.

Hannity's personal interpretation of that Bible lesson pricked my ears. The lesson he was referring to is, of course, from Matthew, chapter 7:

“And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

“Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?

“Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.”

I remember this passage very well from my days in Sunday School at Liberty Baptist Church in North Georgia. However, the lesson we learned back then was different from the one Hannity apparently came away with, which I would sum up as: “Be generous and charitable only after you have fulfilled your own needs”.

As I was taught, the lesson is instead: “You shouldn’t judge others for their small faults until you recognize, and correct, your own larger faults”. It’s all about not judging others.

In fact, that message is encapsulated in the very first verse of the chapter, for Christ’s sake: “Judge not, that ye be not judged”.

Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe in the Age of Trump even lessons from the Bible are not what they used to be. Alternative Bible lessons, perhaps?