Analysis Of Trump Vs. Truth
In the Last Week Tonight segment “Trump vs. Truth”, host John Oliver details the sources of Donald Trump’s blatant lies and how they are then widely believed by the American public. In doing this, he attempts to show the faulty methods by which Trump uses to obtain information, and why believing Trump and using him as a source is in turn unreliable. In doing so, the program attempts to bring awareness to its audience of the unreliability of Trump’s news sources, and in turn use more scrutinizing tactics in assessing which news sources to rely on and believe. At the beginning of the segment, Oliver states that the segment is going to address Donald Trump and his consistent and outrageous lies from his campaign into his presidency. While all
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He outlines four “basic questions” they’re going to seek the answers to: “how did we get a pathological liar in the White House”, “Where are his lies coming from?”, “Why do so many people believe him?”, and “What can we possibly do about it?”. This sets up the ground work to fully assess the scope of Trump’s lies. Firstly, as is documented, Trump has a long history of lying. Previously, the lies included petty ones such as the number of floors in Trump Tower, but as he entered the political sphere, the lies became more heinous, such as those in the infamous “birther” movement. As a Presidential candidate, he began spouting blatant lies, such as lying about the unemployment and murder rate and the “below zero” GDP. Oliver claims that with these outrageous claims, most candidates would have been disqualified from office, but since the public was so accustomed to Trump’s blatant lying, …show more content…
He even validates the beliefs that they see as the “real truth”. This seems to create what Oliver calls a “loop” of information, in which Trump’s beliefs as the President validate these peoples’ beliefs, and the people believing him validates him, despite these facts being unequivocally false. Furthermore, Oliver states that this is based on “belief” or “faith”, and policy cannot be based on it. This is inherently connected to the Colbert Report’s previous segment on “Truthiness”, which is appropriately a parody of the same cable networks that Trump gets his information from. As Colbert’s satirical persona illustrates, these assumptions are based on what you “feel in your heart” is true, rather than from books or
He outlines four “basic questions” they’re going to seek the answers to: “how did we get a pathological liar in the White House”, “Where are his lies coming from?”, “Why do so many people believe him?”, and “What can we possibly do about it?”. This sets up the ground work to fully assess the scope of Trump’s lies. Firstly, as is documented, Trump has a long history of lying. Previously, the lies included petty ones such as the number of floors in Trump Tower, but as he entered the political sphere, the lies became more heinous, such as those in the infamous “birther” movement. As a Presidential candidate, he began spouting blatant lies, such as lying about the unemployment and murder rate and the “below zero” GDP. Oliver claims that with these outrageous claims, most candidates would have been disqualified from office, but since the public was so accustomed to Trump’s blatant lying, …show more content…
He even validates the beliefs that they see as the “real truth”. This seems to create what Oliver calls a “loop” of information, in which Trump’s beliefs as the President validate these peoples’ beliefs, and the people believing him validates him, despite these facts being unequivocally false. Furthermore, Oliver states that this is based on “belief” or “faith”, and policy cannot be based on it. This is inherently connected to the Colbert Report’s previous segment on “Truthiness”, which is appropriately a parody of the same cable networks that Trump gets his information from. As Colbert’s satirical persona illustrates, these assumptions are based on what you “feel in your heart” is true, rather than from books or