Can we really have a presidential election in which one side does nothing but lie? (Apparently so.)

Am I the only one in a state of stupefaction over the course the presidential election has taken? Oh, we saw it coming, but now that it's here, is it any less shocking?

We have a campaign in which essentially every word out of every mouth on one side is a lie.

Oh, we've seen the the extremified Right heading this way, rejecting all obligation to, even minimal respect for, the concept of truth, instead applying the word to what Stephen Colbert has conveniently dubbed "truthiness," which can be either (a) what one thinks ought to be true or (b) what one wishes were true. These are actually very different things, but functionally they have in common that they represent an abandonment of the basic standard of truth.

It's an astonishing thing to watch, and unlike so many progressive commentators, who can tell you exactly how a battle against it should be fought, I'm for the most part struck dumb. I don't see anything the least "postpartisan" about our time, but I see all too clearly that it's "posttrue." And once the public has lost all interest in actual truth, and yet in screeching, almost murderous, hysteria proclaims its lies to be truer than truth, what is there left to discuss?

The Sarah Palin phenomenon is part of the package. In saner times, she would be dismissed by all but the hard-core delusionals as an irrelevant ignoramus, and the McCranky campaign would get the old Gong Show hook and never be heard from again, having admitted that in terms of having anything to say of any relevance to the governance of the country it is 0 for the campaign. Instead, this person of absolutely no qualifications for any public office, let alone the vice presidency of the U.S., is breaking the rule that in presidential elections people don't vote for the VP candidate. It appears that large numbers of voters are prepared to vote for McCranky the empty suit because of the appallingly ignorant Palin and her random snatches of ultra-wacko extremist ideology.

Link to con.