“But better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie.” — Khaled Hosseini

For a guy who was so hard on Ted Cruz for untruthfulness, President Donald Trump sets a new standard for lying. According to a recent report in the Washington Post, Trump has lied more than 3,000 times since taking office on Jan. 20, 2017.

You remember that day, don’t you? The Donald claimed, falsely, that it was the biggest inauguration crowd in history. That wasn’t true. Of course, if he thought it was true, then he wasn’t really lying, was he?  He was just mistaken.

This is a lesson Sarah Huckabee Sanders understands only too well. He also said he’d won by the biggest Electoral College margin, ever. Also demonstrably false. He said Obama wiretapped Trump Tower. Can’t really prove a negative, can we? But the burden of proof is on Don, and he hasn’t offered any evidence to prove his assertion.

Some of the falsehoods are not so benign. He claimed the meeting between Jared and the Russians was about adoption. He knew it wasn’t about that. The meeting had been advertised as a chance for Don, Jr. to get “some dirt” on Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump invented the adoption story, knowing that the truth of his son conferring with foreign nationals during an election campaign might be unseemly. So, Big Don invented the Russian adoption story.

And how many times since then has he said, “no collusion”? Hmm. Little Don meeting with Russians to get dirt. Manafort charged. Flynn convicted by plea. Others in legal difficulty. This doesn’t pass the smell test.

Being a liar is not unique to Donald Trump, but he has shown a propensity for lying seldom seen so often in other public figures.

He didn’t know anything about the $130,000 paid in hush money to the porn star, by his own account. He did meet privately with her in a bungalow, a couple of times. But nothing happened. He says. She says they had unprotected sexual intercourse* during one of the encounters, after she lightly swatted him on the buttocks, using a Time magazine on which he was featured on the cover, while he was clad in tightie whities. This actually happened some years back, but the hush money came just before the presidential election. Would he have us believe that is only coincidental?

And Don reimbursed his attorney, Mike Cohen. He said he didn’t. Rudy Guiliani, Trump’s new attorney who’s going to straighten all this out, said he did. Then Trump said he did. Now we hear that Rudy is a very nice guy, but doesn’t know the facts of the case.

Do you believe Donald Trump about this? I don’t. I wasn’t there, so I can’t know for sure. But I believe Stormy Daniels. I find her more credible than the President of the United States. Bigly more credible. And what is that? Sad!  Ain’t that a shame?

*The lack of employment of a condom was also reported by Karen McDougal, the Playboy Playmate who reported a sexual encounter with Donald (which he also denies). This depiction runs contrary to Don’s defense when he was confronted with the “pee tape” story. Don challenged that claim, about watching two Russian prostitutes urinating on each other, by stating he was a “germophobe.” Should we believe Don? It seems he doesn’t like to shake hands. But, according to reports I deem more credible than his word, he likes to get busy without putting a helmet on that soldier.