Trump Is Rendering Language Meaningless

Michiko Kakutani: “He is constantly contradicting himself and conjuring a reality at odds with verifiable facts—not just in impulsive tweets and incoherent, rambling off-the-cuff remarks, but in his just-delivered Inaugural Address. The lip-service that Trump paid to unity at the end of the speech is belied by his shameless use of nativist and bigoted language over the last 18 months, and by the barrage of insults he’s hurled at institutions—from the judiciary to the intelligence agencies to the press—and at individuals, including, most recently, the revered civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis. His defense of the ‘forgotten men and women’ — a phrase reminiscent of the language that his adviser Steve Bannon has used — is belied by his selection of a Cabinet chock full of millionaires and billionaires and Goldman Sachs alums.”