Paul Kengor: Truth and the 2020 presidential vote

“Where has the truth gone?” asks my Grove City College colleague Jim Thrasher. “Truth and reality, have they gone away? Most journalists in the media seem to ignore the facts and create and advance myths and fables. They have become propaganda machines.”

And yet, notes Thrasher: “God-given truth has not gone away.”

No, it has not. We’re hardwired for truth. We’re made for truth, to desire it, to seek it.

But where has truth gone?

That’s a question that seems to be nagging at many of us lately. It pervades our politics and media, particularly relating to the current political-presidential climate.

I’ve carefully followed the controversies regarding the presidential election, including claims by the Trump campaign (and others) of vote manipulation. I wrote a widely read piece about an extraordinary claim made Nov. 25 in Gettysburg at hearings convened by the Pennsylvania Senate Majority Policy Committee. Presenting was retired Col. Phil Waldron, a former Army officer in electronic warfare, who testified along with Rudy Giuliani’s team.

Waldron, who specializes in analysis of election-data fraud, talked about “spike anomalies” in voting patterns in Pennsylvania. He showed a chart allegedly documenting a massive dump of votes for Joe Biden, a dump “not feasible or mechanically possible under normal circumstances.”

Waldron made a jaw-dropping claim — asserting that over about 90 minutes, a massive batch of votes registered roughly 570,000 ballots for Biden and only 3,200 for Trump. Yes, you read that right.

When Waldron said this, the audience gasped in shock.

I watched the exchange (click here and go to the 1:28:00 mark). If Waldron’s stunning charge is true, it would constitute one of the most insidious examples of vote manipulation in the history of American presidential politics.

That is, if it’s true.

I watched Waldron drop that electoral bombshell. What was equally shocking was how the press completely ignored it. The only national sources I could find reporting it were RealClearPolitics, Breitbart and Newsmax TV. The video link was provided by Right Side Broadcasting Network — a conservative source. CNN never touched it.

I promptly wrote about it. I asked most sincerely: Is this accurate? Who or what could have flipped votes like this? Is this real? Is Waldron reliable? Is this particular claim wild conspiracy theory or clearly documented reality?

That article, posted at The American Spectator, received an enormous number of clicks. At RealClearPolitics, it was the most-read piece for seven days running.

The response to the article broke down very simply: If you voted for Trump, then you believed Waldron. If you didn’t vote for Trump, then you called Waldron a liar. In fact, you called me a liar, too. “You’re a lying Trumpist-propagandist and a hack,” one emailer informed me.

A friend, a Republican never Trumper, told me to go back to writing about socialism. But I can’t ignore a claim like this. Whether you love or loathe Donald Trump (I’m in neither category), you ought to be able to look at claims like this with an open mind and desire for truth and justice.

So, is it true?

“I just don’t even know what the truth is,” one talk-show host said to me in frustration. “Who do you believe? Where do you go for accurate reporting?” Precisely. Like Jim Thrasher said, so much of the media have become propaganda machines. All are biased. All have agendas.

It’s harder and harder to know what the truth is anymore. That’s pretty sad.