During Donald Trump’s presidency, The Washington Post kept a running tally of his alleged lies and/or misleading statements. But, when Joe Biden became president, the Post fact-checker, Glenn Kessler, announced an end to the database operation, saying: “Maintaining the Trump database over four years required about 400 additional 8-hour days over four years beyond our regular jobs for three people.” Looks like supply-chain issues at the Post.

So, while the Post continues to fact-check Biden, it discontinued the Trump-era practice of running the tote board because, after all, Biden is not Trump, and the Post undoubtedly expects Biden to be more truthful.

How’s that working out?

Recently Post fact-checker Kessler wrote: “President Biden is a self-described ‘gaffe machine.’ That’s no excuse, of course, for a president making false or misleading statements. Readers have asked for fact checks of a variety of recent Biden statements, but none of them seemed big enough for a stand-alone fact check.” Really?

Set aside Biden’s decades of falsely claiming, as he did again during the 2020 campaign, that he “was raised in the black church” where, as a teenager, he would meet on Sundays to strategize how to “desegregate movie theaters and restaurants” in Wilmington, Delaware. The New York Times found no evidence of any Biden desegregation activity and congregants of the black church he supposedly attended did not recall seeing Biden there.

Then there is Biden’s decadeslong claim that he and former United Nations Ambassador and Rep. Andrew Young were “arrested” in apartheid South Africa while attempting to visit the imprisoned Nelson Mandela. Young said it never happened.

Biden, on two occasions, publicly and falsely claimed the truck driver who struck and killed his first wife and young daughter was drunk at the time. But he wasn’t, and the claims brought much dismay to the driver and his family.

As to the precipitous and disastrous pullout from Afghanistan, Biden claimed that no one advised him against it, a claim refuted by two top generals who insisted, under oath, that they advised Biden against the move.

On at least two occasions Biden claimed that his son, Beau, died in Iraq. Biden’s son, a military veteran who served in Iraq, died of brain cancer six years after returning home.

In late October, Biden said: “The most common price of gas in America is $3.39. Down from over $5 when I took office.” Two problems. When Biden took office the average price of gas was $2.39, and AAA says the average price on the day he made that statement was $3.76, 37 cents more than asserted by Biden. For good measure, the following day Biden said, “Since the elections, we’ve been — we’re taking gas prices down from where they were.” Given the importance of gas prices, a concern that many voters put at the top of their list, do Biden’s back-to-back gas claims amount to a gaffe or a blatant lie based on the expectation of more lenient media by Biden compared to Trump?

What of Biden’s recent characterization of his student debt forgiveness program, via executive order, that the Congressional Budget Office estimates will cost $400 billion? Biden, during an online discussion with progressive organization NowThis News, also in late October, said: “It’s passed. I got it passed by a vote or two, and it’s in effect.” Except he signed an executive order, currently under challenge and blocked by a federal appeals court. No Congress, no votes, and not in effect.

After Trump’s election, Democrats and the media raised such concerns about Trump’s mental capacity, that the president undertook a cognitive test. Trump then allowed the White House doctor to answer questions from reporters for a full hour, during which the doctor said Trump registered a “perfect” score. It does not appear that Biden undertook the same cognitive test. But despite Biden’s frequent displays of confusion, neither the Democrats nor the media care much about the mental acuity of a Commander-in-Chief not named Trump.

What a difference an administration makes.

COPYRIGHT 2022 LAURENCE A. ELDER