This is Bob Avakian—REVOLUTION—number Ninety-Eight.

The answer is that the fascists lie comprehensively and systematically, while “mainstream” ruling class representatives lie “situationally” and “instrumentally.” To break this down:

For fascists, like those heading up the Republican Party, reality does not matter and they regularly make up lies to substitute for reality. The fascist Donald Trump told thousands of readily-disproved lies while President, and this year both he and J.D. Vance have regularly told the same kinds of lies in debates and in campaigning overall. But, more than the particular lies, it is important for fascists to mobilize mobs of unthinking people who have been conditioned to believe lies that fly in the face of reality—people who distrust reality-based reasoning, and despise those who reason in that way.

And don’t bother with that bullshit that the basic reason why people support Trump is because they are having a hard time economically, and so on. In fact, many Trump supporters are well-off economically (and some are very rich). But even for those who are having a hard time economically, the really relevant question is: why do they support the all-the time-lying, ignorance-promoting, racist, misogynist (hater of women) and all-around fascist Donald Trump? The answer can only be that, at the very least, they find nothing wrong with racism and misogyny—which makes them misogynists and racists (what a terrible irony for those Black people and other people of color who support Trump!). Just like those who supported Hitler and the Nazis in Germany, they support a fascist because fascism appeals to them.

And what does it say about this country—this supposed “great democracy” and “leader of the free world”—when basically half the country supports fascism?!

Unlike the fascists, for “mainstream” ruling class representatives (like the politicians of the Democratic Party and those who run major media like CNN and the New York Times) reality does matter—BUT when reality gets in the way of the interests of this system of capitalism-imperialism, they will distort reality and lie as grossly as the fascists.

This has been true throughout the history of this country—and the “mainstream” representatives of this system have repeatedly lied about this country, from the beginning and down to today—attempting to cover over, or explain away, the history and present reality of blood-soaked oppression on which this country was founded and which is the basis of its wealth and power today.

These “mainstream” politicians and institutions repeatedly lied about the Vietnam war back in the 1960s and early 1970s (and, to this day, they distort the actual history and character of that war). They have continued to lie about other major events in the world, such as the illegal invasion of Iraq by the U.S. in 2003, which constituted an international war crime. And these “mainstream” imperialists have been repeatedly lying now about what is happening in Palestine—attempting to cover up the genocide Israel is carrying out, with the full backing of the U.S. government, and the reality that Israel is a racist (Jewish supremacist) apartheid state, which was founded and continues to exist on the basis of horrific oppression of the Palestinian people, involving the repeated slaughter of Palestinians, including huge numbers of children.

These “mainstream” ruling class figures constantly repeat the fairy-tale lie about the USA as “the leader of the free world”; they lie about what this so-called “free world” actually is (this “free world” includes countries ruled by openly oppressive, viciously brutal tyrants—but they are “our” tyrants...so they are part of the “free world”).

When the interests of a system are repeatedly in conflict with the truth—when its political representatives, whether fascist or “mainstream,” are repeatedly compelled to lie—that is a clear sign that this system is fundamentally rotten and outmoded (past the time when it can represent anything positive) and it needs to be swept into the garbage bin of history at the earliest possible time.