Willful Suspension of Disbelief

Have you ever watched an action adventure movie with a scene like this:

Six bad guys with automatic weapons stand no more than 30 feet away from the hero. They open fire but do not hit the hero as the he runs wildly across an open space, dives through the air, turns toward the bad guys while he is airborne, and fires, killing them all. 

All of this happens on camera in slow motion. The audience smiles inwardly. What a guy!

We all know that things like that don't really happen. That the hero would be shredded by automatic weapons fire coming from the six men. That flying though the air and aiming accurately enough to kill six people is close to impossible. But a Hollywood director knows that the audience will accept all of this because of something called suspension of disbelief.

For the past eight years, the Democrats and their trained hamsters in a media that presents the Dem narrative have relied heavily on suspension of disbelief (SoD) by a significant percentage of the voting public. And its SoD that shields the Dems from public anger that should occur as a consequence of the ruinous results of their governance. The Dems tell us things like this:

• Obamacare will save us money, and you'll be able to keep your current insurance.
• The Benghazi attack was precipitated by an obscure anti-Islam video.
• The widespread IRS attack on conservatives didn't happen, or if it did, was due to decisions made by GS-12s in Cincinnati.
• Climate change science is "settled" and there is no reason to investigate the accuracy of models that predict catastrophic outcomes.
• The failed state that is Libya had nothing to do with the decisions and actions of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
• The rise of ISIS was all George W. Bush's fault.
• Income inequality is the sole fault of millionaires and billionaires.
• Climate change is our most urgent national security challenge.
• Everyone has a right to "free" college.
• Islamic terror groups have nothing whatsoever to do with Islam.
• Universal health care programs implemented in other countries are problem free.
• Hillary Clinton used a private server for "convenience."
• There were no classified documents on Clinton's private server, but if there were, they weren't marked classified, or if they were marked, they were over-classified and therefore not really classified.
• Foreign governments donated tens of millions through cut-outs to the Clinton Global Initiative and didn't expect anything in return.
• The economy is in good shape and unemployment is very low.
• Every Muslim immigrant from terror-infested countries can be fully vetted before entry and besides, you're a racist if you suggest otherwise.
• Bernie Sanders is a different kind of socialist and his programs will help the poor and middle class, as long as "the rich" pay their fair share.
• The on-going collapse of Venezuela under socialist rule is not worthy of examination.

and on ... and on ... and on.

Victor Davis Hansen provides a useful example:

Recent news reports daily detail how former Secretary of State Clinton’s private emails—contrary to her early serial assurances—contained far more than just ordinary classified material. She sent communications of such a sensitive nature that they now cannot even be read by most government officials.

Mrs. Clinton, however, has demanded that these classified documents be released to the public. That gambit, she believes, will prove that she did not send anything top secret at all!

That con too requires a suspension of disbelief. Mrs. Clinton knows full well that it would be illegal for any official to release a highly classified document to the public. She is merely angling for a cheap talking point along the lines of, “I wanted to show the American people how innocent my emails were, but 'they' wouldn’t let me and covered them up.”

Clinton is only one of two presidential options that the Democratic party offers the American public. The other option is a 74-year old socialist.

That, in and of itself, requires a willful suspension of disbelief.

UPDATE-1:
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Next to MSNBC, the trained hamsters at CNN have championed the Democrat narrative for decades. They fully emerged from the closet after Barack Obama was elected and are now an active member of the Democrat Media "superpac." This morning, CNN ran a piece headlined: "Under Sanders, income and jobs would soar, economist says." Here's a breathless excerpt:

Median income would soar by more than $22,000. Nearly 26 million jobs would be created. The unemployment rate would fall to 3.8%.

Those are just a few of the things that would happen if Bernie Sanders became president and his ambitious economic program were put into effect, according to an analysis given exclusively to CNNMoney. The first comprehensive look at the impact of all of Sanders' spending and tax proposals on the economy was done by Gerald Friedman, a University of Massachusetts Amherst economics professor.

This more sweeping analysis was not commissioned by the candidate, though Sanders' policy director called it "outstanding work." Friedman has worked with Sanders in the past, but has never received any compensation. The Vermont senator asked Friedman to estimate the cost of Sanders' Medicare-for-all plan -- which came out to $13.8 trillion over 10 years -- and included the analysis when he unveiled his proposal last month.

Friedman, who believes in democratic socialism like the candidate, found that if Sanders became president -- and was able to push his plan through Congress -- median household income would be $82,200 by 2026, far higher than the $59,300 projected by the Congressional Budget Office.

Three paragraphs in, CCN notes that this so-called economist is a socialist. But no worries, under Bernie's utopian "economic" plans, the median income would rise to $82,000 and "unemployment" would drop to 3.8!!!

And right now, after 20 years of socialist rule, Venezuela's economy is booming. Oh wait, that's not true. Socialist Venezuela is on the brink of collapse, unemployment is skyrocketing, and inflation is 200 percent. Oops, that's not something that CNN is willing to report.

Any one who believes the garbage published by CNN's "economist," exhibits still another example of willful suspension of disbelief.

UPDATE - 2
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David Brookes isn't a fool, but as a moderate who supported Barack Obama from the beginning, it looks like he has been blinded to the reality of the man, his administration and his legacy. It's sometimes hard to admit you're wrong, and Brookes now writes about Obama in a way the requires a clear suspension of disbelief:

The first and most important of these is basic integrity. The Obama administration has been remarkably scandal-free. Think of the way Iran-contra or the Lewinsky scandals swallowed years from Reagan and Clinton.

We’ve had very little of that from Obama. He and his staff have generally behaved with basic rectitude. Hillary Clinton is constantly having to hold these defensive press conferences when she’s trying to explain away some vaguely shady shortcut she’s taken, or decision she has made, but Obama has not had to do that.

He and his wife have not only displayed superior integrity themselves, they have mostly attracted and hired people with high personal standards. There are all sorts of unsightly characters floating around politics, including in the Clinton camp and in Gov. Chris Christie’s administration. This sort has been blocked from team Obama.

"... basic integity." Really? A leader with basic integrity does not demonize his opposition on a regular basis, but rather works with them; does not blame his predecessor repeatedly but rather understands that he is now in charge and has the responsibility to solve problems, not whine about them; does not stonewall when wrong-doing is uncovered on his watch (think: the IRS scandal) but rather works to rectify the wrong-doing.

" ... remarkably scandal free." Seriously? It appears that Brookes is unaware of Fast and Furious, Benghazi, the IRS scandal, the VA scandal and a host of others.

"He and his staff have generally behaved with basic rectitude." Double seriously!? "Rectitude" implies honesty and integrity. Obama has knowingly lied to the American public about Obamacare, promised to "get to the bottom" of the IRS targeting of his opposition (he did nothing of the sort), and stonewalled every attempt to better understand the debacle that was Benghazi. And his staff—think Susan Rice who appeared on all five Sunday morning shows and knowingly lied about the cause of the Benghazi terrorist attack in the run-up to the 2012 presidential election.

But all of this sounds very reasonable indeed with willful SoD, doesn't it?