macduff meets manafort

"Help, YHWH! For anyone with fidelity has ceased to exist;
    vanished from among mankind those who can be trusted.
Everyone speaks dishonestly with everyone;
    they are smooth tongued, telling each other what they want to hear.
Make an end, YHWH, of all such false chatter;
    of lips spewing such hubris
as those that assert, “We will maintain power by means of spin,
    we can do as we want, who would think to control us?”
​                         (Psalm 12.1-4, author’s translation)

Caligula, his family, friends, associates, business partners, attorneys, administration officials, etc., etc., etc., are so utterly accostomed to lying that I truly believe that they are incapable of telling the truth. It is their very first instinct to lie. Lying is as natural to them as breathing.
 
As we have witnessed Manafort’s trials play out, and watched as he has gotten preferential treatment because of his rich whiteness, it has all felt a good bit like theater. This feeling led me to think and consider one of Shakespeare’s many insights into human nature and human society.
 
Lady Macduff is speaking with her son. The son speaks a truth about society as he knows it to be.
 
Macduff’s Son:       And must all who swear and lie be hanged?
 
Lady Macduff:        Every one.
 
Macduff’s Son:       Who must hang them?
 
Lady Macduff:        Why, the honest men.
 
Macduff’s Son:      Then the liars and swearers are fools. There are enough liars and
                                 swearers to beat the honest men and hang them!
                                 (William Shakespeare, Shakespeare Made Easy, “Macbeth,”
​                                 Act 4, Scene 2)
 
This seems to be precisely the sort of cynicism by which Caligula and his cabal of thieves seem to live, and now govern. The rest of us are simply fools in their theater of abomination, blasphemy, and rebellion against God…. Or would be if we hadn’t willfully elected the cabal’s leader as president. Now, we are simply complicit in their ungodly criminality.

"​Why boastest thou thyself in mischief, O mighty man? 
    the goodness of God endureth continually.
Thy tongue deviseth mischiefs;
    like a sharp razor,
        working deceitfully.
Thou lovest evil more than good;
    and lying rather than to speak righteousness. 
Thou lovest all devouring words,
    O thou deceitful tongue.
God shall likewise destroy thee for ever,
    he shall take thee away, and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place,
        and root thee out of the land of the living” (Psalm 52.1-5).