The truth is we prefer to lie

There are no necessary truths any more. Everything is contingent. And those contingencies are the consequence not of what happens in the real world, but of the derangement in our own minds. Some will insist it was ever thus. Well, if so, it’s never been more evident.

Take just two examples. We will never know the truth of the Kavanaugh case unless one of the two principal actors ’fesses up — and even then I wouldn’t be too sure. If the case went to court and Christine Blasey Ford were a reliable witness, and several of her contemporaries gave evidence that they witnessed the attempted rape and all Brett Kavanaugh did was mumble his repetitive idiocies, the right would still be insisting that it was a politically motivated put-up job. The jury would vote on political lines. The judge would hear the case addled by his or her own blend of confirmation bias.