“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.” The quote in my title (above) is how Donald Trump was once characterized by his sister – a federal judge. No kidding. Phineas Taylor Barnum was the nineteenth century self-described “showman” (he seems to have invented that job category) who made a fortune promoting celebrated hoaxes with gullible audiences. Barnum himself marveled at how willingly the American public “submits to a clever humbug.”
