Don’t Fight Their Lies With Lies of Your Own

[Commentary] The 2016 election was unimaginable, and the particulars of Russian meddling deserve further scrutiny. But we seem to have fallen into a trap: The unimaginable, happening out in the open day after day, not only continues to dull our defenses but also creates a need to see a conspiracy big enough, a secret terrible enough to explain how this can be happening to our country. Fraudulent news stories, which used to be largely a right-wing phenomenon, are becoming increasingly popular among those who oppose the president. Each story dangles the promise of a secret that can explain the unimaginable. Each story comes with the ready justification that desperate times call for outrageous claims. But each story deals yet another blow to our fact-based reality, destroying the very fabric of politics that President Donald Trump so clearly disdains.

[Masha Gessen is the author of "The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin"]