“Alternative facts” is an new name for an old practice. Think, for example of Iraq’s “weapons of mass destruction”. This and a host of related alternative facts (aluminium for centrifuge/rocket tubes, trailers for manufacture of biological weapons, etc) manufactured by George “Slam Dunk” Tenet and his CIA were wholeheartedly embraced and enthusiastically published by the Bush administration as well as by the New York Times and the Washington Post. The price for these lies was paid by hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who lost their lives and their homes as a consequence of “alternative facts”. The precedent has long been set: none of these liars/alternative fact purveyors has ever been punished in any way for this monumental crime. The current Liar-in-Chief is a fine and accomplished fabricator in his own right. But he is standing on the shoulders of giants.