Bill Press: No free pass for Carson

This week the world will watch the fourth Republican presidential primary debate for the 2016 contest, and it’s finally time to boot Ben Carson off the stage. 

We already knew he had little experience in politics. Now we also know the former neurosurgeon has little experience telling the truth. His entire life story appears to be based on a cascade of lies, or at best wild exaggerations.

{mosads}It starts with the story that made Carson a hero of the religious right: how he was saved from not qualifying for medical school by an angel who appeared in his dream the night before and revealed all the questions that would show up on the next day’s chemistry exam. 

Does anybody actually believe that fairy tale? Whether you believe it or not, that can’t be how he promises to govern as leader of the free world. “Cut Social Security benefits? Repeal ObamaCare? Don’t worry, I’ll sleep on it. God will send an angel to tell me what to do.”

But it turns out the med school angel was just the first of many lies for Carson. 

Politico first punctured the claim he makes in his autobiography, “Gifted Hands,” that after having dinner with Gen. William Westmoreland, the 17-year old ROTC student was offered a “full scholarship” to West Point. 

Not true. West Point does not offer scholarships. Carson was not offered one. He was not accepted at West Point. In fact, he never even applied.

In the same book, Carson tells of his explosive temper as a young man, which led him to stab a friend — whose life was saved only because the knife struck his belt buckle — and consider bashing his own mother’s head in with a hammer. Recognizing his violent tendencies, Carson reveals, prompted him to embrace Christianity.

CNN interviewed nine neighbors, friends and classmates who grew up with the retired neurosurgeon, some going back as far as elementary school, and none of them could provide any recollection of Carson’s said violent streak. The White House hopeful still insists his story of a violent past is true. It kind of makes for an unusual campaign slogan: “Vote for me, because I stabbed and almost killed someone.”

It doesn’t end there. 

The Wall Street Journal was similarly unable to find any classmate of Carson’s who could verify his claim of hiding white students in a high school lab to protect them from violence during the riots following Martin Luther King’s death. 

And the Yale Daily News reports it never ran a photo of Carson on its front page as the university’s “most honest student,” as Carson also claimed. 

We can add to all this his bizarre story about being held up at gunpoint at a Popeyes restaurant — of which the Baltimore Police Department has no record — and his denial of any association with the dietary supplement maker Mannatech despite having made a promotional video for the company.

In his defense, Carson complains the media never gave candidate Barack Obama such scrutiny. Who’s he kidding? Did he forget about Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright or the birthers? 

Every candidate is under the microscope. Ben Carson gets no free pass.

Press is host of “The Bill Press Show” on Free Speech TV and author of “The Obama Hate Machine.”