When Did Truth Become Optional?

Years ago, after Bill Clinton issued his famous denial of having sex with Monica Lewinsky, I was surprised by the reaction of many of my Kennesaw State University students. Instead of being outraged by his deceit, a significant number of them declared that what he did was “no big deal.” As they explained, “everyone lies and everyone cheats.”
Some of them went even further and insisted that all politicians lie. It was merely business as usual. Besides, everybody lies about sex. Sophisticated people understood this and therefore made allowances for the president.
As time has revealed, this turned out to be the first line of defense against indignation at Democratic party deceit. The second line came into play when no weapons of mass destruction were discovered in the wake of the Iraq War. Soon it became an article of faith among liberals that George W. Bush had lied. For seven straight years, this was their mantra. Why, he was a bad as Hitler.
Among his detractors, it did not matter that Bush initially believed WMDs would be found. That he had not intentionally told an untruth was considered irrelevant. He was wrong and so he must have lied. Evidently he was a bigger liar than Clinton and therefore Republicans were more dishonest than Democrats. In other words, the other side was phonier than their own.
Today we are confronted with an unending series of falsehoods, this time coming from Barack Obama and his administration. And once more the response has been to claim that the other side is worse. Thus, Republicans are now loudly accused of spreading misinformation—for example, about the dangers of proposed health care legislation. The public is said to have been deceived by a barrage of propaganda that is worse than anything emanating from the president’s supporters.
Meanwhile, the president’s opponents have been remarkably polite in answering such attacks. For the most part, they have refrained from calling him a “liar.” In an effort to demonstrate respect for Obama’s office they have resorted to language such as “disingenuous” and “hypocritical.” Even though there was no corresponding delicacy with respect to Bush, they have sought to avoid accusations that they are violating the president’s dignity.
Sadly, despite the fact that there is little doubt the president is a serial prevaricator—a fact that even moderates have come to appreciate after a summer during which he and his allies have defamed their critics as un-American mobsters—the tolerance of his dishonesty remains. While there can be no question that he was less than candid in asserting his administration would be “bipartisan” and “transparent,” calling these “lies” continues to be out of bounds.
Unfortunately this squeamishness has a huge downside. It amounts to nothing less than accepting dishonesty as legal political tender. Truth has become optional. Just as with my students, fewer of us seem outraged when it is utterly disregarded. Indeed, when it wins a political point it is considered clever. It is merely “spin” that has worked.
The tragedy in all this is that, as the political scientist Francis Fukuyama has observed, a mass democracy cannot remain viable when people no longer trust most strangers. Once others are allowed to lie with impunity, it becomes dangerous to place confidence in police officers, supermarket clerks, or even passersby on a crowded street.
Unless this trend is reversed, the United States may eventually descend into the chaos of a Somalia. Fortunately, there is a way out. Ordinary citizens must not only express their explicit disapproval when lied to, they must punish those who do the lying. When these others are politicians, the best way to accomplish this is at the polls. The rascals deserve to be thrown out rather than rewarded with further accolades.
It simply cannot be the case that we stand idly by while it becomes correct to say that “everyone lies and everyone cheats.”
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University