The Politics of Lying
I’m not accustomed to just posting links, but this article speaks for itself and I hope a couple hundred million Americans read it before November.
One of the unavoidable downsides of working as a political speechwriter is meeting some smart aleck who says, “so you write all those lies that politicians say.” Between clenched teeth, my usual response is: “I’ve never written a lie in my life.” It’s true: not only for reasons of personal morality, but because no politician I’ve ever met wants to be caught telling a lie.
Sure politicians occasionally stretch the truth or exaggerate, but willful and conscious lying is something else, which makes the stream of fabrications from the [ed.: read the article] campaign over the last week that much more shocking.
