Wounded Soldier in Vietnam
(Credit: fotoshoptifs@pisxabay.com)
On October 21, 1964, near the end of the election campaign, President Lyndon Johnson gave a speech at Akron University. Casting his opponent, Barry Goldwater, as the “war candidate” Johnson said: “We are not about to send American boys 9 or 10,000 miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.” Americans learned much later that while giving this speech, Johnson had already ordered a massive escalation of American troops in Vietnam.
Johnson was certainly not the first politician to lie – nor the last. President Richard Nixon, during the Watergate scandal told reporters “I am not a crook” while engaged in a cover-up that would cost him his presidency. Americans are neither happy nor surprised by dishonesty in politics. Sixty-five percent in a 2018 Pew Research poll said “it is very (or somewhat) hard to tell the difference between what’s true and not true when listening to elected officials.” In a 2020 Newsweek poll 54 percent agreed that lying has become more acceptable in recent years. Not surprisingly, popular culture has a cynical test: “How can you tell if a politician is lying? See if his lips are moving.”
"Integrity is the lifeblood of democracy. Deceit is a poison in its veins." - Senator Edward Kennedy
Lying and Democracy
If dishonesty in politics is “business as usual,” it’s not good business. Democracy requires citizens with views based on facts. Yet lies are told not only by elected officials but by others in public life – candidates, lobbyists, government workers, partisan media, interest groups and ordinary citizens posting on social media.
When conspiracy theories dominate public discussion (Question #11) and when disinformation and fake news clog the arteries of public conversation (Question #12) fiction not fact dominates. As one woman said to the New York Times: “I guess I would have to say that I’m completely confused as to who is lying and who is telling the truth. I just feel helpless.” As Jonathan Rauch noted about this comment in The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth, such citizens may just drop out of engaging in politics: “From a political point of view, demoralization is demobilization.”
Lying destroys trust in government. The National Election Studies tracks responses to the question: “How much do you trust the government to do what is right?” Trust was high before the lies of the Vietnam War and Watergate sent it plummeting.
Trust in Government
(Credit: Pew Research Center)
In Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life, ethicist Sissela Bok noted that when President Johnson lied about Vietnam he in effect took away the votes of millions of his supporters, who got the opposite of what they voted for. Lying in public life also eats away at trust in each other, on which democracy depends.
“Trust is a social good to be protected just as much as the air we breathe or the water we drink. When it is damaged, the community as a whole suffers; and, when it is destroyed, societies falter and collapse.” – Sissela Bok
What is a Lie in Public Life?
Let’s Talk
How would you define lying?
In early January 1998, reports surfaced that President Clinton had a sexual relationship with a White House intern, Monica Lewinsky. On January 26th, Clinton told a televised White House gathering “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky.” Yet on August 17th, in grand jury testimony, he admitted to “inappropriate intimate contact” and apologized for it to the nation that evening. On September 21st he told a grand jury that his behavior “did not constitute sexual relations, as I understood that term.” He also stood by a January 21st statement to PBS reporter Jim Lehrer: “There is no improper relationship.” He defended that statement later by telling a grand jury “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is,” arguing he was not at that time in a relationship with her.
President Clinton Denies Affair with Monica Lewinsky
(Credit: Inside Edition)
Despite verbal gymnastics, Clinton’s behavior helps define lying. Public figures don’t take the courtroom oath to “tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth,” so we need a more useful definition. For Merriam-Webster “lying” is “to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive” and/or “to create a false or misleading impression.” Clearly, Clinton intended to deceive with false statements in January and later tried to mislead by parsing the definitions of “sexual relations” and “is.”
Lies aren’t always easy to spot. In the spring of 2014, a scandal erupted in the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) when reports surfaced that employees were falsifying patient appointment wait times. For example, a veteran would request an appointment but be told he could not get one for at least a month. Rather than enter the "request date" in the system at that moment, the scheduler would wait until an appointment was available and then enter the request as if it had been made on that day, not weeks or months earlier. Thus, the data system was made to appear as if veterans were getting appointments as soon as they asked for them. This was clearly distorting data with the intent to deceive.
Consider other behaviors sometimes used in public life to deceive and mislead:
Withholding Information, Cherry-picking or Distorting Data, such as refusing to disclose disappointing news or sharing good statistics but hiding bad ones
Spinning a Story, such as crafting a deceptive explanation for embarrassing information
Leaking, such as anonymously feeding reporters information that is false or intended to distort or deceive
Being Vague, such as using confusing language to hide the truth
Exaggerating, such as making wild, untrue claims to attack a proposed policy
Language Euphemisms, such as denying the use of torture by calling it “enhanced interrogation”
Many in public life don’t consider these behaviors lying (many citizens don’t either if their favored politician uses them). Nevertheless, when used they weaken trust and democracy suffers.
The Brain Can Be Enlisted to Help People Lie
Research shows telling the truth is the default state for our brain’s wiring and that the brain’s amygdala, its emotional center, sends us a warning signal when we contemplate lying. In order to lie, we have to suppress the preference for truthfulness.
As neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky notes in Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, the brain can help us lie. The prefrontal cortex - the executive, decision making part of the brain - is active in helping us tell the truth. Yet, if we experience emotions such as fear, anxiety or aggression, that same prefrontal cortex can shift gears to help us lie to protect ourselves. As Sapolsky notes, we have more cognitive capacity to engage in lying than other primates and more control of facial muscles, which help us hide the fact we’re lying (the “poker face”).
We can even get better at lying the more we do it. The first lie may cause twinges of emotional pain but that pain diminishes with more lies. In an experiment by neuroscientist Tali Sharot, volunteers were asked to estimate the value of money in a jar and communicate their estimate by computer to a partner in another room, who had a blurry photo of the jar. The volunteers in one round were told that the more accurate their estimates, the more money they and their partner would win – an incentive for truthfulness. In another round, the volunteers were told that the more their partners exaggerated the value of the money in the jar, the more the volunteer would win and the less the partner would win – an incentive to falsify their estimates so the partner would guess too high. In the latter case, the lying by volunteers increased with each round and the activation of their amygdala, which would indicate qualms about lying, decreased.
In their private lives most people tell the truth. Good personal relationships depend on it. In public life, motivation to lie may be stronger.
Why Do Those in Public Life Lie?
“ . . . a man who wishes to act entirely up to his profession of virtue soon meets with what destroys him among so much that is evil . . . one must know how to colour one's actions and to be a great liar and deceiver.” - 16th Century political theorist Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince
Not all public figures agree, of course, but those who adopt Machiavelli’s view can justify lying for just about any reason: to gain votes, sway policy, attack opponents, raise money, advance a career. But even those who don’t agree with him sometimes find more nuanced reasons.
On March 12, 2013, James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence, was asked by Sen. Ron Wyden of the Senate Intelligence Committee: "Does the NSA [National Security Agency] collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" "No, sir," Clapper replied.
On June 5th, information emerged showing NSA was doing just that. By June 21st, Clapper had written Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Diane Feinstein that: "My response was clearly erroneous - for which I apologize." Shortly thereafter, he told MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell that "I responded in what I thought was the most truthful, or least untruthful manner, by saying no." Clapper went on to say that his testimony was not a lie because it all hinged on what the word "collect" means. He also claimed that he was caught in a situation where he was asked in a public forum about a classified data collection system.
This case illuminates the fact that those working in government sometimes struggle with whether, as well as how, to be truthful. After all, public officials like Clapper must guard classified or confidential information, appeal to different audiences, build coalitions and engage in compromises, keep options open, and avoid social media turning their honesty against them. The task for thinking citizens is thus to determine if an official is being as truthful as possible and not rationalizing a lie for reasons that have nothing to do with serving the public. In Clappper’s case, he could have told Wyden he could not answer that question in a public forum, rather than lying to him.
Sometimes We May Want Those in Public Life to Lie
A CIA manager may lie to protect the life of a covert agent. In the case Frazier v. Cupp, the Supreme Court held that a confession was voluntary and admissible even though the police had lied in telling the defendant that his accomplice had already confessed.
President John F. Kennedy
(Credit: wikiimages)
During the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis President Kennedy forged a secret deal with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. The U.S. would remove nuclear missiles from Turkey (which were old and already scheduled for removal) if the Soviets agreed to remove theirs from Cuba. In a later press conference, Kennedy was asked if negotiations to end the crisis involved anything other than Cuba. His response:
“No. I instructed the negotiators to confine themselves to the matter of Cuba completely, and therefore no other matters were discussed. . . . So that has been all we have done diplomatically with the Soviet Union the last month.
Had he told the truth, it could have undermined Europe’s confidence in our willingness to defend it.
Still, the number of such situations is small and the burden of proof is high. In her book, Sissela Bok offers a useful set of questions to guide those in public life - and us - when we observe or suspect a lie is being told.
Is It OK to Lie? - Questions to Ask
1. Is the lie essential to save a life or prevent imminent physical danger to others?
2. Will the lie damage human dignity? Preserve it?
3. Would the lie be viewed by the duped as equally justified?
4. Is there time to consider alternatives to lying?
5. Are there truthful alternatives?
6. Will the lie set a dangerous precedent - increase the chances for future lies?
7. Are there moral reasons that justify the lie?
8. What will be the impact of the lie on the liar? The duped? Society? Trust in
government?
9. Has a public process been used in which reasonable people representing diverse
viewpoints have set standards for when such a lie might be permissible?
10. Will the liar be able to explain the lie afterwards?
Spotting Those Who Lie
Many believe they can spot liars, such as seeing if they sweat, avoid eye contact, fidget and/or clear their throat. Yet a review of research found these are neither reliable indicators nor are people adept at using such behavioral signals.
Fact Finder
How reliable are lie detector tests?
One way to spot liars is to study if they’ve been loose with the truth before. That’s a sign they’re on the slippery slope.
A warning bell should also sound for leaders who have succumbed to what management professors Dean Ludwig and Clinton Longenecker call the Bathsheba Syndrome. At the height of his power, King David saw Bathsheba bathing and desired her. When he got her pregnant, he tried to entice her husband, the soldier Uriah, to return from war to re-consummate his marriage and thus hide David’s sin. When Uriah insisted on remaining in the field, as he felt honor demanded, David ordered him sent to the front lines, where he would be - and was - killed. David then married Bathsheba. Ludwig and Longenecker argue that the benefits that come with success can set leaders up for such egregious behavior.
Leadership success they note yields higher level positions and the advantages that come with them - greater status, influence, more power and latitude to act, less direct supervision and more control over decisions. In the hands of good public leaders, these benefits enhance their ability to achieve goals and serve. But, as with King David, increased power can lead to disaster. Leaders may get an inflated ego, become more isolated from reality and good advice, be under more stress and have more fear of failure. This may lead to lying and other behaviors that harm the public.
John Edwards, Senator, Vice-Presidential candidate in 2004 and candidate for both the 2004 and 2008 Democratic nomination, illustrates the Bathsheba Syndrome. He had an affair with a campaign worker, Rielle Hunter, while married to his wife, Elizabeth. He denied it and fathering Hunter’s child but would eventually admit to both. Interviewed by ABC News, he explained: "[My experiences] fed a self-focus, an egotism, a narcissism that leads you to believe you can do whatever you want . . . You're invincible. And there will be no consequences."
We Can Be Too Accepting of Lies
Let’s Talk
What kinds of lies do we accept? What kinds of lies are not OK? Why?
We can’t stop political lies, but we can avoid accepting them. Being aware of what a lie is, why people in public life may lie and when that’s not acceptable helps. But if we collude in being lied to, we become part of the problem. This can happen.
Motivated Blindness
(Credit: Microsoft Images)
Motivated Blindness: When incontrovertible evidence emerged that President Nixon lied when he denied wrongdoing during Watergate, his Vice-President, Gerald Ford, was stunned. He had asked Nixon if the Watergate charges were true and Nixon told him they were not. Ford allowed himself to be duped. Nixon had been his friend for nearly thirty years so he chose to believe him. He would later acknowledge: “My staff saw what was coming much earlier than I did. I always brushed it off.” Ford succumbed to what Harvard professor Max Bazerman calls motivated blindness – the willingness to ignore facts because they are inconvenient to recognize.
Rationalization: In his Autobiography, Benjamin Franklin said: “So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do.” That’s what we do when we rationalize accepting a lie. We come up with what seems like a good explanation. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX), angered over what he believed was a double standard allowing Democrats to lie but not Republicans, said to a NewsMax interviewer: “If you’re Republican, you can’t even lie to Congress or lie to an FBI agent or they’re coming after you. . . . Of course you’re gonna lie. Everybody lies!” Supporters who accepted this excuse for lying were rationalizing his own rationalization.
Confirmation Bias: Those who believe the 2020 election was “stolen” have no trouble finding “evidence” to confirm their belief. That’s confirmation bias. Its flip side, called the Semmelweis Reflex, is the tendency to reject or deny information that conflicts with an existing belief – in this case dismissing evidence that Trump lied about the election.
Fluency Bias: Sometimes we’re willing to accept a lie because it’s repeated so often: “where there’s smoke there must be fire.” It just becomes easier to digest and feels more comfortable. Adolph Hitler said: “If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.” In America, some Democratic politicians frequently charge that Republicans will end Social Security. While some Republicans have suggested changes, most have not called for abolishing it. Yet many Democrats have accepted the lie
The Allure of Stories: In the spring of 2022, a deep drop in the availability of baby formula hit the nation. Some social media sites posted a story that the Biden Administration was providing baby formula to immigrants at the border instead of supplying it to American babies. The story generated strong emotions and widespread anger. However, those who spread the story misled the public. The law required the administration to supply formula for infants in its care and Biden was also taking steps to end the national shortage. Stories are attractive because they provide an explanation for events. If we’re not careful, however, stories are taken as true when they’re not.
Fact Finder
During COVID, stories circulated that vaccination increased the chances of becoming infected. How would you determine if such stories were true?
So What? Now What?
Detecting and defending against lying in public life requires avoiding several thinking traps. We discussed some of these before. See the discussion of confirmation and fluency biases (Question #11) and the allure of stories (Question # 6). We’ve also talked about the power of fake news (Question #12) and political ads that lie (Question #14). Two other traps also require action steps:
Motivated Blindness: willingly ignoring facts because they’re inconvenient to accept
Rationalization: ascribing reasons for bad behavior that attempt to excuse it
Ways to avoid these traps include:
Use “Truth-Meter” and Fact-checking Websites:
o Glenn Kessler, who helms the Washington Post’s “fact-checker” feature, has created a rating system of up to four “Pinocchios” to rate statements by public figures. The definitions of these levels and his ratings help us avoid being duped.
o Politifact.com uses a “Truth-Meter” with six levels: “True, Mostly True, Half-True, Mostly False, False and Pants-on-Fire”. This site also rates the truthfulness of posts on Facebook and other social media.
o Other useful fact-checking sites that can help identify lies include:
§ Fact-check.org – focuses on political news
§ Snopes.com – specializes in debunking urban legends (folklore circulated as if true)
Use Trustworthy News Sources: Some news sources have a political agenda and thus motivation to lie. NewsGuard is an independent site that rates the trustworthiness of online news sources. It uses nine criteria to give each site a rating of green (generally trustworthy) or red (generally not trustworthy) and a trust score of 0-100. It also provides a “Nutrition Label” explaining its rating and who’s behind the site. Its desired criteria are useful for evaluating any site we may encounter:
o “Does not regularly publish false content
o Gathers and presents information responsibly
o Regularly corrects or clarifies errors
o Handles the difference between news and opinion responsibly
o Avoids deceptive headlines
o Discloses ownership and financing
o Clearly labels advertising
o Reveals who’s in charge, including possible conflicts of interest
o Provides names of content creators, along with contact or biographical information”
Avoid the Less-obvious Lying Approaches we cited earlier, such as withholding information, cherry-picking, spinning a story, being vague and exaggerating:
o Read the Original Source that is cited to see what information has been left out or misrepresented, such as consulting www.bls.gov (Bureau of Labor Statistics) to test the truthfulness of statements about job/unemployment data.
o Review Several, Politically Diverse Respectable Sources to see how they report a story you suspect may have been “spun,” such as the Wall Street Journal, USA Today and the New York Times.
o Put the Possible Lie in an Internet Search Engine and see what else is said about it – whether it is confirmed or disputed.
o Read the Original Policy Document or Bill introduced in Congress if you suspect its impact has been exaggerated.
o Do a Web Search to find others reporting a government “leak” of information to see who may have leaked it and possible motives
o Identify Language Euphemisms to see what they may conceal
Judge the Character of Public Figures to assess their proneness to the Bathsheba Syndrome:
o Do a wikipedia.org Search to Get an In-depth Biography which will usually include any controversies or legal charges connected to them. You can also consult biography.com for such information (available on many public figures).
o Read Articles from Respected Source about how the person has dealt with ethical issues and how often they may have tried to disguise their behavior
Avoid the Dangers of Motivated Blindness and Rationalization by Asking:
o Am I So Emotional about this that I can’t step back and question whether lying may be going on?
o Do I Just Consult Sources I Like and Agree With?
o Do I Ever Find Fault with Public Figures I Admire or do I always find ways to excuse or deny negative information about them?
o Do I Use Ways to Rationalize what might be a lie by a public figure?
Ways We May Rationalize Lying in Public Life
She/he had no other choice.
Well, it wasn’t illegal.
It’s part of being in public life. Everyone does it. .
It didn’t hurt anyone.
He/she was just following orders from higher ups.
Maybe it was a lie, but it was for a good cause.
He/she did it to protect the country.
She/he didn’t gain anything by it, so what’s the problem?
Clearly, we don’t want public figures who lie. But there are other considerations in deciding if a public figure should receive our support. That’s the focus of Question #16.