Religious Resignation

[Kevin]

One way of reading that is that you expect, and nearly demand, that your politicians lie to you, or lie to get things done.

Maybe the issue is degree, and not kind.

Occhi

I pretty much expect them to lie to get things done, yes. It's not a pretty view, but it seems to be the reality. Even in smaller organizations the truth is something that is often warped as much as possible to get to an end result. I was pretty much lied to when I was asked to work overtime but I know without that lie some other folks would have (and could have) refused to do the work and it was good that the work got done. Most advertising has some level of lies to it, etc.

But yes the degree matters. I'm much happier the closer you can get to the truth. I'm happier when the motives are clearer. No I'm not a strict the ends justify the means but have I lied to get things done, yes. Have I lied to get things done and found out it would have been better had I not lied, yes as well. Do I try to avoid it and make the lie as close to the truth as possible, yes. But I was in the military, I was basically trained to lie directly and to lie by omission in some situations. Maybe the brainwashing worked but I think reality works better that way. I will lie to spare feelings at the immediate crisis point and then later on reveal the truth. Of course other times I won't lie to spare feelings. I'm making a judgement call. Would I like a utopia where I know that no one else will lie and I can not lie? Yeah, I think would. Do I have enough faith in humanity to believe it could happen? Nope.

Do I want to be lied to about certain issues that I really do believe are matters of national security, yes. Do I prefer those to be lies of omission, yes. Do I think somethings I'm lied to about by politicians are things they shouldn't lie about, yes. Is it a slippery slope, yes. The lie about going into Iraq because of WMD, bad lie, not happy about it. Clinton saying he didn't have sex, a lie but one I'm not as concerned about. Yeah I picked two of the bigger more recent lies that we've been told.

Heck if the Stargate actually existed and SG-1 was actually out there, I'd be all for the government covering it up. I think that gives better results than the panic that I really do believe would happen if that were true.


So yeah I'm not really bothered much by what Obama is doing. I don't think it's that big of a deal.