The Art of Lying...Low

By Matthew Cooper

All deceptions aren't equal. On the scale of untruths, from I-love-your-mother's-cooking to I-would-never-hurt-Nicole, George Bush's cuteness about coke ranks pretty low. He's not telling us explicitly that he did drugs as a kid, but, hey, in that 60 Minutes interview, Clinton never said he was a skirt hound either. He just bit his lip and acknowledged "pain in my marriage." When CBS's Steve Kroft tried to pin Clinton on specifics, he demurred, saying that the American people "got" what he meant. Bush is basically winking at us too when he says he was "young and irresponsible." We're just supposed to get it and move on. When your Aunt Edna says her stomach's been acting up, you're not supposed to shout a detailed follow-up question about her colon.

I find myself enamored of Bush's interpretation of the Fifth Amendment: Answer only the questions to which you have a good response. That way you'd never have to lie--not even the I-love-your-mother's-cooking sort. Had Clinton done this, he could have ducked the definition-of-sex queries and just talked about something to his liking, such as barbecue or Medicare Part B. This may seem like a fancy ruse only politicians would try, but it works in daily life:

Wife: How does this scarf look?

Me: I've already said I think you're a beautiful woman. Anything else would be a game of gotcha. I refuse to play.

Editor: Is your piece ready?

Me: Look, I hope you like the way I do my job. But if it's not working out, then I'll spend a lot of time fishing with the old man.

Friend: Don't you owe me a 20?

Me: I believe it is important to put a stake in the ground and say enough is enough when it comes to trying to dig up people's backgrounds.

College roommate: Is that your bong?

Me: I have made mistakes, and I'm going to learn from those mistakes.

Then when you finally get a question you do like, it's open season.

Colleague: Have you lost weight?

Me: As I understand it, you've asked about my girth. I will be glad to answer that question, and the answer is, yes, I have lost some flab. Not only could I pass the standards of losing 7 lbs., I could have passed the standards of losing 15 unsightly ones. (O.K., I made this part up.)

Half-truths and evasions are a part of everyday life. We don't, like Jim Carrey, when he's unable to prevaricate in Liar Liar, lean over to our lover and say, "I've had better." Manners are deception by another name. The same is true of politics. We say we want politicians to give us the unvarnished truth, but at the end of the day we really don't want to hear a detailed history of a candidate's bathroom coke snorts any more than, say, Iowans want to hear that subsidizing ethanol is a dubious use of government money (something that even self-styled truth tellers like Bill Bradley can't bring themselves to say).

It's not a left-right thing. We want our liberals to tout government and our conservatives to cheer faith-based solutions with equal confidence that they'll solve social problems, even when we know, in our hearts, each approach has its limits. We like the con. So George Bush is being coy. So what? Join the club.