The truth about lying - it's situational

WARNING: Some adult language and subject matter included.

I have, by now, lost count of the number of times that Jill, of the oh so appropriately named "Brilliant at Breakfast," has amused us by pointing out that lies by government officials only matter if "they are about blowjobs." It took a while, but Eric Alterman at The Nation has apparently caught on to the same concept. (My emphasis in bold... watch closely for the bait and switch.)

A true dichotomy between the public and the elite media can be found, on the other hand, on the subject of presidential lying. Excluding George Washington and perhaps Jimmy Carter, just about all Presidents have found it necessary to lie to the American people. And with those two exceptions, and possibly a few others, many have also found it necessary--or at least desirable--to fool around with women other than their wives. For reasons of culture and history, the mainstream media decided that both of these longstanding traditions had to end with Bill Clinton.

When Bill Clinton lied about a few blowjobs, the Washington press corps treated his actions as a threat to the Republic. As John Harris observes in his history of the period, The Survivor, on the night Clinton offered his prime-time, post-testimony national apology, network commentary was overwhelmingly negative. Calls for Clinton to resign reigned on pundit television and on the op-ed pages throughout the ordeal--often couched in terms of doing so "for the children." But Clinton pollster Mark Penn would soon find, Harris explains, that "a clear majority of viewers thought Clinton's remarks were fine.... It was only hard-core Republicans and political 'elites'--the kind of people quoted by the networks--who were dissatisfied with the speech." This would prove, Harris observes, "a vivid example of the dichotomy in public opinion that had existed all year." Indeed, Clinton's approval rating hovered between the mid-sixties and the low seventies through the entire ordeal.

(Ed: at the height of his impeachment hearings, Clinton's approval rating was more than twent points higher than George W. Bush's are today.)

Oddly, given the many obvious and quite consequential differences between a blowjob and a botched war effort, the Washington press corps appears to have reached a consensus that the former is a far more serious matter. Pundit "dean" David Broder, who whined that Clinton "trashed the place, and it's not his place," has declared himself uninterested in the question of whether Bush & Co. deceived Congress and the nation into its ruinous Iraq adventure.

Yes, lies about blowjobs are bad. Lies about wars are just something to put up with. The "Liberal Media" just isn't interested. I suppose it's true... only sex sells.