Benjamin Sisko’s fictional lying is the kind of lying we expect of our politicians. We’re okay with them playing fast and loose with the truth for the greater good. Just as we’re okay with the sort of lying that happens in playing a game of poker. We accept the deception involved in being an undercover police officer, or a spy. We accept lying in diplomatic relations with other nations, and in war. All such activities involve “strategy.”
But that’s not the kind of lying that we get from the current occupant in the White House. He just lies to everyone. He was bound and determined to pass a health care plan for the American public, no matter whether it was any good or not. When he discovered that it would cost people more than what they already had, when he found out that it would mean people would not get to keep their current health plans and that they wouldn’t get to keep their current doctors, rather than trying to fix the faults with the plan, he just went out and lied about it to everyone, and got his supporters to join in the lying: “if you like your doctor, you can keep him.” Not really. “If you like your health plan, you can keep it.” Nope. He knew what he was saying wasn’t the truth, but he lied anyhow. Repeatedly.
Now, he and other western leaders have an agreement with the Iran that he’d like the U.S. Senate to ratify. Of course, because he insists that it isn’t really a treaty, he’s trying to sidestep the constitutionally mandated requirements of how this agreement must be dealt with.
Then he lies to the American people about what the deal entails. He claims that he wants to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, but as Andrew C. McCarthy has pointed out at the National Review, all he really has done is agree to allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons. He is lifting restrictions on Iran’s ability to get ballistic missiles and conventional weapons. He is providing material support to Iran’s terrorism since the deal will put a hundred billion dollars into Iran’s economy. And even worse, the United States not only will allow Iran to continue on the path of gaining a nuclear capability, it will actively protect Iranian nuclear facilities from sabotage.
And then there are the “side deals.” So far, only two are known. There might be others. He tried to keep the Congress from knowing about them and he most assuredly did not want the American public to know about them. As McCarthy points out in his National Review article, “the administration repeatedly promised there would be no deal, that the president would walk away from the table, unless Iran agreed to a rigorous inspection regiment.” Unfortunately the side deals prevent U.S. inspections and the Iranians themselves will now supply the samples for inspections. Sort of like allowing a drug addict to bring his urine sample from home. You just know it’s his pee in the cup and not pee from his choir boy neighbor, right?
The current President lies so much one wonders if he even knows what the truth is anymore. Or cares.