One of the most remarkable elements of political campaigning and governmental policy these days is the stark contrast between the public representations and any factual or concrete basis. We have gone from an environment of "bending" the facts and record to what amounts to a compound fracture of reality. The public is well acquainted with a divergence of political viewpoints when candidates attempt to differentiate their positions by "coloring" the facts and "interpreting" them through the lens of their political philosophy. However, the past decade has seen a marked shift in which the point of departure for the bend or "spin" is no longer an objective and concrete set of facts or even a semblance of the truth. What we see and hear repeatedly these days are complete fabrications, often 180 degrees from any reasonable conclusion drawn from underpinning facts. And even worse, these openly false representations are made in the face of readily available facts that disprove the truth of the assertions.
Let's talk examples. In Massachusetts, there is a current debate over "taxes" and which candidate would raise or roll back taxes. Set aside, for the moment, the reasonableness of the political dogma that declares taxes as bad in all circumstances. The public debate turns upon whether a candidate can successfully claim that fee increases or other "revenue enhancements" are not taxes, and thus contend that taxes have not been raised. We all know, at least those of us that adhere to some logical integrity, that inflation and cost increases for government services require either more revenue or reduced services. Government services and state aid to local governments have been cut, whether by direct reductions or by failing to adjust funding for inflation and permitting a de facto reduction to occur. We also know that there have been some increases in government revenue. So the public debate is based upon common factual underpinnings, but positions are differentiated by sophistry and labels, or "characterizations."
No candidate wants to campaign on a promise to cut services, so each candidate must face the problem of how to address the need for increased revenue. One party claims that it will "not raise taxes," but resorts to fee increases and revenue enhancers that it says are not "taxes" despite the fact that they look and act precisely like taxes. The other party claims that the public deserves more "honesty" and accountability. This opposing party asserts that when the government imposes economic burdens in order to raise revenue, the attempt to disguise that action as something other than a tax is not being fair or honest with the public. Whether you ascribe to the technicality approach or the "quacks like a duck" approach, this is fair political debate because neither side denies the common facts that the government has raised revenues that it needed to carry out a public purpose.
Enter the new era of public debate. Congress passes legislation called the "Clean Skies" law that one can see, upon cursory reading, permits an increase in the volume of air pollution permitted by industries that are prime contributors to air contamination. These industries have provided strong lobbying and large political campaign contributions to the GOP legislators that control Congress. The "Help America Vote" Act passed by Congress imposes measures that require use of electronic voting machines that have been shown by objective testing to be highly prone to hacking, manipulation and corruption of voting results tabulation. This legislation also imposes voter ID requirements of questionable constitutionality, with which the states and local governments cannot comply for lack of funding and resources. The direct and objective result of the legislation is to suppress voting and to undermine the integrity of the voting process. Were these acts of Congress subject to FDA or truth in packaging approval, they could never be released fButublic consumption. Butu there is no requirement that Congress act honestly or that legislation must be labeled truthfully.
President Bush yesterday proclaimed that Americans can "read for themselves" the National Intelligence Briefing report that critics of the administration have cited in support of assertions that the Bush Administration invasion and occupation of Iraq has made the world less safe from terrorism. In fact, the White House has declassified only a portion of the 3 page "key findings" summary from that report. In fact, the public cannot read for themselves what the consensus of all major intelligence agencies reported regarding the recent historical background, current status and future prospects regarding one of the largest issues facing this country in its history. These examples are different from the "taxation vs. fees" debate. These involve outright lies, prevarication and deliberate deception of the public in the face of clear and objective information that proves the lie.
We might question why the President of the United States would go on public television and declare that the National Intelligence Briefing does not say that the world and the country is less safe as a result of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, when even the selective portion released by the White House under pressure patently does provide that assessment. Indeed we should raise that question. It is one thing to publicly disagree with the report. Underlying foundation, political philosophy and one's connection with reality can be debated on common factual grounds. It is an entirely different matter when an elephant is standing in the room for all to see, and the President of the United States declares publicly that it is not an elephant but rather a mouse we are seeing. This is not a matter of nuance; it is a matter of basic competence. We can all understand that the President would like the report to have said that he has done a successful job of protecting national interests and reducing the threat of terrorism. But regardless of one's sympathies toward the Commander in Chief, the NIB summary that we have seen states otherwise. If there are other portions of the report that contradict the summary findings, it behooves the President to release them publicly. Any claimed threat to national security from releasing the report is outweighed by the legitimate concern that the person occupying the most powerful position on the planet is entirely out of touch with reality and incapable of even comprehending, much less following the best available expert advice.
A fundamental tenet of the political doctrine of democracy is that freedom of information and debate will enable the better ideas to percolate to the surface and guide the governance of the country and body politic toward a reasonably viable future. What we have currently is an environment in which important factual information is withheld from the public on the purported basis of "national security." Furthermore, the leaders who are keeping such information secret are openly and audaciously lying to us. They are telling us that a set of facts and circumstances are true when they know that those facts are not true. They are not coloring the facts in order to lead us; they are deliberately misrepresenting the facts in order to mislead us.
Perhaps the most frightening and hopeful sign of late is the increasing number of highly experienced and respected professionals and experts who were within the Bush Administration. They are now departing from the ranks and exercising the courage to tell the public what they know about the development of our current situation. They acknowledge that they were unable to be open or honest with Congress or the American people while in the Administration, and they explain why. We know that their reasons are valid because we have ample instances of persons who dissented while in office and were summarily relieved of their duties. But these experts do not come forward expecting us to hold them blameless for their failings and complicity. They come forward because they fear that the current course this government and this country is on, based upon their knowledge and experience, portends far greater peril that we have so far experienced. The Bush Administration would label these people traitors, when in truth there are few acts of patriotism needed more by this country than the service these people are providing.
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